Vetten, L. (1998). Geography and Sexual Violence: Mapping rape in Johannesburg. In Development Update, Vol. 2. No. 2.
Lisa Vetten
In Development Update, Vol. 2, No. 2, 2000.
Lisa Vetten is the former Manager of the Gender Programme at the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation.
Sexual behaviour is often thought about in purely biological terns – a matter, merely, of penile tumescence, vaginal blood flow, nipple enlargement, stimulated brain centres and clitoral tissue chemistry. (Tiefer 1195:25) Writers and thinkers such as Foucalt, Gergen and Tiefer, to highlight just a few, have challenged this essentialist view by exploring the effects of socio-historical circumstances on human sexuality. As a result, a more complex and far richer understanding of sexuality is emerging. Adding to these enquiries, Lisa Vetten explores how urban design and maintenance may impact upon rape, one of the most violent and exploitative manifestations of sexuality. Her article also suggests how a geography of sexual violence can be mapped. She concludes that different urban environmental design and better use of resources for urban development and security can drastically reduce the threat of rape.
Early in 1996, the Institute for Social and Behavioural Studies at the University of South Africa (UNISA) began a surveillance project on rape. Its findings have subsequently been made use of by the Johannesburg Sexual Violence Forum.1 Questionnaires were distributed to the Johannesburg Medico-legal Clinic in the city and staff were asked to record a range of details about each sexual assault on a woman that they dealt with (such as the time and location of the assault, the number of assailants, and the relationship between perpetrators and victim). The questionnaires were later also distributed to the Lenasia and Chris Hani Baragwanath hospitals, both in the south-western reaches of Johannesburg.
This method of gathering information has its limitations, the most obvious being that it cannot provide any information about unreported cases. In addition, women who are seriously injured in a sexual assault are examined and treated at the Johannesburg Hospital so their details will not have been picked up at the three hospitals covered by the surveillance project, nor will those of women who report more than 72 hours after the attack since they are unlikely to receive a medical examination at all. Also, medical staff do not always have the time to complete the questionnaire after each case.
Data collection has been most successful from the Johannesburg Medico-legal Clinic, which contributed 70 per cent of the questionnaires analysed. Lenasia and Chris Hani Baragwanath hospitals together provided the rest. So the findings are a reflection of rape in the Johannesburg magisterial district in particular, rather than in Lenasia or Soweto.
The Rape Surveillance Project: Selected findings
Distinct patterns and trends in the incidence of rape emerge from an analysis of the approximately 800 cases recorded by the project to date.
The incidence of rape increased between 4pm and 6pm, reached a peak between 6pm and 10pm, and then began declining from 10pm. The decline was fastest between 10pm and 12pm.
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The majority of rapes occurred on Saturdays, and then on Fridays and Sundays. The least rapes were recorded on Thursdays.
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The group of women most vulnerable to rape was aged between 13 and 30 years.
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Approximately 42 per cent of women raped knew their assailant. Of these women, just over half knew their attackers by sight only.
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Husbands, boyfriends and ex-husbands and ex-boyfriends accounted for 12 per cent of perpetrators, while friends and relatives comprised a further 17 per cent.
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Approximately 30 per cent of rapes occurred in the rapist's home. Twenty-five per cent took place on open ground. The third most likely location of a rape was the victim's home, accounting for 17 per cent of all cases. The remaining sites included the rapist's or victim's car, public toilets, hotel rooms and alleys.
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When rapists used weapons, they were most likely to choose knives, which accounted for more than half of all weapons used. Firearms, used in 30 percent of the cases involving weapons, were the second most common choice. Other weapons used included bottles, screwdrivers and blunt objects. In the majority of cases, the weapons were used to threaten only.
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A quarter of all the rapes reported were committed by gangs involving anything between two and ten men.
Places Where Two or More Rapes Occurred
| Streets | Hotels | Parks | Train Stations | Others |
| Bok Twist Smit Wolmarans Claim De Villiers Pretorius Wanderers Banket King George Noord Harrow Nugget Soper |
Nest Inn (Hillbrow) | Zoo Lake Barnato Park |
Park Ikwezi New Canada |
West Park cemetery FNB sports stadium Newtown Cultural Precinct |
A Brief Discussion of Some of the Findings
The following findings highlight the role of urban environmental design, and the allocation and use of local council and police resources, in contributing to or preventing sexual assaults.
Environmental Design
The design of an environment can both promote and inhibit sexual violence. Take Harrow Road, listed in the table on p. 13, as an illustration. Rapes occur on a very specific section of Harrow Road: under the bridge over Saratoga Road. This strip is enclosed by the bridge overhead and a sheer face of rock on one side. The pillars supporting the bridge are wide, providing ample hiding space, and – when the lights work – the area is poorly lit. It's a space which provides a number of opportunities for rapists.
Open spaces become dangerous when deserted, such as West Park cemetery after hours, or when they are covered with long grass. Long grass not only provides cover for potential rapists, but also obscures the attack itself.
The type of activity (or activities) within and around a space is another factor which appears to contribute to the potential for rape there. Public toilets, for instance, are made dangerous for women because they are both guaranteed to be occupied by women at some point and enclosed. This is not an argument for the abolition of toilet cubicles, but may be one for increasing security around them. And similar arguments can be made for taxi ranks, train stations and streets around transport terminuses (such as King George, Wanderers and Noord streets) – also environments likely to guarantee the presence of women. In addition, public transport generally runs according to a timetable, which means that the same women will walk the same route at the same time every day or night. Rapists may target particular women based on this familiarity with their daily routines, actively seeking or creating opportunities within these.
The Allocation and Use of Resources
Preventive measures, such as increasing lighting and security, need to be supplemented with other actions to be truly effective. For example, in the Johannesburg Sexual Violence Forum's discussions with the local council about improving safety in parks it emerged that a number of security guards are employed to patrol these spaces – but only during the day. No guards are available from the late afternoon. Yet according to the surveillance project's findings, this is the very time they are most likely to be needed. It may not be possible to redesign some streets and alleyways, but certainly the danger of rape in these spots can be decreased by planning police patrols that coincide with high-risk periods.
The police often claim to have too few vehicles and too few people to perform their duties properly (Gauteng Regional Network on Violence Against Women 1998). If this is the case, then decisions on where to allocate such limited resources should be based on need – and not on whether a certain Community Policing Forum (CPF)2 is more persuasive and influential. From the surveillance project, it is clear that Hillbrow should be the priority police station in the Johannesburg magisterial district, since most assaults take place in that area.
While a combination of thoughtful urban design and the appropriate, timely use of police and local council resources might prevent some rapes, it would certainly not prevent all. It is simply not possible to patrol the interiors of people's homes and rapes here require different prevention strategies. The unexpected finding that most of the rapes in this survey occurred in the rapist's home raises some disturbing questions. It could be that these men do not consider their sexual assaults to be harmful or criminal and so see no need to conceal where they live. Or perhaps they see so little chance of being reported, arrested, prosecuted or convicted. Whatever the explanation, this surprising finding highlights the need for more educational work on sexual violence with men.
Acting on the Findings
To date, the Johannesburg Sexual Violence Forum has held a press briefing to publicise the surveillance project's findings, followed by a briefing for members of CPFs in the Johannesburg magisterial district and police station commanders. Meetings have also been held with members of the Greater Johannesburg Metropolitan Council (GJMC) and police area commissioners. Frustratingly, the response of most of these bodies was indifference. But this appears to be changing: Hillbrow police station now claims to take the project's findings into account when it plans patrols, and firmer links have been established between the forum and the GJMC's Safer Cities project.
The Safer Cities Project
This urban crime prevention project was established during 1997 following a collaborative agreement between the United Nations Centre for Human Settlements (Habitat UNCHS), the International Centre for Prevention of Crime, and the Public Safety and Emergency Services cluster at the GJMC. Safer Cities aims to reduce crime as well as lessen people's fear of crime, in order to create a safe urban environment that encourages communal life and economic activity. The project intends altering the environment in which crime occurs, as well as introducing broader initiatives to alter the social (or other) conditions thought to cause crime. Both specific crimes and specific geographical areas will be the target of interventions. An important focus will be violence against women and it has been agreed that the Johannesburg Sexual Violence Forum will work with Safer Cities to co-ordinate services to survivors of sexual violence, and to make recommendations about improving the safety of the urban environment.
While the approach this article takes needs to be developed and refined, it clearly adds another dimension to our understanding of sexual violence.
(This article updates an earlier study which appeared in Agenda, 36, 1998.)
Notes
1 A grouping of local organisations including the Centre for the Study of Violence an Reconciliation (CSVR), the Sexual Harassment Education Project (SHEP), Lifeline, People Opposing Women Abuse (POWA), the UNISA Institute for Social and Behaioural Studies, Nisaa Institute for Women's Development, the Johannesburg Medico-legal Clinic, the Johannesburg Regional Courts, and the Tshwaranang Legal Advocacy Centre to End Violence Against Women.
2 A CPF is comprised of representatives of a community, the police and interested organisations. Its purpose is to discuss local policing in order to improve police-community relations and reduce crime.
References
Foucault, M. 1978. The History of Sexuality Vol. 1: An introduction. New York: Pantheon.
Gauteng Regional Network on Violence Against Women. 1998. An evaluation of the three day gender sensitivity training for the South African Police Service. Unpublished report available from the Gauteng Regional Network on Violence Against Women.
Gergen, K.J. 1985. The social constructionist movement in modern psychology. In American Psychologist, 40: 266-275.
Tiefer, L. 1995. Sex is Not a Natural Act and Other Essays. Oxford: Westview Press.
Safer Cities Johannesburg Strategy Development Team. 1997. Safer Cities: Johannesburg, Draft strategy document available from the Greater Johannesburg Metropolitan Council.
UNISA Health and Psychology Unit. 1997. Rape in Johannesburg, unpublished findings.
© Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation
CSVR is a multi-disciplinary institute that seeks to understand and prevent violence, heal its effects and build sustainable peace at the community, national and regional levels.
