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Beyond the Law: Using Legal Literacy to Prevent Gender-Based Violence/Violence Against Women and Girls
By Catherine Cox
Content Warning: This material discusses topics of sexual and gender-based violence, which may be distressing to some readers.
If you or someone you know needs support, please scroll to the bottom for resources.
A note on language:
Throughout this article, I use the term Violence Against Women and Girls/Gender-Based Violence (VAWG/GBV). These terms are often used interchangeably to refer to multiple forms of violence that are underpinned by gender inequality and harmful gender norms that disproportionately, but not exclusively, impact women and girls.
Gender-Based Violence (GBV) is often used as an umbrella term to refer to a range of gendered harms, while Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) refers to specific forms of GBV to which women and girls are disproportionately vulnerable. This can include sexual violence and exploitation, domestic and intimate partner abuse, so-called "honor" killings, FGM/C, acid attacks, female foeticide, sex trafficking, and other forms of abuse.
A National Emergency Beyond the Courtroom
Gender-Based Violence/Violence Against Women and Girls (GBV/VAWG) has increasingly become a focus of public attention throughout the UK. High-profile cases, such as the murder of Sarah Everard and the Plymouth shootings, have prompted difficult conversations about misogyny, violence, and the systems that are failing to prevent harm and support survivors. More recently, documentaries such as Louis Theroux's Inside the Manosphere have highlighted the rise of digital harm and online “influencers” who promote hostility towards women and reinforce harmful gender norms.
In 2024, the National Police Chiefs' Council declared violence against women and girls a national emergency, describing the scale and impact of the issue as having reached "epidemic levels". The Office for National Statistics reports that violence against women and girls accounts for 20% of all recorded crime across the United Kingdom, and the Femicide Census further found that one woman is killed by a man every three days in the UK.
The sheer scale of GBV/VAWG has led many organisations (including the UK Police Foundation) to argue that violence against women and girls should be understood not only as a criminal justice issue, but also as a public health emergency. One that requires a whole systems response to tackle.
Yet, within the work to end GBV/VAWG, we often focus on creating stronger laws and harsher penalties for perpetrators, but spend far less time considering whether communities can understand and access the protections that already exist. I believe that legal literacy efforts are an important piece of community prevention effort that receives far less attention than it deserves. Legal literacy is not simply about knowing the law. It can be a powerful prevention tool that helps individuals recognise abuse, understand their rights, and access support before violence escalates.
Why Law Alone Is Not Enough
Compared to many countries across the world, the UK has relatively strong legal frameworks to address violence against women and girls. Legislation such as the Equality Act 2010, Sexual Offences Act 2003, Domestic Abuse Act 2021, and Online Safety Act 2023 provide important protections for women and girls in workplaces, homes, online spaces, and within the criminal justice system.
These laws matter. They establish legal definitions of abuse, create routes to justice, and hold perpetrators accountable. They also recognise forms of gendered harm that were once overlooked or minimised. For example, it was only in 1991 that rape within a marriage was recognised and prosecuted as rape under UK law. Yet, recent statistics have shown that, despite these laws, GBV/VAWG remains endemic within the UK.
Organisations such as the End Violence Against Women Coalition have repeatedly highlighted the gap between legal rights on paper and women's experiences in practice. Low charging rates, lengthy investigations, poor treatment by police, and the retraumatising nature of criminal proceedings continue to discourage many survivors from seeking justice. The Casey Review and Angiolini Inquiry, both commissioned following the rape and murder of Sarah Everard by a serving Metropolitan Police officer, exposed serious concerns about the prevalence of misogyny within institutions that are meant to protect women. What these findings demonstrate is that legal protections alone are only one part of the solution.
The attitudes that enable violence begin long before GBV/VAWG cases reach a courtroom. They are embedded within communities, relationships, schools, workplaces, and online spaces. They are reinforced by social norms that diminish women's autonomy and by the stigma and shame that survivors often face when they speak about abuse.
If we want to prevent violence rather than simply respond to it, it is crucial that we engage with communities and survivors themselves. I have spent much of my time working with communities across the UK to understand the shortcomings in the law and why GBV/VAWG continues to be such a pervasive issue.
Legal Literacy as Prevention
In my work across the UK, as well as the United States, and internationally, I have seen the important role legal literacy can play in prevention efforts. When people understand their rights, they are often better equipped to identify abusive behaviour, seek support, and advocate for themselves and others. Legal literacy can also challenge misconceptions about what abuse looks like and clarify the protections available to survivors.
This is particularly important for women and girls who may face additional barriers when accessing support, including migrant women, refugee communities, disabled women, working class women, and those with limited experience of navigating legal systems. Research by Dr Katherine Brickell has found that programmes designed to improve legal literacy can be critical in overcoming barriers to justice. Yet, in my work across communities I have seen how legal education remains an underused prevention tool within many community settings.
Throughout my career, I have tried to incorporate legal education into community prevention work wherever possible. One experience that has stayed with me was a time when I was invited to lead a session with a group of young refugee and asylum-seeking women and girls on the topic of healthy relationships. Alongside typical discussions about consent, boundaries, and recognising abuse, I also explored some of the legal protections available in the UK. This included information about the Migrant Victims of Domestic Abuse Concession, which can provide access to support for migrant survivors whose immigration status is linked to an abusive partner, as well as protective measures such as non-molestation orders and Domestic Abuse Protection Orders, otherwise known as DAPOs.
The conversation and reflections I heard from the young women after this session were some of the most powerful I have been a part of throughout my career. Several participants spoke about how they felt more confident in their ability to seek help if they ever needed it and in their understanding of where to go for support. Others reflected on how they could share this information with family members and members of their wider communities if anything were to happen. It was clear that this was a lesson that would not just live with them, but that they would take back and use if another friend or family member ever came to them for help.
After the session was done, one young woman came up to me and quietly wondered out-loud whether her mother might have been able to leave her abusive marriage sooner if she had been told about the kind of support and legal protections available when she was young as well.
That moment has stayed with me throughout my time in community settings because it illustrated something that is so often overlooked in our advocacy and policy work; laws can only protect people if they know those protections exist and how to access them.
Building Safer Communities
Legal literacy, however, is only one side of the equation. It is crucial that communities also play a greater role in shaping the laws and policies that affect them. Far too often, legal reform takes place without meaningful engagement with survivors and frontline organisations. This can create deadly gaps between policy intentions and the lived realities of survivors.
A current example can be seen in the ongoing treatment of survivors who have endured repeat victimization within criminal proceedings. Currently, with the UK courts, survivors disclosers of previous sexual abuse (even if unrelated to the case in court) can be used as evidence of “bad character” to discredit them in court. The End Violence Against Women Coalition has worked closely with survivors to challenge the use of previous disclosures of sexual violence as so called "bad character" evidence. Survivors and advocates have argued that this practice can undermine survivors' credibility, discourage them from speaking out about harm, and retraumatise those seeking justice.
These conversations demonstrate why survivor voices are essential to legal reform. Effective laws must be informed not only by legal expertise, but also by the experiences of those most affected by violence and the communities that surround them.
The same principle applies to prevention. Community organisations, educators, survivors, and legal professionals all have a role to play in addressing the attitudes and inequalities that underpin violence against women and girls.
Looking Beyond the Courtroom
It is undeniable that the law remains one of the most powerful tools available to challenge violence against women and girls. Legal protections, accountability, and justice matters to survivors and their communities. Yet law alone cannot change the attitudes, norms, and inequalities that allows GBV/VAWG to flourish both in the UK and globally.
If we are serious about ending violence against women and girls, legal reform must be accompanied by investment in community prevention, legal literacy, and meaningful engagement with survivors. The courtroom will always have an important role to play, but lasting change begins much earlier.
By bridging the gap between law and community, we can move beyond responding to violence and begin building the conditions that prevent it.
What To Do If You or a Loved One Needs Support
Despite the many challenges faced by survivors of VAWG/GBV, there are organisations working tirelessly across England and Wales to help survivors access safety, justice, and pathways towards healing.
EVAW has compiled a list of organisations that can provide support:
https://www.endviolenceagainstwomen.org.uk/find-help/
You are not alone, and help is available.
Catherine Cox,
Community Prevention Officer,
Women and Girls Network
https://www.linkedin.com/in/catherine-c-cox
https://www.linkedin.com/company/women-and-girls-network
Catherine is a human and women's rights advocate with experience in policy, research, and frontline prevention. Her work focuses on empowering women, girls, and vulnerable communities through trauma-informed and survivor-centred approaches. She holds a Master of Arts in Human Rights Law from SOAS University of London and has received several honours for her work, including the James P. Warburg Award.
June 26