Ten per cent of Guyana’s women believe that a husband is justified in beating a wife if she neglects the children, demonstrates her autonomy ‒ for example by leaving the house without his permission ‒ refuses him sex, argues with him or burns the food. Older women who are married or are in unions account for the highest percentage of those who justify domestic violence of this kind.
The same percentage of men agrees that men should hit their wives, although the numbers vary according to the specific justification. This information was revealed in a recently released Guyana Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey Round 5 (MICS5) conducted in 2014 by the Bureau of Statistics. The project was part of a global MICS programme and technical support was provided by the United Nations Children’s fund (UNICEF), which also provided financing along with the Inter-American Bank (IDB) and the Guyana Government. The survey among other things, also looked at the age of marriage for women in the various age cohorts.
It is expected that the results from the new survey will be important for the final Millennium Development Gold (MDG) report and are expected to form part of the baseline data for the post-2015 era. “Justification in any of the five situations is more prevalent among those living in the poorest households (19%), less education women (22%-no education) and also those living in households with an Amerindian household head (27%),” the report said of the women who justified being beaten by their husband.
Women and men between the ages 15 and 49 were asked whether it was justifiable for men to beat their wives in the various situations (especially in the contexts where women have a lower status in society) as a disciplinary action for women’s non-compliance with certain expected gender roles. As such the survey only captures attitudes towards physical violence (beating) and does not include other forms of domestic violence.
Eight per cent of the women surveyed expressed the view that women should be beaten for neglecting their children while 5% of men felt the same way about this. Where arguing was concerned, 4% of men agreed that they should be beaten for this versus 3% of women. Three per cent of both men and women felt women should be beaten for going out without informing their husbands and 3% of men also felt that women should be beaten if they refused their partners sex, with 2% of the women concurring. And 2% of both men and women said women should be beaten if they burnt the food.
According to the survey only 3% of urban women justified violence in any of the situations listed above, compared to 13% of rural women, 9% of coastal women and 16% of interior women.
“Disparities are even greater by region, with Region 9 having the highest percentage in each of the situations: one in four women (27%) can justify violence in any of the situations, and between 11 to 17 percent of each of the five situations,” the report said.
On the other hand one in every five women (20-21%) in Regions 2 and 5 justify violence while in Region 10, the figure was 4% of women and in Region 6, 6% of women.
“It is noteworthy that women aged 45-49 years and those currently married/in union represent the highest percentages who justify violence 14% and 11% respectively), compared with women of other age groups and those who were formerly married/in union or never married/in union,” the report noted.
But in contrast to the above it was men between the ages of 15 and 19 and those who were never married who represented the highest percentages (14% and 13% respectively) of those who justified violence. And as was the case with women, men living in the poorest households and who were less educated were much more likely to justify violence, as were Amerindian household heads.
Early marriage and polygyny
Meanwhile, the survey found that among women aged 15-49, 4% were married before age 15 and in the case of women aged 20-49 years, more than one in four (27%) was married before the age of 18. Regions 1, 7 and 8 have the highest percentages of marriages before age 15 among women aged 15-49 years ‒ nine per cent in each case ‒ while Regions 2 and 6 have the lowest percentage (3% in each case). Region 9 has the highest percentage of women (41%) aged 20-49 years who were married before age 18, while Region 10 has the lowest (20%).
“Marriage before age 15 in both groups of women and marriage before age 18 are strongly related to the woman’s education and the socio-economic status of the household, with less educated and poorer women being more likely to be married/in union at a young age,” the survey said.”
Importantly, it was pointed out that looking across the age groups, early marriage does not show a declining or increasing trend, but appears to take place at a relatively stable frequency over the years. Early marriages are more prevalent among women living in Amerindian headed households.
It was also found that about one in eight girls between the ages of 15-19 (13%) are currently married, with the proportion being higher in rural areas (15%) as opposed to 9% in urban areas, but similar in coastal (13%) and interior (14%) areas. The highest percentages of girls aged 15-19 years who are currently married or in a union are living in Region 1 (32%), Regions 7 and 8 (21%) and Region 2 (17%), while the lowest percentage lives in Region 10 (5%). Girls aged 15-19 years form poorer households are more likely to be married than those from richer households.
“Of note, girls aged 15-19 years living in a household with an African household head are less likely to be married than those living in households with other ethnicities as household heads,” the report stated.
According to the survey child marriage results in low or no level of education, few or no skills, early pregnancy with its related physiological and psychological effects, and social isolation. It was pointed out that under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights the right to “free and full” consent to a marriage is recognized, and that consent cannot be “free and full” when one of the parties involved is not sufficiently mature to make an informed decision about a life partner. It was also noted that women who are married before age 18 tend to have more children than those who marry later in life. Pregnancy-related deaths are known to be a leading cause of mortality for both married and unmarried girls between the ages of 15 and 19, especially among the youngest of this cohort.
Evidence also suggests that young girls tend to marry older men and as such often the demand for the young wife to reproduce and the power imbalance resulting from the age difference leads to very low condom use among such couples, and this puts the girls at increased risk of sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV infection.
On another issue the survey found that 3% of women between the ages of 15-49 are in polygynous unions with it being more prevalent in Region 10 (10%) and least prevalent in Regions 2 and 9 (2% in each case). Additionally, the survey also found that polygynous relationships are most prevalent among women aged 40-44 years (7%), and least prevalent among the 15-19 and 25-49 age groups with 1%. Women with a higher level of education account for the highest proportion of polygynous unions (5%) compared to 2% of women with a primary education and (3%) with no education or a secondary education. On the other hand, there does not seem to be a clear relationship between polygynous unions among women and the socio-economic status of the household.
The global MICS programme was developed by UNICEF in the 1990s as an international household survey programme to support countries in the collection of internationally comparable data on a wide range of indicators on the situation of children and women. The surveys measure key indicators that allow countries to generate data to use in policies and programmes, and to monitor progress towards the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and other internationally agreed upon commitments.
