I find the
commonly used term ‘migration’ highly political in nature. In humanitarian
crisis parlance it refers to “the movements of refugees and internally
displaced people” (IDPs). It is and cannot be a value-neutral word in
humanitarian contexts because in such contexts migration is not self-induced.
Humanitarian workers like me have not seen prior desire or motivation to leave
among the migrants or if at all there has been a motivation, it has been
induced by poverty or armed conflict or war. Not surprisingly, the main causes
of migration remain wars and armed conflicts, although in many other contexts natural
disasters and large-development projects are also to blame. For example, migration
forced by ‘development induced displacement’ in the states of Jharkhand, Orissa
and Chhattisgarh in India .
There are other types of forced migration as well, but these are not rigid
categories since overlaps are common.
According
to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), there are some 50
million displaced people around the world, including both refugees and IDPs.
Around 75-80 per cent of them are women and children; women and girls account
for an estimated 50 per cent of any displaced population. The causes and effects
of forced migration vary and range from political, socio-economic, environmental
and cultural factors, and according to factors such as gender, class, age,
race, or ethnicity. The proportion of
women refugees and IDPs vis-à-vis men from the same context is particularly
affected by the cultural factors.
Globally, since
the 1980s, there has been growing recognition that not adequate attention has
been given to women in conflict situations, and their needs and capacities did
not form the basis of planning and implementation of humanitarian assistance. But
the growth in recognition remains slow and limited and results of this
recognition have not led to more than a few women/girl child specific projects.
Throughout
the 1990s, women’s rights advocates raised the issue of women’s bodies being
used as battlegrounds by the warring factions in a conflict and sexual
exploitation and abuse of women and girls in humanitarian response and in
development induced disaster situations. The adoption of the Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), the Charter
of the Rights of the Child (CRC), and the United Nations (UN) Security Council
Resolution 1325, and the appointment of a Special Rapporteur on Violence Against
Women by the UN have been milestones in the effort towards gender mainstreaming
and recognition of women’s/girls’ rights.
In the
humanitarian and development fields, I find that gender analysis of the needs
and capacities of women and men and girls are being taken into account but regrettably
in an ad-hoc manner. Culture, tradition, family unity, religion, etc continue
to be used as excuses for not responding to transformative gender needs. This
observation is not a reflection on only small community based or local level
non-governmental organizations (NGOs) rather it is based on experiences with
larger international NGOs, international institutions and organs of the
national governments. At the national, regional and international governance
level, gender based discrimination and denial of the rights of women asylum
seekers continue to be a reality. It is not surprising that even in the
programmes run by the international institutions and large international NGOs, immediate
protection and assistance of women/girl IDPs with their participation and
decision-making remains a need yet to be met. The process to engender the
migration discourse and response is relatively new and still evolving. There is
increased awareness of the differences in wider effects of migration caused by
conflict, large infrastructure development, or natural disaster. International
and humanitarian organizations are waking up to these considerations. But most
of the recognition remains limited to the text. Action on gender analysis and
implementation of gender guidelines and policies is still weak. Gender issues
have been relatively readily accepted in protection of and assistance to
refugees. The same cannot be said of assistance to the IDPs. Also, among IDPs
in context of natural disasters and ‘development induced displacement’
acceptance of engendering approach is the least.
In the
recent times, a major development has been the move towards seeing the rape and
sexual abuse of women and girls during wars and armed conflict as a deliberate
strategy and a crime to be punished, as reflected in the UN Security Council
Resolution 1820 passed in 2008 and the statutes for the War Crimes Tribunals
for Rwanda and the Former Republic of Yugoslavia. However, the move does not
always cover the sexual exploitation and abuse that take place as a consequence
of political instability and conflict. For example, in Nepal , the conflict between the
Maoists and the State, put Nepali women in the eastern hill areas at a higher
risk of abuse. At one end women were being pressurized to join the militia, at
the other end, if they fled to escape poverty and militia, trafficking for sex
work was a major threat. Such women, even if rescued, were rarely reintegrated
with their communities because of the associated stigma. The situation has not
been any different for Bantu women in Somalia, a country located far from Nepal
in East Africa. Starvation and sexual violence were the two most important
factors for fleeing Somalia during war in 1990s. Bantu women, young and old,
suffered multiple rapes while fleeing and in the IDP and refugee camps. Rape
created an acute sense of disempowerment among both women and men. While women
and girls were being raped, men and male children were forced to watch the
sexual persecution of their female relatives. In the camps it was not uncommon
to find sexual exploitation of male children. Most of these cases went
unreported out the fear of stigma or out of a not-so-far from reality belief that
no action will be taken either by the state machinery or the international
actors.
It is not
such an uncommon knowledge that displacement affects women and men differently
because of the pre-determined gender division of roles and responsibilities.
Though war is seen as a ‘male affair’, mostly women, children, the elderly, and
the disabled are the main victims of wars. It is estimated that they constitute
30-90 per cent of casualties (for more information, please see: http://www.unicef.org/children-in-war/mainfindings-humimpact.pdf). In low informal low-key armed
conflicts, women and children are 80 per cent of casualties by small arms and
the rest are military causalities. Among such casualties the number of young men
is far higher. According to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)
men account for 96 per cent of the detainee population and 90 per cent of the
missing, and women and children represent a majority of the displaced. For
example, it is estimated that 70 per cent of the IDPs in Somalia are women and
children. In Nepal, a large percentage of IDPs are women in the age group of
20-35 years of age.
It is
generally said that a war does not discriminate and that it targets all in its
range: women, men, children, livestock, and so on. The reality, however, is
that women are not just affected as civilians or targeted because they happen
to be in the range. Rather they are targeted because of their gender. Armed
conflict usually aggravates social and gender inequalities and makes those who
lack social power or have disadvantaged position in society particularly
vulnerable. Weaker population groups and women usually have less access to
education and training opportunities and have poor employability and
entrepreneurial skills. Because of their low educational and training levels,
they are not among the ‘favoured’ type of migrants. Due to their poor social
status and their traditional productive and reproductive roles they are also
not used to mobility. This is one of the reasons that lead to higher mortality
and morbidity among women and impoverished minorities during armed conflict.
Other factors include a lack of access to basic goods and services, and gender
discrimination against women.
Since a
larger portion of the migrants are women and because they are a group without
marketable skills and education, and are denied rights to own and control
assets and property, they experience distinct economic and social problems as
migrants. It is much harder for them to earn a living and support themselves
and their families financially while continuing to be the traditional ‘carers’
at home. This pushes them further towards hunger, malnutrition, and
exploitation. Not surprisingly, among displaced populations, women and girls
‘voluntarily’ resort to sex work. A recent survey by UNHCR in Bassaso IDP camps
in Somalia reveals that considerable number of young women offer sex in
exchange of basic services to meet their own and their families’ basic needs or
for protection. In Nepal, poverty and conflict have been two major factors
prompting women to seek opportunities in neighbouring India as well as far away
countries. A Nepali NGO, Saathi, has reported an ever increasing number of
women leaving villages. Many of these women are falling prey to traffickers who
lead them to the brothels in India or to the Arab countries. In some cases
women know the consequences, yet they have gone ahead ‘voluntarily’ as they had
no option. Between June 2003 to February 2006, the Kathmandu Post regularly
reported the increase in rural to urban migration as a result of insurgency and
increase in violence. They reported dramatic increase in sex work along the
highways and in the dance and cabin restaurants close to Kathmandu.
Migration is
also associated with the lack or disruption of basic services, including
healthcare. The absence or disruption of the health services during high
migration period when women and girls are at a greater risk of being sexually
abused, exploited, contracting sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), and
getting pregnant and infected by HIV/AIDS complicates women’s vulnerabilities. The
spread of HIV/AIDS is further fuelled by sexual violence in the armed conflict
contexts. HIV positive women and girls are targets of socio-economic violence.
The
increased inequalities caused by globalization have increased women's
vulnerability to violence, particularly in the context of economic migration
and trafficking in persons. Several studies have noted that internally displaced
women, illegal immigrants and street children are particularly vulnerable to
sexual exploitation and HIV/AIDS, and often resort to ‘survival sex' to earn a
living, with some women accepting food or items for their children in exchange
for sex. According to a survey conducted by General Welfare Pratisthan around
the market of Hetauda in Nepal in 2004, 98 per cent of the sex workers, most of
whom are displaced women, are aware of the use of condoms to prevent HIV/AIDS
and spread of STDs, not more than 60 per cent have been making use of condoms. The
reason is their poor bargaining capacity in relation to their customers and no
power in relation to their abusers and exploiters.
However, not
all effects of migration on women are bad. Some women gain greater mobility and
are able to use opportunities to learn new skills and assume new roles. In many
countries, some migrant women regard changes in their lives as a result of
migration an empowering experience as has been reported from some of the Tamil
IDP camps in Sri Lanka. I also saw this in Somalia. However, such gains for
women do not go without contentions which create further tensions in gender
relations. In the meetings held on the issue of increasing political
participation of Somali women in the governance and democratic institutions, I
often came across an argument from men that women should not be allowed equal
representation and participation because they are already the breadwinners of
majority of the Somali households. Research conducted in Nepal indicates that men
find it difficult to cope with their reduced ability to fulfil their
traditional responsibilities. In such instances men use the social power over
women more aggressively leading to higher incidence of violence against women
and girls. But women facing domestic/social violence find it harder to gain
refuge in another country. The 1951 Refugee Convention, popularly known as the
Geneva Convention, on which most countries’ asylum laws are based, considers
refugees “persons outside their country of nationality who have a well-founded
fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a
particular social group, or political opinion” (for more information, please
read: Mertus, J.A., ‘War’s Offensive on Women. The Humanitarian Challenge in Bosnia , Kosovo, and Afghanistan ’. Humanitarianism
and War Project: Kumarian Press, 2000).
The Geneva
Convention does not include violence against women or gender based violence as
a form of persecution despite decades long struggle of women’s rights advocates
to get the countries to recognize violence against women or gender based
violence as a ground to seek refuge.
For a long
time, monitoring of humanitarian response initiatives, urban slum projects, and
migration have shown that migrant women and girls living in the refugee/IDP
camps/makeshift slums suffer from rape, early pregnancies, kidnapping, and
forced marriage. Girls and young women from the marginalized ethnic groups are
one of the most vulnerable. For examples, in Somalia, rape and sexual abuse in
IDP camps is common but marginalized ethnic Bantus and Ogadenis women and girls
suffered from greater risk. Traditionally, shelter is organized in consultation
with men Somali women and girls living in refugee camps in Kenya have also been
the target of rape and sexual attack by other Somalis, Kenyan police and
soldiers. In some instances, the design of camps adds to women’s and girls’
discomforts and insecurities. For instance, communal housing offers no privacy
for women, while lone women and girls housed in marked tents may become easy
targets of sexual abuse. A survey conducted by the UNHCR in Bassaso , Somalia
indicates that women are often sexually or physically attacked going out for
toilets or for the collection of fuel wood and water.
The women/girl
child-specific projects of the national and international NGOs and
international institutions are not at all enough to address gendered needs of
women migrants. Though there is a move towards an inclusive approach but it has
focused attention on wider issues but the attention is usually around the
immediate needs of women. Conceptualization of transformation of gender roles
and relations to eliminate inequalities in the long-term are greatly lacking.
Unless gender role and relation transformation is aimed and greater attention
is paid to the impact of policies and programmes on the displaced in general,
and women in particular, the issues around women’s participation and
decision-making in redressing their challenges around migration cannot be
secured. In the absence of a vision for gender role and relation change, encouraging
women to assume new roles may merely increase their work burden. It is not
possible to get women to perform leadership roles or an equal role without
challenging the gender stereotypes and biases because they will not have
institutional or social support to fulfil these roles.
While
specificities may vary from country to country and culture to culture the
broader trends indicate that women are more vulnerable to sexual and other
types of gender-based violence, and they are frequently forced to cope with
more and different roles in the search for their survival and that of their
families. They are forced to take on greater role and responsibilities than
before in an environment of gender-based discrimination and disempowerment. Such
inequalities have to be confronted and addressed to allow women to acquire more
skills, confidence, and gender and political consciousness. There is also a
need to engage with men towards changing the gender roles and relations to
ensure that their coping capacity in context of displacement and their
abilities to evolve in the face of challenges to their traditional gender roles
and identity is adequately supported.