Punishment alone cannot stop violence against women

South Korea has repeatedly tightened laws in response to stalking murders, digital sex crimes and intimate partner killings. But global experts say the country’s next challenge is focusing not only on how to punish violence against women, but how to prevent it.

That requires treating violence against women as a systemic problem that demands long-term prevention across government, according to Melissa Alvarado, program specialist on Ending Violence against Women at UN Women’s Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, and Dean Peacock, co-founder of MenEngage Global Alliance, a global NGO network.

In a joint interview with The Korea Herald, the two experts said governments needed national strategies that address the structural causes of violence through coordinated policies spanning education, healthcare, social welfare, justice and the private sector.

“We do have to pay attention to this whole collection of laws and policies,” Alvarado said, saying governments increasingly recognize prevention as the most effective approach.

Korea has strengthened its legal response to stalking and gender-based violence in recent years. Under the Framework Act on the Prevention of Violence Against Women, the government compiles national statistics every three years, drawing together data from multiple agencies.

Yet experts noted that official data on femicide — the killing of women and girls because of their gender — remained fragmented, making it difficult to understand patterns of violence and evaluate prevention efforts in the country.

Alvarado said emerging international research suggests that a wide range of policies — not only laws directly addressing violence against women — can significantly reduce abuse before it occurs.

Alcohol regulation, education policy, cash transfer programs, inheritance rights, marriage and divorce laws, and social protection measures all influence women’s ability to live free from violence, she said.

“It’s not only legislation on violence against women that can produce change,” she said. “It’s education policy, laws on marriage, age of marriage, laws on divorce, inheritance or property law. These are all very powerful.”

Such policies matter because they shape whether people have the option to leave abusive relationships, she explained.

“Just having a broader set of options and opportunities available to her makes a big difference.”

Peacock agreed that preventing violence requires governments to look beyond criminal justice approaches.

Drawing on research conducted through South Africa’s participation in the international What Works to Prevent Violence program, he said violence was driven by multiple, interconnected factors.

According to Peacock, researchers found that men who held inequitable gender attitudes were more likely to perpetrate violence, but childhood trauma, food insecurity, heavy alcohol use and poverty proved even stronger predictors.

“Gender norms are important, but they’re not the only thing that’s important,” Peacock said. “Our interventions must address this complexity.”

The findings suggest that governments should invest not only in changing attitudes but also in preventing childhood violence, expanding parenting support, addressing harmful alcohol use and reducing economic insecurity.

“For women’s experiences of violence, the gender of the perpetrator is quite clear,” Peacock said. “If we want to reduce women’s experiences of violence, quite simply we have to engage men and boys.”

But engaging men, Alvarado emphasized, should not come at the expense of women’s leadership.

While more men are becoming involved in gender equality, she cautioned that some initiatives risked focusing only on surface-level solutions.

She pointed to arguments that protecting women means restricting where they can go.

“Women don’t want to be kept at home,” she said. “They want to be working, participating, and they want to be safe wherever they are.”

Instead, she argued, conversations about engaging men must challenge the institutions and structures that continue to reinforce unequal gender norms.

That task has become increasingly difficult as a backlash against feminism spreads across many countries, often amplified through online platforms.

Alvarado said social media algorithms, misinformation and political polarization have intensified hostility toward women’s rights.

“It really seems to be spinning these narratives that women’s rights are somehow harmful, or that men are losing,” she said.

Peacock argued that the backlash should not simply be dismissed as a spontaneous social phenomenon.

“There may be some grievances,” he said, referring to the economic uncertainty experienced by many young men. “But they get amplified by people with very particular agendas.”

Political leaders, he said, often redirect public frustration toward women or minority groups instead of addressing deeper structural economic problems.

Rather than deepening divisions between men and women, both experts argued that policymakers should create opportunities for dialogue and build policies based on shared interests.

“I don’t think we need to divide the world into these two distinct categories,” Peacock said. “There are men and women who together recognize the violence has to stop.”

Korea’s experience illustrates many of the challenges the experts described.

The country has strengthened legal protections in recent years, including enacting the Stalking Punishment Act in 2021 and expanding measures against digital sex crimes. Yet women’s rights advocates have repeatedly argued that policy responses remain largely reactive, often introduced after high-profile crimes trigger public outrage.

One of the biggest gaps, the experts said, is data.

Alvarado said many governments still lack a clear picture of the most severe forms of violence against women because cases are not systematically analyzed.

“Femicide is a much quieter conversation in Asia and the Pacific,” she said. “We’re trying to change that.”

She said studying femicide is not merely about terminology but about understanding the pathways that lead to lethal violence.

“If we understand what’s driving it, then we can better understand how to prevent it and how to respond better,” she said.

The issue resonates in Korea, where there is no separate legal classification for femicide. While civic groups and researchers have attempted to track suspected gender-motivated killings for years, official government statistics identify homicide victims by gender, but do not combine this with information on the motive or other data.

Better data, Alvarado argued, would enable governments to identify high-risk cases earlier, strengthen interventions, and improve cooperation among police, health authorities and social welfare agencies.

Alvarado highlighted National Action Plans on violence against women adopted in countries including Cambodia and East Timor as examples of how governments can coordinate efforts across ministries and sectors.

“The process of developing this type of plan is incredibly valuable,” she said. “If it’s done well — if it’s a consultative process — the final product really represents how addressing this issue is a shared responsibility.”

Instead of leaving the issue to a single ministry, a national action plan assigns clear responsibilities across government agencies while incorporating researchers, civil society organizations and businesses.

She added that effective plans should also involve ministries that are often left out of gender discussions, including the finance and planning ministries responsible for budgeting and implementation.

Governments should also consult survivors when designing policies, she said, describing women with lived experience of violence as experts whose perspectives often improve legislation and support systems.

Peacock said South Africa’s National Strategic Plan on Gender-Based Violence offers one possible model. For such strategies to succeed, he said, governments need to move beyond symbolic commitments.

“If it’s not costed, it’s wishful thinking,” Peacock said, arguing that national plans should include dedicated budgets, clear political leadership and independent monitoring by civil society.