The Safety of Women Journalists: Breaking the Cycle of Silence and Violence

"Within the last decade, awareness that women in media are subject to gender-based attacks has grown, along with a greater understanding that this poses a serious challenge to media freedom and development....When women journalists are restricted or hounded out of the profession, society is denied access to a diverse range of information and perspectives."

This International Media Support (IMS) report assesses how women in media are being targeted and how journalism is impacted by gender-specific harassment and violence. It also discusses existing efforts to improve the safety and protection of women journalists in 9 countries across Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and South America, with a view to informing debate and actions by media owners and editors, policymakers, press freedom organisations, and journalists.

In Part I, the report's author, Silvia Chocarro, gives a global perspective on the nature of threats women journalists face, based on research conducted by various freedom of expression groups around the world and consultations with individual experts. Chocarro explains that these threats include not just violence, often in the form of sexual assault, but a larger array of attacks and entrenched behaviours that challenge women's ability to practice and advance in the profession (e.g., sexual harassment, unequal working conditions, and online abuse). The prevailing culture in newsrooms can be marginalising or even hostile toward women or simply unprepared when it comes to addressing gender-specific safety concerns. Women journalists in many countries also face social and family pressures that may hinder or discourage their work.

Chocarro also looks at steps international organisations, including non-governmental organisations (NGOs), the United Nations (UN), and regional bodies, have taken in response. A normative base has been established through multiple international documents (cited in the report) recognising the need for a gender-based approach, and a number of organisations have initiated research and concrete programmes to address the issue. For example, civil society groups and media support organisations have launched projects such as the Byte Back campaign throughout South Asia, which, along with the work of the Digital Rights Foundation in Pakistan, aim at countering online abuse with messages of solidarity, guidance on documenting and reporting instances, and public awareness campaigns. However, Chocarro argues, more needs to be done to see gender-based concerns integrated throughout the safety work of stakeholders.

Part II of the report looks at gender-specific threats, challenges, and responses in 9 countries: Afghanistan, Colombia, Indonesia, Iraq, Kenya, Nepal, Pakistan, Somalia, and the Philippines. Core safety challenges present across all analysed countries are outlined to support the development of universal gender guidelines (tailored to the national and local context) to promote the safety of journalists. Challenges include:

• Societal norms, gender-based inequality, and discrimination;
• Gender-based and sexualised attacks by state and non-state actors;
• Gender-based physical and psychological violence perpetrated by colleagues, professional superiors, and sources;
• Discriminatory working conditions such as lower wages, lack of benefits such as maternity leave, lack of opportunities for promotion, lack of safety training, and inappropriate safety equipment;
• Gender-based violence and harassment online;
• Lack of (or insufficient) gender policies and anti-harassment measures in newsrooms;
• Lack of (or insufficient) gender sensitivity in safety mechanisms;
• Lack of (or insufficient) gender-sensitivity by law enforcement personnel and the judiciary;
• Lack of (or insufficient) gender-sensitive monitoring, including disaggregated data by gender, type of attacks, and lack of data on perpetrators of sexual attacks;
• Lack of (or insufficient) country-specific field research to identify and respond to the specific needs of women journalists with regard to the violence they face; and
• Lack of gender mainstreaming in journalism education and training, including in safety workshops and materials.

Based on this analysis, Part III of the report identifies key work areas to focus on moving forward. For example, there is a need for additional elements when it comes to prevention and response, such as training by women available to women, risks assessments, protocols and security guides that include gender considerations, emergency response programmes with resources dedicated to women and that take into account the social context, and psychological care that addresses sexual assault. One model is the emergency support programme established by IMS and Afghan Journalists Safety Committee (AJSC), which provides an educational, physical, psychological, and legal support programme for women journalists that is coordinated by AJSC-appointed women in various provinces and Kabul. In Nepal, NGOs with international support have organised security training workshops exclusively for women. There, and in Iraq and Kenya, freedom of expression groups have produced security guides for journalists that are dedicated to women journalists.

To cite another example, several approaches for how to improve behaviour within newsrooms have been developed. In Afghanistan, groups launched a set of anti-sexual-harassment guidelines for media outlets and set up a committee to hear complaints by women journalists. One group in Colombia is working with media outlets on a certification programme for security protocols and risk prevention, which includes implementing non-discrimination and sexual harassment policies. In Pakistan, a gender-sensitive code of ethics for print media has been introduced to media groups. Monitoring and ensuring these are being implemented is a pressing concern, Chocarro argues.

Along these lines, Chocarro stresses that, to gain an accurate understanding of threats to women journalists and in turn appropriate response mechanisms, disaggregated data on attacks against journalists is needed. She identifies the lack of common standards around monitoring of these data globally as a priority.

She also suggests that creating forums to bring women together can lead to steps to promote security and identify issues that commonly impact women journalists in a given country. In Somalia, women journalists came together and successfully advocated for paid maternity leave at 10 media houses and also formed an action plan intended for newsrooms to adopt to end sexual harassment. In Colombia, women journalists are increasingly sharing their stories of sexual harassment publicly as well as working to improve coverage of gender-based violence and other gender-specific issues.

The experiences of several countries looked at for this publication show the importance of engaging the State in promoting and understanding how men and women are affected differently by different threats and ultimately use a gender-sensitive approach.

In conclusion: "Ultimately, the full scope and specific impacts of human rights violations experienced by women journalists must be addressed in the broader context and structures of discrimination against women. This requires substantive shifts in deeply entrenched social and cultural norms."