WUNRN
WAVE - Women Against Violence Europe
Direct Link to Full 326-Page WAVE
Report:
On an annual basis WAVE conducts research on services available to women survivors of violence in 46 European countries. The findings are important as they reflect on whether European countries’ observe the related Council of Europe Taskforce Recommendations on Combating Violence against Women, including Domestic Violence, as well as the recent Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women, including domestic violence.
WAVE Country
Report 2012:
Reality Check on Data Collection and European
Services for Women and Children Survivors of Violence: A Right for Protection
and Support?
The
WAVE Country Report 2012 titled Reality Check on Data Collection and
European Services for Women and Children Survivors of Violence: A Right for
Protection and Support? focuses largely on availability of women's
services in Europe for women survivors of violence and their children and on
statistics available in the area of domestic violence and/or intimate partner
violence in European countries. Reliable statistics on the rates of violence
against women are not always publically available, not gender disaggregated, or
do not show a distinction between DV and IPV. Prevalence studies, police and
court statistics, not only provide an important overview of rates of violence
against women in a given country, but may also provide an insight into the
effectiveness of State institutions in dealing with violence against women.
Service provision in European countries for women survivors of violence,
including national women's helplines, women's shelters, women's centers and
rape crisis centers, most often does not meet the recommended minimum
standards.
The research
conducted for the WAVE Country Report 2012 is in the area of national
prevalence studies, national criminal statistics (police) and criminal justice
statistics (court), in addition to data collection in the healthcare system.
This includes providing estimated rates of violence against women, recorded rates
of violence against women, cases brought to court as well as conviction rates
in countries, where such data was available. Additionally, information on the
methods of data collection and presentation of the data is provided in each
country, where data was available. Another area addressed is the response of
the national healthcare system to domestic violence and/or intimate partner
violence, in recognition of the fact that a healthcare institution may
sometimes be the only place where a woman could have a chance to either
disclose violence or be given advice, including referrals, to other services,
or where violence may be detected by a medical professional.
‘Services available to women survivors of violence’ has been the main theme of
previous WAVE Country Reports (2008-2011) and continues to be a topic addressed
in the WAVE Country Report 2012. The focus is on the following services:
helplines, shelters, women’s centers and centers for women survivors of sexual
violence.
The report serves as a monitoring tool for use by relevent stakeholders, including government, NGO and academic experts to provide information on the standards in service provision and data collection, pointing out the gaps in practice and showing a path for the implementation of improvements in the field of combating violence against women and children.
