Sports as a Gender Based Violence (GBV) Mitigation Strategy in Higher Education Institutions

Abstract

The gender-based nature of sexual and physical violence in higher education institutions has resulted in women’s disproportionate vulnerability compared to their male counterparts. The women here would include instructors, support staff and students. In such a context, women are denied equal opportunity to realize their full potential in spaces that are supposed to be inclusive and equal. To address this issue, this article proposes that empowerment interventions be implemented to provide women with knowledge and awareness about their human, socio-cultural agency and rights. This would allow women to emerge as strong leaders and combat the phenomenon of violence and discrimination. Drawing on extant literature on mitigation strategies for gender based violence (GBV) in higher education institutions, the study explores the efficacy of sport as a tool to increase women’s capacity to prevent and respond to GBV. Sport participation is shown to deconstruct dynamics of male dominance in sport while also empowering women to have more ownership and control over their bodies which is critical to prevent and mitigate GBV. The study concludes by advocating for the use of sport as a mitigation strategy not only in higher education contexts, but also in communities at large, as they are not immune to this pervasive problem. Overall, the research fits wells within national development vision since it has a high level of political support in conscientizing the community at large about GBV which in most cases becomes discriminatory (236).