Authored By: Birhan Asmare Adane
Bahirdar University
Abstract
Women in Ethiopia face many risks because of problems like conflict, displacement, harmful traditions, poverty, disability, and weak law enforcement. Even though the constitution and criminal law forbid violence and harmful practices, these laws are not always applied well, and survivors often do not get enough support especially in emergency situations. This article uses social work ideas like intersectionality and ecological systems to explain why women are vulnerable. It looks at recent data (2023–2025), legal rules, and how courts and services respond. It also shows the gap between policy and real life, reviews new steps like GBV guidelines, and suggests practical solutions: better survivor services, protection orders, community action, rules for online abuse, and strong data systems. The article argues that using social work principles empowerment, safety, dignity, and teamwork can help close these gaps and protect women’s.
Introduction
Gender based violence (GBV) remains one of Ethiopia’s most pervasive protection concerns, intensified by recent conflicts, displacement, and climate shocks. Humanitarian straps in late 2024 highlight GBV as a major protection risk across conflict affected regions, with service delivery trailing needs due to access and resource constraints.
Across 2023–2025 syntheses, common drivers include insecurity, economic decline, entrenched patriarchal norms, displacement and weak rule of law exposing women and adolescent girls (especially those with disabilities or heading households) to multiple forms of violence (IPV, rape, abduction, denial of resources, early marriage, FGM/C).
Thesis/Objective. This article, written from a social work lens, examines (i) the legal framework and its application, (ii) judicial and practice responses, and (iii) system gaps that perpetuate vulnerability then sets out a survivor centered “way forward” rooted in social work practice and recent policy reforms.
Research Methodology
This is an analytical/doctrinal and comparative review triangulating (a) humanitarian and academic syntheses (2022–2025), (b) Ethiopian constitutional/penal provisions and national strategies, and (c) African regional standards (Maputo Protocol). It integrates social work frameworks intersectionality and ecological systems to interpret vulnerability and practice responses.
Main Body
Legal Framework (Ethiopia & Regional)
Domestic norms. The FDRE Constitution protects bodily integrity and prohibits cruel, inhuman treatment, guarantees equality, and recognizes women’s rights including protection from harmful customs. The criminal law penalizes rape and domestic violence, while ant trafficking instruments impose severe penalties; however, Ethiopia lacks a comprehensive standalone domestic violence act and holistic civil remedies.
Harmful practices. National strategies target child marriage and Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting FGM/C, and Ethiopia has adopted a Costed Roadmap (2020–2024) to end these practices, yet prevalence remains high in several regions and enforcement is uneven.
Regional standards. The Maputo Protocol guarantees extensive rights protection from violence and harmful practices, access to justice and health, minimum age of marriage, and survivor support setting a benchmark for domestication and implementation in Ethiopia. Ongoing AU commemorations and analyses emphasize closing ratification/implementation gaps and addressing reservations that narrow protections
Practice reality. Legal pluralism customary and religious for an exercising de facto authority poses persistent challenges to women’s rights enforcement and remedies, even where formal law meets international standards.
Judicial Interpretation & Evidence
Judicial and system assessments find restricted definitions of GBV in national law, lack of civil protective orders, and procedural barriers (e.g., survivor unfriendly processes). Case mapping in federal courts highlights gaps in victim centered approaches and limited coordination across justice and social services.
In conflict affected Northeast Amhara (2023 community survey), 39% of women and girls reported GBV, with emotional violence most prevalent, followed by physical and sexual violence; risk heightened for divorced women, substance users, those with low social support, and conflict participants.
A 2025 systematic review and meta-analysis estimates pooled GBV prevalence among Ethiopian women at 51.34%, identifying associated factors such as urban residence, young age, alcohol use, tight family control, and relationship characteristics underscoring the need for tailored prevention.
Public attitudes complicate enforcement: while most Ethiopians condemn violence against women, a majority view domestic violence as a private matter, impeding police involvement and judicial redress.
Critical Social Work Analysis (Loopholes, Challenges, Comparative Insights)
Intersectionality. Women’s vulnerability is not monolithic: disability, displacement (IDPs/ Internally Displaced Persons /refugees), poverty, age, marital status, and digital exposure intersect producing differentiated risks and barriers to help seeking. Intersectional social work frameworks call for disaggregated analysis and responses across micro macro systems.
Ecological systems. Applying the Life Model, risk factors span individual (trauma, health), micro system (family power dynamics), mesosystem (school/community leaders), exosystem (service access, media), and macro system (laws, norms, conflict). Effective intervention must be multi-layered and non-hierarchical, strengthening person in environment transactions and survivor agency.
Legal and service gaps. Studies consistently flag (i) absence of a comprehensive domestic violence /DV/ statute with civil protection orders, (ii) intermittent enforcement on harmful practices, (iii) limited survivor centered case management, and (iv) weak coordination/monitoring across sectors especially in humanitarian contexts and IDP sites.
Online GBV. Digital violence mirrors offline oppression; Ethiopia’s frameworks to address technology facilitated abuse stalking, non-consensual intimate imagery, cyber harassment remain under developed compared to regional peers, requiring regulatory and practice updates.
Recent Developments
National GBV SOPs (2024). Ministry of Women, Children, and Youth (MoWSA), with United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and Gender-Based Violence Area of Responsibility (GBV AoR), launched Standard Operating Procedures for GBV prevention, risk mitigation and response aimed at cross sector protocols, referral, and survivor support. Implementation fidelity and resourcing are now the key tests.
Response services scale up (2023–2024). Through World Bank supported efforts, Women and Girl-Friendly Safe Spaces in Tigray enabled 681,000+ women and girls to access GBV services, with 281,000+ receiving MHPSS illustrating the impact of integrated, donor supported models in conflict recovery.
Humanitarian context (2024). OCHA (United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs,) emphasizes GBV risks persisting alongside drought/floods and conflict, with 10.2 million people assisted across sectors yet protection responses lag demand, reinforcing the need for coordinated, data driven prioritization.
Case Management Guideline (2025). Ethiopia launched its first national GBV Case Management Guideline, standardizing survivor centered referral and care across sectors an important systems step requiring capacity building and accountability.
FGM/C & child marriage trends. Despite declines, FGM/C remains ~65% among women 15–49 nationally (EDHS 2016), with entrenched pockets and risk of pushback in rural/conflict
affected areas; child marriage still affects ~40% of girls <18, underscoring the enforcement challenge.
Suggestions / Way Forward
- Enact a comprehensive Domestic Violence Act with civil protection orders. Define GBV holistically, provide protection orders, emergency housing, financial relief, and clear police duties; harmonize with criminal provisions and the Maputo Protocol.
- Institutionalize survivor centered case management nationwide. Fully roll out the GBV SOPs (2024) and Case Management Guideline (2025) with training, supervision, and audits; integrate one stop centers linking health, psychosocial, legal aid, and safe shelter; guarantee disability inclusive access.
- Strengthen community level prevention using ecological & intersectional models. Resource social workers to convene multi-system safety networks (families, schools, elders, faith leaders), address norms, and build survivor pathways especially in IDP/refugee contexts where legal pluralism is strong.
- Combat harmful practices through coordinated enforcement + social change. Pair prosecutions with community education, alternative rites, and economic supports for ex-practitioners; monitor with disaggregated data to track hotspots and backlash risk.
- Address technology facilitated GBV. Update laws to cover non-consensual intimate imagery, cyber stalking, doxing; equip police and social workers with digital evidence protocols; collaborate with platforms for rapid takedowns.
- Humanitarian protection mainstreaming. Embed GBV risk mitigation across WASH, shelter, health, food systems; expand Safe Spaces and mobile MHPSS; fund confidential grievance mechanisms; maintain service continuity during access constraints.
- Data & accountability. Establish national GBV data dashboards (privacy preserving) to monitor referrals, case outcomes, and enforcement; commission independent reviews on legal pluralism’s impact and Maputo domestication progress.
Conclusion
Ethiopia’s formal legal framework anchored in constitutional protections and criminal prohibitions set important norms against GBV and harmful practices. Yet women’s vulnerability persists due to implementation gaps, legal pluralism, humanitarian stressors, and social attitudes treating domestic violence as “private.” Recent policy advances the GBV SOPs, expansion of Safe Spaces, and a national case management guideline offers a pathway to system change. Centering social work practice intersectional assessment, ecological prevention, and survivor centered care, and multi sector coordination can convert legal promises into lived protection and dignity, in line with the Maputo Protocol’s vision.
References / Bibliography
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