Understanding Forced Marriage
Dr. Khatidja Chantler
Reader, School of Social Work
Email: kchantler@uclan.ac.uk
Forced Marriage: An abuse of human
rights
• “Marriage shall be entered into only with the free
and full consent of the intending spouses.”
(Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article
16 (2))
• “A woman’s right to choose a spouse and enter
freely into marriage is central to her life and her
dignity and equality as a human being.” (General
Recommendation No. 21, UN Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against
Women)
What is Forced Marriage?
• Difficult to define Forced Marriage (FM). HO
definition:
‘Where one or both parties are coerced into a
marriage against their will and under duress¹’
• Lack of consent (one or both parties)
• Duress: includes emotional, physical, financial
and other forms of violence
• Positioned as distinct from arranged marriage
• Is FM an issue of Honour based violence (HBV)?
• Several government initiatives to prevent forced
marriage
¹ http://www.communities.homeoffice.gov.uk/raceandfaith/faith/forcedmarriages
Arranged Marriage
• Where family introduce young people to each
other based on certain criteria (e.g. language,
religion, job)
• Where both parties consent to marry
• Romantic love may occur during courtship, but is
assumed that love and commitment will develop
in time
• Courtship periods are quite condensed compared
to Euro/American cultural practices
• Growing significance of dating websites
Slippery categories: Arranged or
Forced Marriage
Slippage between arranged and forced in some cases,
especially when arranged marriage happens at the level
of social expectation.
I had the choice to say, erm I wasn’t forced into
saying yes. But I think my mum, my parents didn’t
give me enough time, or didn’t, they didn’t, even
though I was about fourteen, fifteen, that’s no
age to ask a girl does she want to get engaged to
someone
(survivor, FM, Hester et al, 2007)
Forced Marriage Research in the UK
7 studies in the UK since 2006:
• Gangoli et al (2006) (study based in Newcastle)
• Hester et al (2007): Manchester, Birmingham, London
• Brandon & Hafez (2008)
• Khanum (2008): Luton
• Natcen 2009: Prevalence study
• MoJ (2009) – Number of FMPOs and courts using them
• Freeman, M & Klein, R. (2013) College and University
Responses to Forced Marriage
Quantitative Data on Forced Marriage
• Difficult to measure Forced Marriage: when
should actions be counted as a case of FM?
Before or after the marriage?
• Available information is largely about South Asian
communities
• Kazmirski et al study (2009): 5000-8000 cases of
FM in 2008
• Forced Marriage Unit also produces data (largely
based on transnational marriages):
• 2013: 1302; 2012: 1485; 2011: 1468 ; 2010: 1735;
2009:1682. Approximately 20% are male victims.
In 2013, 33% were aged 18-21
Forced Marriage Research in the UK: Key
themes
• Lack of adequate recording of incidents of FM –
in part because of definitional issues (Hester et al
2007) and what counts as a ‘case’ (Nat Cen 2009)
• Majority of victims are young, South Asian
women, but FM occurs in a range of communities
(Hester et al 2007; Khanum 2008)
• Differences in the conceptualisation of FM: is it
purely cultural (Branden & Hafiz) or is part of
gender based violence (Gangoli et al 2011)
• Lack of professional knowledge and fear of
intervention (Chantler, 2001, MoJ 2009)
Key Interlinked Concepts
 ‘Race Anxiety’
 Cultural Privacy
 Cultural Matching
 Culturalised thinking which positions western women
as individuals but minoritsed women as cultural beings
 Feminist concerns becoming co-opted as part of the
state apparatus in unhelpful ways
 Politics as shaping what can be spoken
 Intersections of practitioner/organisational and macro
issues
Connect Centre for International Research on Interpersonal Violence and Harm
Political Contexts and
Speaking Out
 Batsleer et al (2002): Manchester DV helpline reported
drop in Muslim women contacting the helpline post
9/11.
because that [majority]community over there doesn’t
know me, doesn’t want me doesn’t trust me and so,
particularly if you’re from a Muslim background, it’s like
you’re, it’s like your choices have suddenly over the last
couple of years been diminished as a Muslim woman,
diminished over time diminished with the politics and
so the community feels like it’s under siege and
(women) are part of that community and therefore
they feel as though they are under siege and therefore
they’re not going to go and take the risks and have that
trusting relationship with the mainstream…
(survivor of forced marriage, Hester et al 2007)
Connect Centre for International Research on Interpersonal Violence and Harm
‘Race Anxiety’
 A term introduced by Chantler et al, 2001 to
express the discomfort of practitioners working
with race and their fear of being labelled ‘racist’
and was also found more recently re: FMPO
 Privileging culture over gender runs the risk of
overlooking violence and abuse as it is presented as
a cultural issue and therefore not amenable to
intervention
 Limitations of ‘culturally sensitive’ practice – what
about gender and other social divisions?
Connect Centre for International Research on Interpersonal Violence and Harm
Shame and Honour
 VAW in minoritsed communities often badged as




‘cultural’, but not in majority cultures – and this is
problematic
VAW constructed as an aberration in majority cultures,
but as a norm in minority cultures
Available information shows that VAW happens in all
communities so this challenges the notion of cultural
specificity – and of cultural ‘others’
Are honour and shame restricted to particular
communities?
‘Race’ anxiety, shame and honour
Connect Centre for International Research on Interpersonal Violence and Harm
Razack’s critique of Wikan
13
 Problematizing feminsim
 Implication that westerners have values (liberal,
egalitarian) whilst Muslims have cultures (oppressive,
patriarchal)
 Over determining culture obscures structural
relationships based on ‘race’ and class
 Implicit in Wikan’s work is the self-image of the West as
‘outside’ of culture
(Razack, 2004)
Connect Centre for International Research on Interpersonal Violence and Harm
Which Communities? (Hester et al
2007)
Main Community
Targeted
Number
%
South Asian
43
37.4
Somali
20
17.4
Other African
19
16.5
Middle Eastern
17
14.8
Chinese
9
7.8
Latin American
7
7.1
115*
100
Learning Disability and Forced
Marriage (Ann Craft and Judith Trust)
• Children & adults with learning difficulties more likely
to be abused than their peers (Sullivan, P. and Knutson,
J. 2000)
• Difficulties of consent (both for person with LD and
their potential spouse)
• Motivation: can be benign, but still an abuse of human
rights
• Gender: roughly equal numbers of men and women
• Specific guidelines (2010):
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uplo
ads/attachment_data/file/35533/fm-disabilityguidelines.pdf
Routes into Forced Marriage
(Hester et al 2007)
•
•
•
•
•
Financial
Social (gender inequalities)
Sexuality (compulsory heterosexuality)
Child marriage (and what is a child?)
Immigration (works both at the point of entry
and to restrict exit)
Poverty/Financial
• Use of women as commodities (bride price in
African communities intersects with ‘consent’ )
•
Poverty is the major thing…if she [prospective
in-laws] gives money, the family won’t ask [for
the young woman’s consent]…the money will buy
rice for them. …. Because of money, they will
send their kids [for marriage].
• Poverty in Chinese contexts – sale of women for
marriage
Poverty/Gender/Immigration
18
“ I was pregnant at the time and he drinks, so one day I
asked him where he was as I as taking his shoes off, you
have to take his shoes off, socks off everything, sometimes
soak his legs, and I asked him where he was and he didn’t
reply so I asked him again and the next thing he hitted me
on my face, I couldn’t believe this and again the next one,
I didn’t say anything he said how dare you ask me I didn’t
get married so you could ask me, you live under my roof,
you have to obey my rules I paid money for you and your
father knows you are here and you were given to me…
and I kept quiet…so I prepared the food, still crying and he
ate and went to bed”
Connect Centre for International Research on Interpersonal Violence and Harm
VAW & Asylum
 “Even if this country [UK] reject me I don’t know where I
will go…it will be my dead body going back [to Africa]. I
tried to commit suicide twice…I keep a diary in case and
leave it where someone can find in case I die…“I will kill
myself before I go back to Africa…I am ready for
that…It’s really too much…at any time they can call me
and say we are going to deport you…I live life by the
day”(M19).
(‘Failed’ asylum seeker, Hester et al, 2007)
Connect Centre for International Research on Interpersonal Violence and Harm
Compulsory Heterosexuality
• I will take that one step further and say in what community do
we not see the pressure of marriage, yeah, I would say that
we as a society are trained, from a very young age to believe
that there are particular roles we need to fulfil and the other
aspect of our life is that we want to fulfil those roles.
(Interviewee, Hester et al 2007)
• I guess for me I wouldn’t necessarily see that as just peculiar
to this community …I think that that’s happened in white
communities and majoritised communities as well…if you get
married then that will iron out all the, the bumps of your
sexuality so to speak and frankly that saying isn’t it, all she
needs is a good… husband wedding. (FG Participant, Hester et
al, 2007)
Child Marriage
• A man who is forty-five, marrying a sixteen
year or seventeen year old, is not marrying a
wife. He’s marrying a… slave. Someone he can
control. Someone he can tell to do what he
wants to do when. Somebody who doesn’t
know where to find help. Someone who is
locked in the house as he goes to work. You
know it’s just a way of, child abuse
(Interviewee, Hester et al, 2007)
Immigration
• Improving career and life chances (Foreign
nationals and UK nationals)
• Milbank and Dauvergne (2011): vulnerable brides
as ‘ours’ (nationals or dual nationals) and
imposed grooms as ‘theirs’ (migrant spouses), so
eliciting an immigration response to FM
• Women forced into marriage in non EC countries
and now claiming asylum in the UK on the basis
of gender persecution.
• Trafficking of women for marriage – illegal
immigration
Impact of Forced Marriage: Self-harm
It’s like something comes into you, You don’t feel scared
of killing yourself you get so fed up, so much abused, you
don’t care about anything, how much you’re going to
hurt yourself. There have been times I would have liked to
stab myself but they’d hidden all the knives. I was craving
for a knife to put inside me just wanted to finish myself –
no other way out. I was always thinking about killing
myself, feeling I had to. It was like I was in hell.”
(Survivor, aged 15 at the time of second forced marriage,
Chantler et al, 2001)
• Self-harm also emerged in survivor accounts in our
Hester et al study (Hester et al 2007)
• Bhui et al (2007) review of literature on rates, risk
factors and methods found a link between ‘arranged
marriages’ and self-harm
Exiting a Forced Marriage
• Most attention is paid to entry into rather
than exit from force marriage
• Need to consider both
• No recourse to public funds – financial
barriers, fear of deportation, asylum
• Stigmatisation of divorce for women
• Gendered surveillance post marriage
Forced Marriage in Asylum Cases
• Forced Marriage frequently presented as a
case within asylum claims
• FM as a human rights issues not seriously
considered in asylum cases (survivor accounts)
• Treated differently in different fields of social
policy
• Impact of such contradictions is that victims
are often left unprotected
Legal Measures
• Debates on criminalisation (two consultations)
• Civil Protection – Forced Marriage (Civil
Protection) Act 2007 – Nov. 2008
• Raising the age of marriage and sponsorship
(for non EU spouses) to 21 – implemented
Nov 2008, withdrawn 2011 (ruled unlawful)
• Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act
(2014) has made: i) FM a criminal offence and
ii) the breach of an FMPO a criminal offence
FM Civil Protection Act (2007)
• Courts have power to make Forced Marriage
Protection Orders.
• Breach of an injunction was not originally a
criminal offence, but a contempt of court.
Courts have the full range of sanctions
available to them, including imprisonment.
• Enables people to apply for an injunction at
the county courts, rather than just the high
courts
FM Civil Protection Act (2007)
• Forced Marriage Protection Orders – applies to
children and adults
• Enables victims to apply for an order
• Relevant third party can apply on behalf of victim
• Places FMU Guidelines on a statutory footing.
• Forced marriage similar to (and sometimes is)
child abuse or domestic violence
• SSD has a duty to investigate under s.47 Children
Act 1989 to protect children
Conclusions
• Focussing on routes in to and out of forced marriage
promises more than a culturalist framing
• Beware of how legitimate concerns of VAW/FM can be i)
co-opted by the state; ii) used to reinforce the superiority
of the West
• FM treated differently in different fields of social policy
resulting in victims often left unprotected
• The mental health impact of FM should not be
underestimated
• There needs to be increased recognition and intervention
in FM – cuts to (BME) women’s organisations unhelpful
• Further research
Reading/Resources (FM)
• Anitha, S. and Gill, A. (2009) Coercion, Consent and the
Forced Marriage Debate in the UK, Feminist Legal Studies 17
pp 165-184
• Brandon, J. & Hafez, S. (2008) Crimes of the Community:
Honour Based Violence in the UK, Centre for Social Cohesion
• Chantler, K., Gangoli, G. and Hester, M. (2009) ‘Forced
Marriage in the UK: Religious, Cultural,’ Economic or State
Violence? Critical Social Policy (November)
• Gill, A. and Anitha, S. (eds) (2011), Forced Marriage: Introducing a
social justice and human rights perspective. London: Zed.
• Gangoli, G & Chantler, K. (2009) Protecting Victims of Forced
Marriage: Is Age a Protective Factor? Feminist Legal Studies
vol. 17, no. 3 pp 267-288
Reading/Resources (FM)
• Hester et al (2007): Forced Marriage: the risk factors and effects of
raising the minimum age for a sponsor and of leave to enter the UK
as a spouse or fiancé(e):
http://www.bris.ac.uk/sps/research/projects/completed/2007/rk66
12/rk6612finalreport.pdf
• Gangoli, G., Chantler, K., Hester, M & Singleton, A (2011)
‘Understanding Forced Marriage: Definitions and Realities’. In
A. Gill and A. Sundari (eds) (Ed.), Forced Marriage: Introducing
a social justice and human rights perspective. London: Zed.
• Chantler, K. and Gangoli, G. (2011) ‘Domestic Violence in
Minority Communities’: Cultural Norm or Cultural Anomaly?’
In R. Thiara, M. Schroettle & S. Condon (eds) (Ed.), Violence
against Women and Ethnicity: Commonalities and Differences
across Europe
Reading/Resources (FM)
• Chantler, K. (2014) ‘What’s love got to do with
Marriage?’ Journal of Families, Relationships
and Society, Vol 3(1) pp. 19-33
• Chantler, K. (2012)Recognition of and
Intervention in Forced Marriage, Journal of
Trauma, Violence and Abuse 13 (3) pp 176-183
• Kazmirski et al (2009) Prevalence and Service
response. Available at:
http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/research/data/uploadfiles/
DCSF-RR128.pdf
• Forced Marriage Unit: fmu@fco.gov.uk
Making Research Count: Forced
Marriage Research, Policy and
Practice
Dr. Khatidja Chantler
Reader, School of Social Work
Email: kchantler@uclan.ac.uk