A surge in reports of women murdered by men, and national rallies demanding greater action, have ignited widespread conversations across Australia about how we end gender-based violence.
Coinciding with a sharp rise in women killed in the early months of 2024, the Australian Institute of Criminology released new statistics that the rate of women killed by their partners in Australia increased by 28% from 2021–22 to 2022–23.
In response, our Prime Minister acknowledged that 'violence against women is a national crisis' and the Australian Government appointed an Expert Panel to conduct a rapid review into best-practice prevention approaches.
The true scale and toll of gender-based violence is not yet known. But the statistics we do have evidence a scourge of violence that is both ubiquitous and persistent. For example:
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1 in 4 women (27%) have experienced violence by an intimate partner or family member since the age of 15 (ABS 2021-22).
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1 in 5 women (22%) have experienced sexual violence since the age of 15 (ABS 2021-22).
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A recent study by the Australian Institute of Criminology (2024) found that 22.1% of respondents self-reported they had perpetrated one or more forms of sexual violence since the age of 18, with men significantly more likely to have perpetrated all and multiple forms of sexual violence.
While gender-based violence is prevalent throughout our society, we also know that some Australians are at greater risk than others. This includes Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women, women with disability, and LGBTIQA+ people.
This Folio Conversation with Claire Marshall and Stephanie Lusby PhD will help us understand the nature and drivers of gender-based violence and examine Australia's approaches to preventing violence.
This event is part of a collection of events and curated content on the theme, 'Disrupting Violence'. This theme explores the complexity and many manifestations of gender-based violence (including family, domestic and sexual violence) and how we might work together to create a safe and equal future for all women and children.
Stephanie Lusby PhD
Stephanie is Research Manager at Respect Victoria and a Research Fellow at the Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society at La Trobe University.
Her current research focuses on LGBTIQ people's experience of family, domestic and sexual violence services in Australia. Stephanie has a background in qualitative research, evaluation and program implementation in family and sexual violence sectors, HIV and STI prevention, gender, social change and governance, and gendered violence in post-conflict settings.
Stephanie was previously Director of Prevention at Domestic Violence Resource Centre Victoria, where her worked expanded prevention practitioners' understanding of the gendered drivers of violence against women to include how these are mapped onto drivers of violence against LGBTIQ people.
Steph's PhD explored how different interpretations of 'good' masculinity shape how men in Papua New Guinea engage with primary prevention initiatives focused on violence against women and HIV.
Stephanie has published on the disconnect between gendered violence prevention and securitisation discourses in the development sector, how men's lived experiences of violence and precarity shape interpretation of prevention of violence against women and HIV awareness messaging, and the importance of not limiting gendered analysis of violence to violence perpetrated by cis men against cis women.
Claire Marshall
Claire is the CEO of Emerge Women and Children’s Support Network, a specialist family violence service that runs secure refuge, case management and therapeutic support for victim survivors. Emerge specialises in services for children as individual clients, and is dedicated to building practice that disrupts the cycles of violence through secondary prevention and early intervention.
Claire is a human rights lawyer with a background working in institutional reform, and has worked across NFP and government on research and transformation initiatives that increase safety and equality and improve access to justice.
Before working as CEO of Emerge, her recent work has included initiatives to ensure that victim survivors of institutional gendered violence have access to redress and restorative justice, research to increase the cultural safety and rehabilitative focus of prisons, and working with police to create safe and equal workplaces.
She is passionate about good data, evidence-driven policy, disability rights, and her two small daughters.
Event Details
We will be serving drinks and nibbles from 6pm onwards, with the conversation starting at 6:30pm.
