“Stand up, speak out and act”: A critical reading of Australia’s White Ribbon campaign
| DOI | 10.1177/0004865817722187 |
| Author | Kate Seymour |
| Date | 01 June 2018 |
| Published date | 01 June 2018 |
| Subject Matter | Review Article |
Review Article
‘‘Stand up, speak out and act’’:
A critical reading of Australia’s
White Ribbon campaign
Kate Seymour
Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences, School of Social and Policy
Studies, Flinders University, Australia
Abstract
The White Ribbon campaign has come to occupy a central position in Australia’s efforts to
address violence against women. This article critically examines key elements of the White
Ribbon awareness-raising campaigns, paying particular attention to the conceptualisation of
gender, masculinity, and equality. It is argued that White Ribbon’s reliance on a binary view of
gender, together with its emphasis on the attitudes and acts of individual men, contributes to
the obscuration of men’s collective advantage. Acknowledging the intersectional positionings
associated with hierarchies of power and privilege, this article calls for deeper engagement
with the complexities of gender and violence; a commitment to both engage with and
transcend the interpersonal.
Keywords
Gender, gender equality, masculinities, violence against women, violence prevention
Date received: 16 March 2017; accepted: 29 June 2017
The White Ribbon (WR) campaign has come to occupy a central position in
Australia’s efforts to address violence against women (VAW). Originally a protest
response to the 1989 shooting of 14 women in Canada, WR has received considerable
public support since being introduced to Australia. Its high profile, celebrity endorse-
ments and heavily publicised events, along with extensive government support, have
brought strong, perhaps, unprecedented, attention to the issue of VAW in Australia.
While it could be said that increasing awareness is, in itself, a good thing, I argue here
that this is not unequivocally so; rather critical questions can and should be asked of the
WR phenomenon.
I am by no means the first to question White Ribbon Australia’s (WRA) approach to
violence prevention. WRA has long been critiqued by anti-feminist groups for both
Australian & New Zealand
Journal of Criminology
2018, Vol. 51(2) 293–310
!The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/0004865817722187
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Corresponding author:
Kate Seymour, School of Social and PolicyStudies, Flinders University, Bedford Park Adelaide, South Australia 5001,
Australia.
Email: kate.seymour@flinders.edu.au
‘‘greatly exaggerat[ing]’’ (Australian Men’s Rights Agency, 2009) the extent of men’s
violence towards women and ‘‘disingenuously paint[ing]’’ this as a ‘‘problem rooted in
masculinity’’ (Elam, 2014). More recently, however, criticism has come from other dir-
ections: public critiques, focusing on WRA leadership and strategic direction as well as
the limitations of its approach to violence prevention, have been widely reported in both
the traditional and digital news and social media (see, for example, Ford, 2016; Funnell,
2016a, 2016b; Stark, 2016). WRA nonetheless continues to receive considerable govern-
ment (federal and state/territory) and corporate support in relation to its
‘‘workplace accreditation’’ and school (‘‘Breaking the silence’’) programs as well as its
awareness-raising campaigns. With a focus on the latter, this article provides a critical
examination of key elements of WRA’s awareness campaigns, paying particular atten-
tion to the conceptualisation of masculinity and gender equality. The argument pre-
sented here is twofold: First, I argue that the WRA campaign relies upon and
reiterates a binary of gender that fundamentally undermines its stated commitment to
social change. Second, I reflect on WRA’s denouncement of violence as a gendered/ing
practice, serving to maintain the division between not only ‘‘men’’ and ‘‘women’’ but
also ‘‘good’’ men and ‘‘bad’’ men.
Method
This study takes the form of a qualitative investigation of documentary material pro-
duced and/or published by WRA for the purpose of public awareness campaigning,
broadly defined as violence prevention. The documents selected for analysis are pub-
lically available on the WRA website and include awareness-raising materials, resources
for community events and other online content but exclude WRA’s social media content
(Facebook, Twitter and Youtube). Approximately 65 texts (documents, webpages) were
viewed over the period January 2015 to February 2017 across the categories of fact
sheets, FAQs, downloadable posters and brochures, corporate and governance docu-
ments (including Annual Reports), news and media releases and other content-specific
webpages. All of the materials were current at the time of viewing (WRA ß2015–2017)
and no archival content has been included.
Following a careful reading, the selected documents were coded inductively using
NVIVO computer software. A thematic analysis approach was chosen for its emphasis
on both ‘‘systematic and deep engagement’’ and ‘‘rich and complex’’ data (Clarke &
Braun, 2013). Reflecting a view of data collection and data analysis practices as dynamic,
symbiotic and generative, additional materials (such as WRA research reports, current
strategic plan and annual reports) were integrated to address gaps and ambiguities as
these emerged. The identification of patterns and emerging themes was achieved via an
iterative process of coding and re-coding, enabling ‘‘progressive identification and inte-
gration of categories of meaning’’ (Willig, 2001, p. 33). On this basis, five main, yet
interconnected, themes (gender equality, men and masculinity, violence prevention as
primary prevention, VAW as a men’s issue, and violent men as the minority) and mul-
tiple sub-themes were generated. This article focuses, primarily, on the themes of gender
equality and men and masculinity.
294 Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology 51(2)
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