There is increasing recognition that sexual violence victims have multiple and complex needs,
requiring the joint intervention of multiple sectors to generate a more effective response. As
such, multi-sector collaborations that integrate health, legal and psychosocial support
services are acknowledged as a best practice intervention. Despite the dearth of evidence on
how such integration approaches operate in resource-constrained settings, they continue to
be established and scaled up in parts of Africa. Using a qualitative case-study approach, this
thesis seeks to understand how integration approaches in Kenya and South Africa contribute
to the fulfilment of the human rights obligations of states to prevent and effectively respond
to sexual violence against women.
I use interview data to compare Kenya’s Gender Based Violence Recovery Centres and South
Africa’s Thuthuzela Care Centres across rural, peri-urban and urban contexts. The thesis
moves away from current analysis approaches, which assess integration models based on
separate, sector-specific outcome indicators, such as health or criminal justice system
outcomes. I use a feminist human rights perspective, based on the state’s responsibility to
exercise due diligence in prevention, protection, prosecution, punishment and provision of
adequate redress. This perspective facilitates the centrality of victims’ needs and rights in
assessing service integration models, while foregrounding the need for state accountability
to establish sustainable and effective sexual violence interventions.
I argue that multisector approaches that integrate sexual violence services are complex
networks, which produce different service orientations, shaped by the interactions of
collaborating partners, amidst fundamental systemic and structural flaws. In the governance
of collaboration systems, different service orientations emerge as stakeholders within
networks, wield their resources, mentalities, methods and institutions to produce certain
outcomes as priority over others. Consequently, as competing sector-specific mandates and
ideologies are prioritised, multi-sector approaches can eclipse and de-centre the needs and
rights of sexual violence victims.
To fulfil the state responsibility to exercise due diligence, there is a need to re-orientate
integration models in a way that centres the needs and rights of victims rather than the
competing institutional mandates of network players. This requires the implementation of a
victim-centred integration approach that goes beyond creating safe havens or protected
processes through specializations, to that of shifting deeply-rooted social and institutional
norms, which are the root causes of violence against women.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:uct/oai:localhost:11427/35308 |
| Date | 04 November 2021 |
| Creators | Lekakeny, Ruth Nekura |
| Contributors | Moult, Kelley, Smythe Deirdre |
| Publisher | University Of Cape Town, Faculty of Law, Department of Public Law |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis / Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
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