women's rights page @ www.sacw.net | May 2, 2008
Faith
in the state? Asian women's struggles for human rights in the UK
by
Pragna Patel*
(in:
Feminist
Legal Studies, April 2008)
Abstract The discourse of multiculturalism
provides a useful means of understanding the complexities, tensions,
and dilemmas that Asian and other minority women in the U.K. grapple
with in their quest for human rights. However, the adoption of
multiculturalist approaches has also silenced women's voices,
obscuring, for example, the role of the family in gendered violence and
abuse. Focusing on the work of Southall Black Sisters, and locating
this work within current debates on the intersection of government
policy, cultural diversity, and feminist activism, this article
examines, and critiques, the Labour government's current "multi-faith"
agenda for its impact on Black and minority ethnic women in the U.K.
Keywords Asian women - black women - domestic
violence - multiculturalism - multi-faithism - religious fundamentalism
- secularism - state policies - women's human rights
Introduction
This article draws on the experiences of predominantly South Asian
women who approach Southall Black Sisters, whose lives encapsulate the
contradictions facing many black and minority women in their struggle
for survival and freedom in the U.K. The struggle for the rights of
black and minority women in the U.K. is inextricably linked to the
practice of multiculturalism. Indeed, it is impossible to discuss the
one without discussing the other. A focus on multiculturalism also
provides a useful means of understanding the complexities, tensions and
dilemmas with which Asian and other minority women in the U.K. have
grappled, in their quest for human rights. The key question is whether
the state's approach to race relations and minority communities has
hindered or enhanced their struggle for rights, particularly in
relation to the family where they are most vulnerable to abuse,
violence and unequal treatment. Experience shows that at its worst,
multiculturalism has colluded in the silencing of women's voices. But
now, an even greater danger looms: the government promotion of the
faith agenda (a Blairite initiative) and the drift from
multiculturalism to "multi-faithism" provides an opportunity for
fundamentalists and religionists to set an agenda that poses a major
threat to the human rights of Asian and other minority women. The need
for vigilance and activism is now more urgent than ever.
Southall Black Sisters
Southall Black Sisters (S.B.S.) first set up in 1979, initially as a
campaigning organisation comprising African-Caribbean and Asian women,
in the midst of intense anti-racist activity. We consciously adopted a
secular feminist identity, one based on a shared history of racism and
religious patriarchal control. The absence of the recognition of gender
power relations within the anti-racist movements and the absence of an
acknowledgement of racism within white feminist movements had resulted
in the invisibility of black and minority women. It was this
invisibility which gave rise to our organisation and others like us.
Southall Black Sisters now operates as a not for profit, advice,
campaigning, resource and advocacy centre for black women with a
particular focus on the needs of South Asian women. Whilst based in
West London, an area with a large South Asian population, we have a
national reach.
The history of S.B.S. in a sense has been a history of resisting
imposed identities. Throughout our existence, we have attempted to
shake off singular identities foisted on us by the community, the
anti-racist movement and the state. Over the years, women who walk
through our doors, largely South Asian, have demanded support and
assistance in the face of domestic violence and other forms of gender
based violence and restrictions on their personal freedom, exacerbated
by poverty and racism. Our work by its very nature has therefore had to
simultaneously challenge violence against women and racism.
More recently, we have been forced to challenge very specific
fundamentalist and nationalist identities that have been fostered by
the rise of Sikh, Muslim and Hindu religious fundamentalist movements
in the U.K. and abroad.
In Britain, the rise of fundamentalism in all religions has in part
been due to the role of the British state and the privileging of
Christianity,1 but the form of multiculturalism that has been practiced
at national and local levels has also provided the space for religion
to emerge as the main badge of identity in minority communities. This
political development has compelled us to defend the secular space that
we had created and, until the early 1990s, we had taken for granted.
Religious fundamentalism in this context is defined specifically as any
modern political movement that exercises selectivity in the
interpretation of its religious texts. However, two features that are
common to all fundamentalist religious movements stand out: first, they
claim their version of religion to be the only true one and feel
threatened by pluralist systems of thought; and secondly, they use
political means to impose their version of the truth on all members of
their religion. Fundamentalism is not a term that is specific to any
one religion but cuts across all religions and can take different
political forms. However, at the heart of all fundamentalist movements
is support for the patriarchal family as a central agent of control.
And women are viewed as embodying the morals and traditional values of
the family and the whole community (see Sahgal and Yuval-Davis 1992).
These movements demand absolute conformity to religious laws as
interpreted by male religious leaders in denial of countless variations
in interpretation and cultural practices that have evolved in different
communities.
Multiculturalism
It needs to be stated at the outset that our criticism of
multiculturalism should not be taken as a rejection of multiculturalism
per se. It is still viable in the fight against racism because it
recognises diversity and promotes pluralism. It involves an
acknowledgement of distinct cultural and group identities and the right
to guard against cultural hegemony. However, the effectiveness of
multiculturalism must be considered not only in relation to combating
racism but also inequality based on gender and class within minority
communities. Our view is that the struggle for citizenship rights must
involve a challenge to racism, economic disadvantage, discrimination
and other exclusionary practices which affect entire minority groups,
but the struggle for minority women's rights must also be located
within that wider context. By highlighting the flaws in
multiculturalism, our aim is to call for its redefinition so that human
rights and citizenship rights are not denied to Asian and other
minority women or indeed other vulnerable minorities. This requires
constant struggle and negotiation since the demand for the state to
intervene in the family affairs of black and minority communities in
its protective capacity must also take into account the state's control
of black and minority communities - primarily through oppressive
immigration and policing practices.
Multiculturalism has been the dominant social policy approach to race
relations between the state and minority communities in the U.K. It was
first introduced in education but was quickly accepted as a tool of
national policy across a range of issues at the local and national
levels (Anthias and Yuval-Davis 1992). Although the present government
has attempted to revert back to aspects of previous (discredited)
policies based on assimilation, predicated on the notion that 'good'
race relations can only be achieved if minority communities shed all
aspects of their religious and cultural identity and blend in with the
"British way of life", the multicultural model, with some variation, is
still prevalent. The difficulty with the multicultural approach,
however, is that in practice it has lost its more progressive aspects.
Instead of distinguishing between valid cultural demands and
fundamental human rights, it was and is seen as an end in itself - a
way of simply recognising and 'tolerating' difference.
Perhaps the most significant aspect of the multicultural model is that
it assumes that minority communities are homogeneous or monolithic
entities, with no internal differences based on class, gender or even
caste lines which give rise to differences of power and advantage.
Instead, differences are constructed in a stereotypical and
essentialist manner, fixing and reifying boundaries of community
affiliation. The more 'different' an identity is, the more authentic it
becomes. In many respects, it draws on previous models of British
colonial rule whereby the indigenous laws of the colonised country were
codified with reference to religious texts but without reference to
changing customs, practices and interpretations (see, e.g., Sahgal
1992). Minorities are therefore viewed primarily as targets of social
policy, rather than as actors in the democratic system (Ali 1992), and
notions of citizenship are deemed not to apply except in a facile way -
to demand allegiance to the state. This process has been heightened
since 9/11 with the creation of "faith communities" - a construction
borne out of community self-definition and state social policy. The
result is that a complex web of political, social and cultural factors,
which helps to form a particular identity, is reduced to purely
religious values.
Groups like S.B.S. have also criticised the multicultural model for
providing the space for unselected community representatives, usually
male and from religious groups, but also from the business classes, to
determine the needs of the community and to mediate between the
community and the state. Although the interests of the community are
often articulated in the name of anti-racism or even human rights, this
very rarely includes recognition of the individual rights of women or
other powerless sub-groups within the community. In this process, the
struggle for community representation at the political level becomes
highly contested, but it has largely been won by predominantly
fundamentalist and conservative male-dominated groups who usually have
exclusionary if not extremist political agendas.
On a daily basis, the nature of state intervention in the family within
minority communities has had a detrimental impact on women's struggles
for greater freedom. Indeed, the practice of multiculturalism has often
led to the adoption of a culturally relativist approach by the state
welfare services and the legal system. In an effort to appear
"culturally sensitive" and "tolerant of diversity", such state
institutions often ignore the rights of the more marginalised groups
and individuals within our communities. Nowhere has this been more
apparent than in the response that has, with few exceptions, been given
to women and children escaping violence and abuse from their partners
or families.2 In addressing issues such as domestic violence, suicide
rates (up to three times the national average (see Raleigh and
Balarajan 1992; Bhugra and Desai 2002)), rape and sexual violence,
honour crimes and forced marriages within Asian communities in
particular, S.B.S. has had to challenge multicultural policies for
their effect in reinforcing rather than challenging such abusive
practices. Until the London bombings, however, one important area of
our achievements was the shift in thinking around multiculturalism as
it impacted on minority women.
In the last decade or so, secular feminist groups such as S.B.S. and
Forward3 made some progress in redefining multiculturalism,
particularly in relation to protecting women and young children
(largely female) from practices such as forced marriage, female genital
mutilation and honour killings. For example, in the debates on forced
marriage in 1999 and 2000 held by the Home Office Working Group on
forced marriage, the then Home Office Minister, Mike O'Brien,
acknowledged that "multiculturalism cannot be an excuse for moral
blindness". Echoing our concerns, he advocated a "mature multicultural"
approach which demands that violence against women and other oppressive
restrictions need to be understood as abuses and violations of women's
fundamental human rights, irrespective of the cultural or religious
contexts in which they occur. Unfortunately, instead of promoting
"mature multiculturalism" and building on the concept, this government
has since taken several steps backwards.
From Multiculturalism to "Multi-faithism"
Despite these dilemmas and difficulties, we have found ourselves in the
ironic position of defending multiculturalism as sections of the
British government and media have decided that multicultural policies
are no longer functional. Following the terrorist bombings in London in
July 2005, the focus has been on the need for social cohesion and
assimilation. Yet at the same time, the need to find Muslim allies for
the so called "War on Terror" has intensified as the government
searches for a largely male religious leadership with which to engage
in a dialogue, in an attempt to co-opt their public support for the war
and for an authoritarian law and order agenda (see Sahgal 2006). This
policy shift has also encouraged the state to conflate issues around
racial inequality with 'authentic' religion and religious identity as
defined by fundamentalist and conservative religious leaderships, and
has led to the direct sponsorship of fundamentalist or reactionary
organisations such as the Muslim Council of Great Britain (M.C.B.),4
The Muslim Association and the Hindu Forum of Britain, all of whom now
enjoy an unprecedented influence on state policy towards minorities.
The increasing emphasis on religion and religious identities has led to
the transformation of multiculturalism into "multi-faithism", a model
of 'integration' which views the discrimination and exclusion of many
in black and minority communities not as a product of class inequality
or racism, but as a historical failure to respect and facilitate
religious identity within public institutions. A new settlement is
taking place between "faith groups" and the state in which "faith
groups" use the terrain of multiculturalism to further an authoritarian
and patriarchal agenda. These groups use the language of equality and
human rights whilst at the same time eschewing these very ideals. The
result is that secular spaces and secular voices within minority
communities are being squeezed out, which in turn means that fewer
alternatives will be available to minority women and others from
restrictions on fundamental freedoms.
Growing Religious Intolerance and the Threat to Fundamental Human Rights
Following the Rushdie Affair, the mood in all the various minority
communities has been one of growing intolerance for all those who seek
to challenge cultural and religious values and religious abuse of
power. Muslim fundamentalists within South Asian communities have been
the most vociferous, although other minority religious fundamentalists
and religionists have also been quietly organising and jockeying for
key positions as mediators between state and community. In our
communities, we have witnessed, with alarming frequency, fundamentalist
and authoritarian protests at any form of dissent from the dominant
religious orthodoxies. There have been aggressive and intimidating if
not violent campaigns against feminist, gay and lesbian and other
non-conformist activities. It would seem that all the religions are
vying for control of the representation of their communities. In the
process, what is made transparent is the re-invention of essentialist
notions of religion as a framework for highlighting inequalities and
demanding recognition (see Yuval-Davis 1992).
In August 2000, the Islamic Human Rights Association5 protested against
a government-backed European directive which, according to them, would
force Muslim charities and schools to employ non-believers and
homosexuals. This was considered to be an attack on religious freedom
and would have exposed faith-based organisations to infiltration by
hostile campaign groups. Much like the Christian charities that have
recently opposed discrimination law applying to their adoption
services, the Association argued that the duty not to discriminate
undermined the religious ethos of their organisations. In 2005, we
witnessed protests by elements of the Sikh community against the play
"Behzti" (Dishonour) which dealt with issues of rape and abuse of power
within a Gurdwara (Sikh temple). Whilst the protests led to
intimidation and threats of violence from Sikh extremists, even
so-called moderate Sikhs (for example the so-called Sikh Human Rights
Commission) felt that the play's author, Gurpreet Bhatti, had "crossed
the line" and caused extreme offence by setting her play in what is
regarded by Sikhs as a 'sacred' place. Extremist and moderate Sikhs
alike were notably more preoccupied with the question of blasphemy than
with the reality of women who are raped and assaulted on a daily basis,
sometimes by or with the collusion of the very custodians of community
morality!
Not to be outdone, the Hindus have followed the example set by Muslim
fundamentalist leadership in using the language and techniques of human
rights. In 2006, we saw successful attempts by Hindu fundamentalists to
stop an exhibition of paintings by the renowned India painter, M.F.
Hussain, on the grounds that his depiction of naked female deities
offended Hindu religious sensibilities, irrespective of the fact that
over the centuries, Hinduism has been littered with such images. The
campaign was led by the so-called "moderate" Hindu Forum of Britain and
the shadowy Hindu Human Rights group.6 Both took it upon themselves to
represent all Hindus in the U.K., although they have no such mandate to
determine issues of identity and representation. However, this has not
stopped the Forum, with the support of organisations like the Runnymede
Trust, from constructing a monolithic 'Hindu' voice and community in
the U.K.7 Yet whilst professing to uphold democracy, the rule of law
and justice, the Forum has remained silent about the violent tactics
employed by Hindu fundamentalists in India, who have threatened the
painter and his property. Indeed, the General Secretary of the Forum,
Ramesh Kallidai has recently gained further respectability as a
Commissioner for the Commission on Integration and Cohesion, although
he is known to have links with the neo-fascist Hindu organisation the
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (R.S.S.), whose leadership in the past has
declared open admiration for Hitler and called for the R.S.S. to adopt
Nazi Germany's ideology and tactics in dealing with India's Muslims and
other minorities including secularists.8 Elsewhere, so called
"moderate" Hindus have campaigned against the depiction of Hindu
deities in consumer products and, more importantly, against the
depiction of domestic violence and forced marriage within Hindu
populations.9
The growing climate of intolerance is, of course, not confined solely
to minority communities. It is also reflected in the wider society, as
shown by the protests against the Jerry Springer Opera broadcast by the
B.B.C. in December 2004 and in the recent campaigns to prevent
discrimination law applying to gay adoptions. The difference, however,
is that in the wider society, there is greater space and protection for
those wishing to dissent. In minority communities, religious
institutions are dominated by a conservative and even misogynist and
homophobic religious agenda, and although there are liberal strands,
their voices are marginal. For example, the Muslim Parliament of Great
Britain published a courageous report on the prevalence of child abuse
within madrassas or Muslim religious schools, but it was overlooked by
all so-called "representative" Muslim and other faith institutions and
there remains a resounding silence as to its content and implications
within all the Asian communities (see Muslim Parliament of Great
Britain 2006).
Even when harmful cultural practices are addressed, often religious or
community leaders fend off criticism by claiming that their religion
does not condone abuses against women or children. However, the problem
with such assertions is that issues such as forced marriages or honour
crimes are simply seen as symptoms of a declining or malfunctioning
culture, and nothing to do with religion per se. But such assertions
are often disingenuous, since they allow religious spokespersons to
condemn the custom and practice of everyday life within minority
communities without having to admit that there are no neat distinctions
between culture and religion or without having to take any
responsibility for tackling the abusive practices. Further, such denial
and avoidance is used as a ploy to argue even more forcefully that
communities should return to the 'purity' of original religious
teachings.
The furore surrounding the "Behzti" play is but one recent example of
attempts to silence the voices of women. We are aware of countless
cases around the country where South Asian and minority religious
institutions have been involved in, condoned or remained indifferent to
domestic and sexual violence and child abuse. There have even been
cases where religious leaders have sought to 'exorcise' women or
children by beating them, sometimes to death, for non-conformist
behaviour perceived as "possession" by "evil spirits". Whilst these
cases represent the more dramatic end of the spectrum, women find their
aspirations quashed by religious leaders on a day to day basis. As
minority women in the U.K. have no effective political representation
and no power to challenge the hegemony of the religious establishment,
they along with other sub groups have the most to lose.10 Women have
only their voices of dissent as a tool by which to demand more freedom.
The suppression of dissent is therefore literally a matter of life and
death for many. This is precisely why many of us opposed the creation
of a new criminal offence of incitement to religious hatred in 2005. We
perceived it as an attempt to extend the outdated blasphemy laws11
through the back door and we argued that the main targets would be not
those engaged in fomenting hatred towards other religions, but those
wishing to dissent within religion itself; in other words, those
representing a challenge to orthodox traditions. We feared, above all,
that the Act would contribute to the emergence of a culture of
intolerance. Our fears were confirmed by a spokesperson from the Sikh
Human Rights Commission who, in response to the "Behzti" affair, stated
on television that, if the law had existed at the time, the group would
have used it to prevent the play from being performed.
The Emergence of "Faith Communities"
For secular feminists within minority communities, the challenge of
religious fundamentalism is only a part of the battle. A much more
difficult struggle lies with mainstream religious leadership itself -
the moderates - who, with the demise of progressive secular
institutions within minority communities, are seen to be fulfilling a
crucial role in mediating between state and community. This is, of
course, a process that has always occurred, but what is different this
time is the assertion by the state that religion is a vital part of
public life which cannot be ignored, even by those who consider
themselves to be secular in outlook.
Since the London bombings and civil unrest fuelled by racial tensions,
black and ethnic minority communities, redrawn as "faith communities",
have been specifically identified by the state as important sources of
social capital. There is a growing assumption that the social networks,
experiences and resources of the "faith groups" have been neglected for
too long. They are deemed to be invaluable to urban regeneration and
therefore full opportunity is given to faith groups to build capacity
and to participate fully in civil society.12 Interestingly, the
approach represents the other side of the "War on Terror" campaign,
since it is mainly Muslim faith groups that are deemed to be relevant
to stamping out extremism and achieving social cohesion.13 This
development happens also to fit neatly into a wider neo-conservative
agenda, which sees as essential the privatisation of what were once
considered to be vital state functions such as schooling and welfare
provision. Faith groups have therefore been placed at the heart of the
regeneration of communities and as a direct result, religion is
becoming increasingly entrenched within state institutions at central
and local levels, and is reflected at all levels of state policy.
The faith-based approach to multiculturalism has provided the space for
the politics of identity based on religion to flourish, and faith-based
campaigns for legal tolerance, cultural rights, freedom from
discrimination and access to public resources have gained momentum.
Only some such demands are borne out of experiences of alienation and
exclusion due to racism; others are borne out of the perceived need to
maintain religious identity through the control of female sexuality in
particular. The result is that the various religious leaderships within
minority communities have been strengthened considerably. It has also
brought into their domain areas which hitherto have been addressed by
progressive, secular, anti-racist and feminist groups, including issues
such as domestic violence, children's rights and child protection, and
the rights of black and minority offenders in the criminal justice
system. Anecdotal evidence suggests that faith groups are encroaching
on Asian feminist projects and in doing so, they are subverting the
feminist and democratic principles upon which such projects are based.
Indeed, the work of secular groups, especially Asian women's groups
that have organised across religious and ethnic divides, is thus not
only being ignored but increasingly left out of funding and policy
initiatives.
The emphasis has shifted to the need to provide "religious and
culturally sensitive" services, which has resulted in the segregation
of Asian community projects into faith-based projects and
organisations. Notions and models of citizenship based on respect for
individual human rights are being replaced by notions of social
cohesion and integration involving adherence to "core British values".
However, adherence to core values does not displace cultural or
religious identity. In fact, the faith-based approach encourages
adherence to cultural and social autonomy as well as to a core set of
values which are mostly about the maintenance of public order. For
example, the Islamic Human Rights Commission has made it clear that it
sees no reason why minority communities cannot be guided by their
personal religious laws, since this does not impact on social cohesion.
The approach, therefore, substitutes the demand for equality with the
demand for greater recognition of diversity and the need for "religious
literacy", that is, the need to understand the theological values and
traditions as espoused by religious leaders, but not recognition of the
various liberal cultural and religious and non-religious traditions
within a community.
Multiculturalism and the Law's Response
When viewed in the context of the emergence of "faith communities", the
state's current response to black and minority women's needs reveals
two contradictory approaches. First, years of campaigning by S.B.S. and
others mean that from time to time, we still retain some influence on
state policy on issues concerning black and minority women. Even here,
however, there is a tendency for state institutions to 'exoticise' the
more dramatic, culturally-specific practices such as honour killings
and to isolate them from wider debates on violence against women and
state accountability. At the same time, it should not be forgotten that
issues such as honour killings and forced marriage are often utilised
to legitimate a racist and restrictive immigration agenda or to set up
more training programmes aimed at increasing cultural and religious
awareness which, in the absence of community and state accountability,
do not enhance the rights of minority women. The response of the police
to the case of Banaz Mahmood, a young Kurdish woman horrifically
murdered by her father and uncle with others, is a case in point.14
Secondly, although the state has begun to assert more clearly the view
that harmful cultural practices will not be tolerated, the faith-based
approach contributes to a set of policies aimed at recognising and
protecting religious identity, often to the detriment of women's
rights. In our experience, the recognition of religious identity within
state institutions, including the legal system, is undermining, albeit
slowly and surreptitiously, the rights of minority women.
The growing recognition that the worst forms of oppression are often
experienced at the point of intersection of a number of factors that
make a person vulnerable to abuse or exploitation - race, gender, age,
sexuality and class - is to be welcomed. In the U.K., for instance, we
have long been arguing for an intersectional analysis to address and
meet the needs of black and minority women. We have highlighted, for
example, how racist nationality, immigration and asylum laws impact on
black and minority women's experiences of domestic or gender-based
violence and compound their vulnerability, therefore requiring changes
to both domestic violence and immigration and asylum laws and policies.
But the present political climate should also compel us to address the
complications that arise when religious discrimination is treated
unproblematically as an equality strand. We must take account of how,
at national and local levels, religious identity politics is being
contested by women and other minorities in their struggle to be free
from gender violence or other restrictions. Often what is forgotten is
that absolute rights from which the state cannot derogate under any
circumstances - such as the right to life or the right to be free from
torture and inhuman and degrading treatment - are implicated in women's
struggles against gender-based violence and for equality. The right to
manifest one's religion and religious identity, however, is not and can
never be an absolute right - it is, by its very nature limited, subject
to the impact that it has on others, particularly those more
vulnerable. If we don't grasp this, we will be supporting the very
reactionary, exclusionary and even fascistic agendas that
fundamentalists and religionists seek to promote.
It is important that bodies such as the Equality and Human Rights
Commission are aware of the potential conflict between different
equality strands, especially between the gender and sexual equality
strand on the one hand and the religion/belief strand on the other, and
not to assume that religion can be cross cut easily with other strands.
Religion often poses a major obstacle to the realisation of universal
human rights in the family sphere within minority communities because
those who claim to speak on behalf of the community also claim that the
human rights principles of individual choice and autonomy are "western"
or "alien" concepts.
On a daily basis, we have witnessed an increasing dilemma in respect of
the law's response to the needs of black and minority women. For most
women within minority communities, in the absence of internal
democratic and accountable mechanisms for resolving disputes, the legal
system becomes an indispensable tool in the struggle for freedom. It is
not a luxury but a necessity. Yet what we find is that the law also
struggles to accommodate a multicultural perspective that does not
undermine the individual rights of women. At the heart of the dilemma
lie the two contradictory approaches to Asian and minority women - the
"culture is no excuse" approach and the need for greater "religious
literacy or awareness". For example, in cases of forced marriage,
nullity based on lack of consent due to duress has been granted. Yet
following the conclusion of a case in which we were involved, P. v.
R.,15 where nullity was granted, academic commentary warned against
what is perceived to be the imposition of western cultural values on
other systems of belief:
The international clash of cultures in which the issue of forced
marriages contracted overseas arises is a context that may require
greater tolerance to achieve international comity. It could be argued
that the degree of choice implied by consent to marriage (as opposed to
the fact that consent is required) is a matter for the law of
jurisdiction of celebration... [I]t could be argued that English
cultural expectations are being imposed on other jurisdictions because
it depends on the subjective state of mind of the petitioner and could
therefore be readily extended to mild resistance to arranged marriages
if things go wrong.16
At the heart of this comment is a relativist approach to different
cultures - that individual rights can be traded for the sake of
international relations and different cultural expectations. The
comment also presumes that human rights cannot be intrinsic to other
cultures since they originate in the West. Yet any approach by the
courts will be suspect if it fails to take account of the U.K.'s
obligations under international law (such as the Convention on the
Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (C.E.D.A.W.))
or the struggles of women worldwide against the practice of forced
marriage. So far, we have not encountered any attempt by the courts to
adopt an approach which might have undermined the struggle against
forced marriage,17 but there is no room for complacency in view of the
challenges posed by fundamentalists and religionists who, while
demanding the right to have a parallel legal system based on personal
(religious) laws, also appear to have adopted a strategy aimed at
demanding greater recognition of religion in civil and criminal law.
More recently, we have witnessed cases where the Human Rights Act 1998,
a key component of our political and legal strategy in addressing
violence against women and indeed the worst aspects of
multiculturalism, has been utilised by both radical and moderate
religious groups alike, as a way of legitimising restrictions on women.
Shabina Begum18
This case concerned a challenge to the politics of multiculturalism in
a secular, mixed, state high school. It concerned a 14 year old Muslim
girl, Shabina Begum, who wanted to wear the jilbab (full ankle length
dress) rather than a salwar kameez (long tunic and trousers) and head
scarf, which conformed to the school's uniform policy. In 2006, the
House of Lords delivered a judgment stating that Shabina's rights to
manifest her religion or belief and her right not to be denied an
education had not been violated, and any infringement was necessary and
proportionate for the protection and well being of the wider school
community. The judgment in many respects represents a crucial victory
for women in particular, whose bodies often become the means by which
religious identity is imposed.
However, it is significant that the judges argued that the school had a
carefully considered uniform policy which took account of 'mainstream'
Muslim opinion, which confirmed that the uniform conformed to the
Islamic dress code. In respect of its consultation process, therefore,
the school could not be faulted since it had taken advice from Muslim
parents, community leaders (many of whom were represented on the school
governing board) and other Islamic theological experts. The court
praised the school for showing respect for Muslim beliefs in a way that
was "inclusive, unthreatening and uncompetitive".19
More significantly, the court made specific mention of the fact that
throughout her battle with the school, Shabina had been supported and
represented by young Muslim men, including her older brother. At one
point, an unnamed extreme right Muslim group even held demonstrations
outside her school, interestingly protesting not against the school
uniform policy but against the education of Muslim children in secular
schools! The demonstrations had the effect of intimidating other female
students who complained of harassment and interference from the group.
They did not support Shabina's demand, fearing that if she was
successful, they too would be pressurised into wearing a jilbab. They,
along with the school, feared the deep divisions that would be created
between those who were perceived to be pious and religious and those
who were perceived to have lost their religious way. They were afraid
that if they did not conform they would be labelled 'bad' Muslim girls.
The court alluded to the fact that Shabina's challenge had been
motivated by those who sought to impose a political religious identity
on women and young girls. It recognised that the school had in fact
carefully balanced the need to respect its diverse population with the
need to enable those who did not wish to conform to their religious
identity to do so without fear of repercussions.
Whilst there is much to commend the overall judgment and in particular
its nuanced approach to religious identity, religious fundamentalism
and multiculturalism,20 there is nevertheless considerable discomfort
as to how the notion of multiculturalism is increasingly taken to mean
reflecting multi-faith diversity. The House of Lords justified its
decision by noting that the school feared divisions between the
different groups and that racial harmony and social cohesion was at
stake. Yet what is legitimised by the court ruling is the strategy
adopted by the school in pursuit of social cohesion within state
schools. Shabina's case was in effect a battle between religious
fundamentalists and the more moderate, 'mainstream' Muslims, in which
the latter won. But in this battle what room, if any, is there for
those who wish to dissent from mainstream religious opinion? What
standing would minority secular women's groups have, if they sought to
challenge the authority of religious leaders by drawing on other
liberal or even feminist traditions? On the basis of the court's
reasoning, they would be deemed to be outside of "mainstream opinion"
and therefore not "representative" of their community. Ultimately, what
concerns us is that the judgment reflects and reinforces the emergence
of a multi-faith world order, in which secular spaces are being
squeezed out of public life. For these reasons, the court's approach
does not cross the multicultural threshold.
R. v. Sumra21
This case concerned a traditional Muslim woman who was raped by her
husband, who was then prosecuted. However, at trial she claimed that
her religious requirements meant that she could not take part in a
legal process in which she would have to answer questions of a sexual
nature asked by men. She stated that her religion did not permit her to
hear or answer to a male voice. In other words, she could not engage in
a public world occupied by men. In response, the prosecution counsel
requested the defendant to change to a female counsel, but that request
was refused, presumably on the valid grounds that this interfered with
the defendant's right to choose his own legal representation. The
prosecution counsel then requested that the victim be allowed to give
evidence via a video link through a female interpreter so that she
would not have to see or hear the defendant's barrister, or indeed any
other male within the court room. To accommodate this request, the
judge adjourned the hearings to obtain reports from a Muslim cleric in
order to ascertain the position of Muslim women in public spaces.
Following this report, on religious and cultural grounds, he permitted
her to give her evidence and be cross-examined via video link through a
female interpreter.
It is easy to have a feminist knee jerk response to this case; to view
the measures taken by the court as very necessary in a situation where
there is a need to improve the notoriously low rate of prosecutions in
rape cases. However, when examined more closely, the court's approach
gives rise to some concern mainly because it came close to undermining
the rules of evidence in order to allow for greater religious and
cultural accommodation. The court's response was not about the valid
need for witness protection or even about making the court process less
intimidating for female rape victims, but about the need to 'respect'
the religious identity of Muslim women as endorsed by the Muslim
theological expert used by the court. What is endorsed is the view that
Muslim women should not have a public presence or in any way assert
their own agency. In many other situations, the same religious
framework used to determine the state's response to minority women can
and will work against the interests of women precisely because it is
not they but religious 'experts' who validate their responses. In a
political climate where there is huge pressure on women to conform to
standards laid down by fundamentalists and religionists, it is women
who have the most to lose when the rule of law or important legal
safeguards are undermined or when needs are determined upon the basis
of religious identity. More widely, in the context of the resurgence of
religious fundamentalism, experience worldwide tells us that it is
women's human rights that will be the first to be suspended or denied.
It therefore becomes all the more necessary to uphold the rule of law,
since women's freedom is as dependent on it as is the freedom of those
who are targeted as so-called "terrorists". In the struggle to make the
law more accountable to minority women's needs, we have never adhered
to the view that gender equality should override important principles
of law - in this case rules of evidence, which are necessary to protect
both men and women from arbitrary arrests and trials.
The court's approach in this case does not empower minority women but
actually facilitates their removal from the public world. Yet the
approach taken by the court has been widely circulated by the police as
a model of how to address religious and cultural issues within the
criminal justice system. The approach is ultimately alarming in that it
is only a short step to accepting the view that Muslim and other ethnic
minority women have no need to utilise the criminal or civil laws of
the land since they are governed by their own community or personal
laws. Indeed, this is precisely what happened in Germany when a
Moroccan Muslim woman was denied a divorce in the face of domestic
violence by a judge who stated that as a Muslim woman, she was governed
by the Koran and not the civil law of the land (see Hari 2007). We
would argue that whilst religious and cultural contexts should be taken
into account in all legal proceedings where appropriate, they should
not be the overriding frameworks by which those from ethnic and
religious minorities are perceived, since they inevitably draw on very
narrow assumptions about religion and the role of women.
Another particular concern is the creation of a 'Muslim' woman standard
by which all other minority women are measured. For example issues of
honour and culture, which are central organising features of all South
Asian families and communities, are increasingly being attributed to
Muslim women only. Many organisations have unfortunately fallen into
this trap, thereby adding to the process of the communalisation
(segregation along religious lines) of what were once Asian or even
Black communities. One glaring example of this is the way in which the
Muslim Women's Network, set up in 2002 by the Minster of Women and
supported by the Women's National Commission, gave voice only to Muslim
women's needs when they conducted a series of closed focus group
discussions in 2006 (Muslim Women's Network 2006). The report launched
by the Muslim Women's Network identified many issues such as violence
against women, immigration difficulties, community pressures, racism
and the lack of political representation - none of which are specific
to Muslim women only. However, the faith-based strategy of isolating
Muslim women's needs as somehow 'different' from those of other Asian
women is deliberate and divisive. It plays into the fundamentalist
segregationist agenda and denies the overwhelming success of secular
Asian women's projects. The approach strongly undermines the solidarity
that has been forged across ethnic and religious lines within and
outside of our communities. It also encourages groups to compete for
resources and separate provision based solely around religious identity.
The Dangers of Mediation within the Legal System
We are concerned, too, that the increasing emphasis on mediation or
alternative forms of dispute resolution within civil law will have
specific ramifications for women from minority cultures. We recognise
that mediation can have a role to play where marital tensions exist,
but only in contexts where the partners or family members occupy a more
equal playing field. In the vast majority of our cases, women from
minority communities usually make several (almost always failed)
attempts at informal methods of resolution, usually involving family or
community elders, before seeking outside help. The reasons for the high
rates of failure are to do with the fact that the family structures and
community dynamics in many minority communities are built on unequal
power relations between men and women, legitimised by culture and
religion. Women are not heard in reconciliation or mediation meetings,
and even where they are, they are still blamed and made to feel guilty
for the state of the marriage or the disintegration of the family.
Women, in particular daughters-in-law and children, are the most
powerless in the family and have little or no right to assert their own
wishes and desires. In many cases, in mediation meetings, women are
lulled into a false sense of security by community elders promising to
protect and intervene if future problems occur, only to find that they
are punished further through violence and other means. In more extreme
cases, following mediation, they are abducted, killed or maimed for
having brought dishonour to their families and communities. Moreover,
given the fact that Asian women in the U.K. are more likely to attempt
and commit suicide due to pressures to conform to their cultural and
religious identity, mediation as an option or alternative to utilising
the civil law is an extremely problematic if not a highly dangerous
practice.
The proposals to encourage mediation as a first step or as an
alternative to court action also tie in with demands made by many
community and religious leaders for the state to recognise personal
laws and to give them the same equal legal footing as civil law.
Indeed, concepts such as "alternative dispute resolution" have been
welcomed for this reason (see, e.g., Kehsavjee 2004). Personal laws,
like informal methods of resolution, are extremely dangerous for women
since they place emphasis on reconciliation and mediation as key in
solving all marital or family problems and in keeping the family
together at all costs. The emphasis on mediation and reconciliation in
family law initiatives will therefore have a disproportionate and
discriminatory impact on women from some communities, since it will
chime with community demands for less court intervention.
Multi-faithism and Social Policy
The speed with which the English legal system and indeed all public
institutions are absorbing ethnic minority religious identity is
alarming. For example, a seminar on children's rights in 2006,
organised by the Law Society and the Muslim Lawyers Association, began
(uncharacteristically for a legal seminar) with Muslim prayers, thereby
setting the tone for the rest of the seminar. The panel included a
Muslim lawyer who explained Islamic legal principles in relation to
children's contact and custody issues. There was no attempt to
contextualise the speech or indicate how such perspectives are to be
addressed within English civil law. Nor was there any debate about the
potential of religious laws and values to conflict with principles
established in civil law. Alarmingly, the Law Society and the majority
white audience stayed silent, possibly out of 'respect' or fear of
causing 'offence'. Throughout the seminar, the view that the best
interests of the child can be met through Islamic law remained
unchallenged! Yet the speaker's agenda is clear when placed in the
context of the overarching objectives of the Association, which is to
see an Islamic perspective reflected in children and family law. In
April 2007 for instance, the Association organised a conference
entitled "Safeguarding Children in the U.K. - An Islamic Perspective",
the aim of which was to influence both the legal and health services.
Some of those who spoke at this conference were Islamic scholars linked
to the Muslim Council of Britain.
One direct effect of such collaborations between the Law Society and
faith groups is that it contributes to the false construction of the
wider society as 'secular' whilst attributing only religious values to
minority communities. We wonder if the Law Society would entertain the
idea of organising a seminar on children's rights between lawyers and
Christian scholars and whether a similar silence from the audience
would ensue? On the contrary, it is likely that assumptions made by
religion about children's rights would be laid bare, where they clash
with universal human rights of the child. Yet in relation to the
seminar about Islam and children's rights, the Law Society actually
recognised and uncritically accepted the role of so-called "Islamic
values" as part of the continuing education programme for solicitors
and barristers!
Similar partnerships between state institutions and faith groups are
evident up and down the country. In Bradford for instance,
C.A.F.C.A.S.S., which claims to uphold the individual rights of
children, has worked closely with Islamic scholars to determine the
impact of Islam on private law. Nowhere is there any acknowledgement of
possible conflicts between parental and children's rights or the power
dynamics involved in the struggle for the representation of culture and
religion within the community. There is also an automatic assumption
that all Muslims are religious and therefore guided by religious
principles. In Bradford, C.A.F.C.A.S.S. has developed links not with
those who work within minority communities on abuse, marital breakdown
and violence to children but with religious leaders who can advise from
an Islamic perspective.22
As multiculturalism moves into a new phase in the U.K., the impact of
"multi-faithism" on the state's policies on domestic violence is
clearly discernable. We have witnessed the development of integrated
court systems bringing together civil and criminal courts and "one stop
shops" designed to bring together different agencies under one roof,
with the aim of providing a holistic, multi-agency approach to issues
such as domestic violence. Yet in keeping with state policy on
increased participation of faith groups, these new initiatives also
seek to embrace "faith communities". Organisers of such projects
justify the involvement of faith groups by referring to the need to be
"sensitive" to other (minority) faiths. In the process, such
initiatives ignore the political struggles waged by black and minority
women within their communities against domestic violence and the
stranglehold of religion and culture on their lives. At best secular
voices are taken into account, but they are considered no more
legitimate than those of faith groups, even though faith groups have no
history of addressing women's rights or issues of social justice.
In July 2005, the Greater London Domestic Violence Project organised a
round-table discussion on domestic violence with faith leaders from
London's main religions, many of whom belonged to minority religions.
But no secular feminist groups that have worked on domestic violence
within minority communities were invited to be part of the discussion.
The effect of this is two-fold. Firstly, it ensures that community
leaderships do not have to account to their communities for their
actions since they are encouraged to relate only with the state and not
with their own constituents. Secondly, the absence of Asian feminists
and progressive groups from such discussions serves to delegitimise
feminist and secular approaches to social issues within minority
communities. The event led to the publication of a report entitled
"Praying for Peace". Whilst it does contain feminist analysis of
domestic violence, it also encourages partnerships between faith
leaders and the "domestic violence sector" (presumably white feminist
projects) in addressing issues of domestic violence. Unsurprisingly,
the entire debate on violence against women is circumscribed within a
religious framework which by its very nature compromises progressive
human rights language and principles. For example, the report utilises
religious notions of "karma" and "sin" which clearly act as substitutes
for the feminist notions of human rights, choice and autonomy. Perhaps
the most significant aspect of the report is that a contract between
state and faith leaders in relation to domestic violence and abuse
within minority communities is taking shape: in return for taking
responsibility for domestic violence, faith leaders can expect to see
domestic violence refuges and services accommodating religious identity
and the development of partnership working arrangements with local
faith leaders (see Greater London Authority 2006). The overall message
is clear. White feminist groups working on issues such as rape and
domestic violence can continue to organise along secular lines and from
time to time enjoy the support of the liberal establishment including
the Church of England. And individual women can retain their right of
choice as to how they wish domestic violence to be addressed. Minority
women who face violence and abuse, on the other hand, must be corralled
within their religious identity whether or not they wish it and be
represented by 'their' religious leaders, irrespective of the ideology
and objectives of such leaders.
In the new, multi-faith world, the future of black and minority women's
projects on domestic violence in the U.K. could look like the current
experience in Canada, involving collaborations between the domestic
violence and rape crisis sector and the 'Muslim' community (comprising
various ethnic groups including Palestinians, Somalis and Bosnians)
through mosques and business institutions. The Muslim Family Safety
Project in Ontario, for example, is funded by the Government of Canada
Crime Prevention Strategy. Amongst other things, it seeks to establish
a dialogue between the Muslim community and anti-violence agencies;
facilitate an environment of mutual understanding and respect between
the Muslim community and anti-violence agencies; generate a positive
awareness about Islam; and enable the collaborative development of
prevention and intervention materials and services that meet the needs
of Muslim women.23 What is striking about the project is the attempt to
marry feminist good practice with a religious ethos based on an
acceptance of the need to establish mosques as safe places for the
abused and disenfranchised. In addition, the project encourages
research and study of domestic violence from a Quranic world view and
demands solutions based on Islamic values. It also calls for the need
to ensure that each community cultivates or identifies persons who have
domestic violence and Islamic training, conflict resolution skills and
counselling skills. The project endorses the Statement of the National
Muslim Task Force on Domestic Violence which begins with a prayer.
Nowhere in the statement is there reference to human rights, women's
rights or individual autonomy. Instead, constant reference is made to
Islamic values, the need to support and care for the 'family', the need
to come together as a Muslim community to address domestic violence,
and to return to the true principles of Islam over cultural practice.
Conclusion
S.B.S. has always sought to challenge mainstream religious leaders for
their claims to be the 'authentic' voice of their constituencies. The
entrenchment of faith communities represents a particular threat for
women, particularly in regions where there are no effective alternative
voices to counteract the stranglehold of religious institutions. But at
the same time groups like S.B.S. have been caught in a double bind. On
the one hand, the various religious leaderships and their institutions
represent immense dangers for women's rights; yet the continuing
dismantling of the welfare state also forces us more and more into the
hands of those very institutions, to provide basic services for the
women that we see.24
The problem with the state accommodation of religious fundamentalism
and even moderate religious leaderships is that it has undermined the
political and social forces in our communities that have struggled
against racism, poverty and gender discrimination. On the other hand,
religious forces in our communities have grown confident and stronger.
Their financial positions and vast membership bases have enabled them
to occupy key positions from which to consolidate their power and
control over their constituencies. The ideology of these groups, whilst
claiming to be "moderate", is usually profoundly anti-democratic,
working against and not for social justice and equality. Such groups
use the language of discrimination and human rights to reassert a
patriarchal world order by removing women from the public sphere
(metaphorically if not physically) and by assuming absolute control of
their freedom and liberties in the private sphere.
Our struggle to retain our secular spaces, our secular voices, and to
build a truly democratic secular state, has taken on a sense of urgency
and desperation. But our real fear is that we can no longer be sure of
our allies.
References
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at http://www.jrf.org.uk/knowledge/findings/socialpolicy/0136.asp
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Footnotes
1 See, for example, the Education Reform
Act 1988, which imposed a daily act of Christian worship in all
schools. This came about as a result of intense lobbying by the
Association of Christian Teachers. A last-minute amendment was
introduced by Baroness Blatch, amending a previous clause contained in
the Education Act 1944 on compulsory religious worship.
2 The case of Victoria Climbié is
significant for the multicultural assumptions that were made which led
social workers, the police and health professionals to ignore the abuse
to which she was subjected.
3 Forward is a London-based African
women's rights organisation that works on the issue of female genital
mutilation.
4 See Awaaz - South Asia Watch (2006),
which traces the M.C.B.'s roots to the older Islamic right political
party, the Jamaati-I-Islami (J.I.) from the Indian sub-continent. Awaaz
is a U.K.-based secular network of organisations and individuals set up
to monitor religious hatred in South Asia and the U.K:
http://www.awaazsaw.org
5 According to Awaaz, the Islamic Human
Rights Commission (I.H.R.C.) in the U.K. is a radical Islamist
organisation that uses the language of human rights to promote an
extremist agenda including the adoption of sharia law. See Awaaz -
South Asia Watch (2006).
6 There is very little detail available
on this organisation or how it has come to represent the views of all
Hindus in the U.K. Yet during the M.F. Hussain affair, it was quoted in
the press as if it was representative of the Hindu 'voice'.
7 See Berkeley (2006). This report
purports to identify the nature of the British 'Hindu' communities, yet
there was no democratic consultation process with Indians of Hindu
origin to ascertain their concerns or indeed how they identified
themselves. Most of it is based on the views of members of the Hindu
Forum of Britain, many of whom are from Hindu upper and middle caste
backgrounds.
8 Awaaz - South Asia Watch notes that in
April 2006, Ramesh Kallidai attended a meeting of the Hindu Swayamsevak
Sangh (H.S.S.), a British branch of the R.S.S. At the meeting he paid
homage to a previous R.S.S. ideologue, M.S. Golwalkar, who admired and
promoted Nazi-like, fascist and violent ideas in India. The R.S.S.'s
extreme Hindu-supremacist ideology has been widely blamed for
large-scale anti-minority violence in India. It has been banned three
times in India since Independence. The murderer of M.K. Gandhi was a
former R.S.S. member. See http://www.awaazsaw.org
9 For instance in 1994, a group of Hindu
fundamentalists attempted to ban "Bhaji on the Beach", a film depicting
the lives of Asian women who survive domestic violence. A group of men
surrounded a cinema in Nottingham to intimidate and prevent people from
attending.
10 See, for example, Fawcett Society
(2005). This report confirmed the massive inequalities faced by Asian
women in many areas of their lives.
11 Southall Black Sisters and our sister
group, Women Against Fundamentalism, have repeatedly called for the
blasphemy laws to be repealed on the grounds that they are outdated and
privilege Christianity over other religions, thus opening the door for
more not less involvement of religion in public affairs.
12 See Home Office Faith Communities
Unit (2004, 2005); Joseph Rowntree Foundation (2006). The latter is a
summary of a major study conducted by sociologists funded by the Joseph
Rowntree Foundation, which examines the contribution that can be made
by "faith communities", increasingly viewed as "social capital". It is
an example of the high level of academic activity that is now devoted
to constructing notions of "faith communities" and looking at ways to
improve the participation of faith-based groups in civil regeneration.
13 In 2005, the government announced
that it was making £7.75 million available to faith-based groups and in
August 2006, a further £4.5 million capacity-building fund was
announced for such groups. Yet at the same time, in a contradictory
statement, before resigning as Prime Minister, Tony Blair also
announced that the government's intention was to crack down on funding
for groups that were "tightly bonded around religious, racial or ethnic
identities" (Mulholland 2006). So far, evidence suggests that it is not
the faith-based projects but the funding of black autonomous secular
groups such as Southall Black Sisters which is seriously threatened by
the pursuit of so-called "community cohesion".
14 Bahnaz Mahmood's case received high
profile media coverage as an honour killing in 2007. However, its real
significance was not that this was an honour killing, but the fact that
prior to her murder the police failed to act on her demands for
protection. The police response, or lack of it, demonstrates the need
for an urgent public inquiry on the question why, after three decades
of legislation and policies, the state continues to flout its
obligations under the Human Rights Act 1998 and international human
rights law to protect women from domestic violence in all its
manifestations, including honour crimes. There continues to be little
or no comprehensive investigation into continuing police failure in
domestic violence cases, with the result that, with a few individual
exceptions, no progress is evident except at the policy level.
Implementation of policies on domestic violence remains extremely poor
and patchy and the same mistakes are being repeated by police forces
across the country.
15 P. v. R. [2003] 1 F.L.R. 661.
16 See commentary on "P. v. R. (Forced
Marriage: Annulment: Procedure)", Butterworths Family and Child Law
Bulletin no. 68 (May 2003), available at
http://www.communitycare.co.uk/Articles/2003/08/11/41724/may-2003.html
17 Until 2000, the response of the
courts as well as other statutory bodies told a very different story.
In cases of forced marriage, their common response was to deny
protection to young girls on the grounds that they could not interfere
in different 'cultural' practices. See, for example, Patel (1991).
18 R. (on the application of Begum) v.
Head Teacher and Governors of Denbigh High School [2007] 1 A.C. 100.
19 R. v. Governors of Denbigh High
School [2007] 1 A.C. 100, per Lord Bingham of Cornhill at para. 34.
20 Baroness Hale's analysis was
influenced by Gita Sahgal and Nira Yuval-Davis, whose publication
Refusing Holy Orders (1992) was quoted.
21 The details of this case were
circulated to S.B.S., amongst other organisations, on 20 October 2006
by fax by Detective Inspector Brent Hyatt from the Specialist Crime
Directorate of the Metropolitan Police Force.
22 See C.A.F.C.A.S.S. (2006, p. 25): "In
Bradford, staff attended a University of Bradford course entitled
'working with conflict in Muslim families'. This gave them the
opportunity to meet with local religious scholars to inform and explore
how the English justice system sits alongside cultural and religious
issues for Muslim families experiencing separation and divorce. Links
were established to consult with local scholars and to act as mutual
advisers. A seminar is planned to consider the impact of private law
matters in an Islamic context, with a local Imam speaking".
23 See http://www.Ifcc.on.ca/mfsp.html
24 For example, the "No recourse to
public funds" requirement within the U.K.'s welfare and immigration law
means that abused women who do not have secure immigration status
cannot avail themselves of the welfare support - social housing and
benefits - recognised as prerequisites to leaving a violent
relationship. Such women are thus trapped in abusive marriages because
they face destitution and deportation if they contemplate reporting to
outside agencies. Whilst the government has enacted the "Domestic
Violence Rule", allowing women to remain in the country if they can
demonstrate that they are victims of violence, few women are able to
use it, since they cannot report incidents due to "no recourse". The
existence of the "no recourse" requirement therefore defeats the very
purpose of the Domestic Violence Rule and signals a discriminatory
approach to issues of gender-based violence within black and minority
communities. In these circumstances, groups like S.B.S. have no choice
but to turn to religious institutions for assistance; to feed and house
women who have escaped an abusive marriage. Although we insist that all
casework will be conducted by us, needless to say however, the
boundaries between us and religious organisations are not always
respected. In any event, religious institutions are not appropriate in
the rehabilitation of such women since they frequently encounter
hostility or pressure to return home for the sake of preserving their
marriage or family honour.
*(Southall Black
Sisters, 21 Avenue Road, Southall, Middlesex, UB1 3BL, UK)
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