Gender Violence in Russia: The Politics of Feminist Intervention

1. Introduction: Foreign Intervention and Gender Violence

CHAP T ER ONE Introduction: Foreign Intervention and Gender Violence W hen the russian borders opened in the early 1990s, the international community responded with an unprecedented torrent of attention to issues such as rape, sexual harassment, domestic violence , and later, trafficking in women. Small grants and then larger grants funded Russian academics to research and then to create crisis centers and other nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to help women living with such violence. Every kind of donor—from small feminist groups and charitable foundations to international development agencies—seemed interested in helping Russians address violence against women. Young Western feminists arrived on exchange programs, bringing the experience of shelter movements and rape crisis centers in their backpacks; transnational feminists arrived as part of new global networks. Passionate lawyers and judges, many with long-standing interest in Russia or gender violence, hopped on transcontinental planes, hoping to advance human rights and the rule of law. States and the evolving European Union sent diplomats to important international meetings to speak about gender violence and law enforcement experts to train their Russian counterparts. There was so much interest that many activists in Russia assumed that the problem of gender violence had been solved in the West—why else would foreigners pay so much attention to violence against women in other places? 2 gender violence in russia The bulk of the intervention came from the United States, the leading donor to Russia since the Soviet collapse. By 2006, more than $10 million had been distributed from donors—such as the U.S. Agency for International Development, the U.S. State Department, and the New York–based Ford Foundation—to small organizations for whom the grants were often substantial. Millions of U.S. dollars paid for public awareness campaigns and law enforcement and judicial trainings. The United States–based Human Rights Watch and the Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights—along with Amnesty International, the United Nations, and the International Organization for Migration—documented the Russian government ’s failures to provide even minimal assistance or protection to women experiencing violence. Other interventions were more unexpected, such as when the United States passed antitrafficking legislation that took the remarkable step of requiring other countries to meet U.S.-mandated standards or to suffer the termination of non-humanitarian assistance. When the United States delayed action , allies of a U.S.-Russian antitrafficking organization recruited U.S. evangelical Christians to lobby their conservative Congress members to promote change in Russia. These foreign interventions have had significant impact on Russian gender violence politics. From a feminist perspective, some of it seems good. So-called democracy assistance provided the necessary financial resources for an NGObased women’s crisis center movement that included, by 2004, some two hundred new organizations in two-thirds of Russia’s regions, most offering hotline counseling, some providing shelter, and many advocating for change in society. Awareness campaigns spread new consciousness of violence in the family and sometimes even evoked sympathy and outrage. Training of state personnel and foreign lobbying led to some significant reforms on domestic violence in Russian regions and to national legislation on trafficking in persons. By 2006, even the ministry in charge of Russian police seemed changed when it initiated a widespread campaign telling people to call local precincts if they are experiencing “violence in the family,” a new term for Russian people and a new responsibility for Russian authorities. These changes are remarkable given the typical accusations directed at women who suffered gendered violence: “Why did you [insert: talk to him, bring him back to your apartment, agree to go to dinner with him, wear that outfit, drink with him, flick your hair, marry him, agree to go abroad . . . or otherwise provoke him]?” The changes are also astonishing given the general rollback in state social services, the overall consequences for women’s political power and economic status of the shift from socialism, and the authorities’ previous widespread denial of the existence, prevalence, and severity of all types of violence against women by police. Antitrafficking legislation was surprising given that many Russian officials financially benefit from trafficking and prostitution. On the other hand, donors’ funding whims have hamstrung committed and effective organizations and programs and increased fragmentation in the women’s movement in Russia. Global controversies over how best to understand traffick- Introduction 3...