Good Practices of Gender Sensitive Policies in Combating VAW in Local Politics of Turkey

Moving from the assumption that policies, programs, and processes have different impacts on men and women due to their differentiated roles, needs and interests in society, gender mainstreaming calls for a new policy understanding to take these differences into consideration in the policy formulation process and its outcomes at all governmental levels. It is contended that there is a need to spotlight the critical roles local governments can play in the struggle against gender inequality, specifically concerning VAW, by adopting and implementing gender sensitive policies. The purpose of this paper is, thus, to present the selected good practices of gender-sensitive policies at the local level in combatting VAW in Turkey. A qualitative research method, based on the survey of the municipality facility reports, their strategic plans and publications in the period between 2004-2014, was employed. The good practices of the municipalities are classified under three categories: gender-sensitive budgeting; gender-sensitive collective labour contract; and women support agencies. In doing so, the goal is to display how successful stories may constitute models for developing strategies to increase the number of local governments adopting gender-sensitive policy to prevent and eradicate VAW.