SSGM DISCUSSION PAPER 2012/2 Christianity, Masculinity and Gender Violence in Papua New Guinea RICHARD EVES State, Society & Governance in Melanesia http://ips.cap.anu.edu.au/ssgm Gender equality has become a major strategy for success in development work by donor agencies and non-government organisations (NGOs). In our region, AusAID and the New Zealand Aid Pro- gramme (NZAID) stress the importance of gender equality in both their policy documents and their delivery of aid (AusAID 2007; NZAID 2007). Much of the impetus for this has come from the United Nations (UN) Millennium Declaration, which states unequivocally that progress towards gender equal- ity is essential if poverty is to be eradicated and sus- tainable development achieved. One result of the focus on gender equality is that the issue of violence against women, a violence based on gender, has become a major concern of development practitioners. Recognising how widespread the problem of violence against women is, the 2006 UN Secretary-General’s In-Depth Study on all Forms of Violence Against Women Report asserts that ‘as long as violence against women continues, we cannot claim to be making real progress towards equality, development and peace’ (UNGA 2006:9). Some of the highest incidences of violence against women in the world are reported for the Pacific. The problem is particularly severe in the cultural region of Melanesia (Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Papua and Fiji). Due to limited data, the exact extent of the violence is unknown, but the available figures paint a bleak picture. Recent national figures from Solomon Islands reveal prevalence rates of sexual/ physical partner violence of 64 per cent among ever- partnered women aged 15–49, with 42 per cent of women reporting this in the past 12 months (Secre- tariat of the Pacific Community 2009:3). The problem of violence against women is especially acute in the largest country of the region, Papua New Guinea. No nationwide generalisable research has been undertaken in Papua New Guinea since the Law Reform Commission’s research in the 1980s, 1 but reports from the police, the media, anecdotal evidence and an increasing number of reports by NGOs and donor agencies indicate that gender violence, especially violence against women, is endemic (Amnesty International 2006; Bradley 2001; Human Rights Watch 2005, 2006; AusAID 2008; Haley 2005; Kopi et al. 2010). Week after week, horrific reports appear in the national media of women being killed by intimate partners or of cases of violent rape. In the face of such horror stories, it is easy to be pessimistic about the prospects for violence prevention in Papua New Guinea. Although in recent years the prime minister and other ministers have deplored the appalling levels of violence, it still largely remains the concern of donor agencies, NGOs and churches. My focus here is on the churches and how some churches are grappling with the problem of violence against women (particularly violence in the domestic or marital sphere). 2 It is important to take into account that violence against women is violence based on gender, because this demands a broader study of all the ways that gender, including masculinity, is constituted. Although there is an undeniable need for much stronger legal and judicial measures, gender vio- lence is a complex problem that cannot be solved by this alone. 3 This is not merely because much gender violence is not brought to the notice of the law, or because police and judiciary often have lit- tle capacity or willingness to deal with the issue but, more essentially, because legal and judicial measures do not address the root causes of gender violence (Eves 2010a:68). 4 Beyond creating a legal and policy environment supportive of women’s rights, a pri- mary prevention approach focuses on preventing