KWDI Korean Women’s Development Institute

A gender-sensitive analysis of precedents related to violence against women is expected to resolve the male-centered social norms while addressing the power imbalance between men and women, thus setting a direction for a balanced life for men and women. It will also contribute to ensuring the human rights of women who make up the majority of violence victims as well as realize what is envisioned by Article 10 of Koreas Constitution“All citizens shall be assured of human worth and dignity.” With the progress in laws relating to women and family, a number of precedents dealing with violence against women have been accumulated. However, there has been no study analyzing those precedents in earnest in quantitative terms, let alone suggestions for improvement. In this study, a gender-sensitive approach will be used to analyze precedents concerning violence against women, particularly sexual violence and domestic violence, and propose several legislative tasks.

This study is about the history of laws related to violence against women, changes in the way these laws have been utilized, a gender-sensitive analysis of precedents concerning sexual violence and domestic violence, and suggestions for legislative tasks. Several methods were employed in the study, which include literature research, collection and analysis of precedents relating to sexual violence and domestic violence, workshops for each topic of precedents relating to violence against women, and expert meetings for advice.

For precedents for sexual violence, 705 cases of rape and forced indecent acts brought to courts of third instance between 2000 and 2013 have been analyzed. For precedents for domestic violence, 56 family protection cases focusing on violence, injuries and assaults by spouses, and 582 criminal cases were analyzed from a gender-sensitive perspective.

From the gender-sensitive perspective, legislative tasks proposed from sexual violence precedents include the establishment of disagreed adultery and improvement of sexual violence laws. Legislative tasks proposed from domestic violence precedents include a change in the legislation paradigm for laws covering special cases of domestic violence and actualization of punishment against domestic violence crimes. Other suggestions include raising the awareness of gender sensitivity and human rights sensitivity among law enforcers.