Ending Violence Against Women (EVAW) Expert

Background

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination and violence against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, hu-man rights, humanitarian action and peace and security. UN Women supports UN Member States as they set global standards for achieving gender equality and works with governments and civil society to design laws, policies, programs and services needed to implement these standards.
UN Women has a three-pronged mandate focusing on normative, coordination and programmatic engage-ment. Through its programmes and projects, UN Women is supporting national partners (governmental and non-governmental) in the implementation of existing international and national commitments to women’s rights and gender equality, it facilitates networking and exchange of good practices and advocates for women’s rights and gender equality in all areas of life. Programmatically, UN Women works in five thematic areas: leadership and participation, women’s economic empowerment, ending violence against women, women peace and security and gender responsive governance. UN Women also invests signifi-cantly in the coordination within the UN, with the national institutions, with the civil society organizations and with the international development partners. In 2021 UN Women is commencing implementation of its Strategic Note for the period 2021 – 2025, which is aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Co-operation Framework (UNSDCF 2021 – 2025) and is looking to further develop normative and coordination engagement with the key partners in the country.
To support implementation of the UN Women Strategic Note for the period 2021 – 2025, UN Women Clus-ter Office Tunisia has supported the integration of equality provisions in the 2014 constitution. These ef-forts were consolidated during this post-revolution process by the revision of different discriminatory laws, the adoption of the National Action Plan on 1325, and the integration of parity into elections law. In addi-tion, the adoption of Law No. 2017-58 combatting violence against women is a fundamental step in the fight against discrimination. The law criminalizes all types of violence: physical, moral, sexual, economic, and for the first time, political violence. From an economic point of view, and during the first wave of COVID19 pandemic, March 2020, 41% of all calls to the hotline of the Ministry of Women, Family and Sen-iors (MFFS) were made by women experiencing economic violence. Also, it has been concluded that most of them were not aware that they were economically abused.
Under its new project entitled « Addressing Gender-Based Violence (GBV) post COVID-19 in Tunisia », UN Women Cluster Office Tunisia, jointly with UNDP, will be working to shed the light and address gender-based violence, in particular from an economic perspective, that has been exacerbated by the socio-eco-nomic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic and its linked confinement measures.
The socio-economic impact on women is also more pervasive given that they are already the most impov-erished, and that many of them are in the informal and precarious sector (cleaning staff, informal trade, undeclared craftswomen) and that the government has not taken specific measures for women in the pro-vision of social assistance. In this sense, addressing economic violence is crucial if we take the Agenda 2030 principle of ‘Leave No One Behind’ seriously.
The ultimate outcome of the project is for women and girls to live free from economic violence in post-COVID-19 Tunisia. The investment this project makes towards this outcome will give women and girls in situations of vulnerability access to better services and the ability to provide for themselves economically with increased self-confidence, business skills, and financial support, which is the right thing to do and the smart way to reduce poverty and inequalities.

Thus, supporting national institutions in the area of ending violence against women (EVAW) by emphasizing the phenomena and its impacts on women well-being and economic empowerment, could lead to greater sensitivity and responsiveness in order to help in combatting violence against women.
In order to achieve these objectives, UN Women Cluster Office Tunisia is seeking to engage a National Consultant with expertise in the following EVAW areas:
Area 1: Legislative framework on EVAW
- Legal and policy reform and legislative drafting on the elimination of violence against women and girls including various administrative guidelines and standard operating procedures; financial and/or budgetary considerations of proposed or current laws and policies and procedures.
Area 2: Access to services
- General and specialized services and development of standards for the provision of comprehensive quality services for survivors, strengthening of institutional response to economic violence against women and girls (VAWG).
- Sectoral and multi-sectoral response to VAWG including but not limited to legal and social protection including psychosocial support to survivors of violence, law enforcement and justice including treatment of perpetrators, health including psychological support, economic support to survivors of violence.
- Monitoring and evaluation of service provision for survivors of violence, legislative and policy implemen-tation, various project interventions or projects, monitoring methodologies.
Area 3: Prevention of VAWG
- Advocacy and changing social norms, establishing and/or using evidence-based approaches, causality; work with various actors including men and women, boys and girls, religious leaders; community engage-ment and work with key institutional and other local community actors on the prevention; role of and work with media on responsible reporting on GBV; use of the ITC tools in the prevention and reporting of EVAW, and awareness raising on the issue of VAWG
Area 4: Data collection on violence against women and girls
- Conducting qualitative and quantitative research, quality control of research data, experience with ad-ministrative data.
When engaged, the National Consultants will be under the direct supervision of the Programme manager and overall supervision of the Deputy Country Representative.

Duties and Responsibilities

Under the supervision of the Programme manager, the National Consultant will be responsible of the fol-lowing:
1. Conducting consultations and in-depth interviews with stakeholders/institutions/partners on the elimination of violence against women and girls;
2. Doing an assessment of Law 2017-58 outcomes in terms of fighting violence against women and girls with a special focus on economic violence;
3. Working closely with a firm recruited to organize focus group discussions (FGD) by providing technical guidance and assisting in the preparation/organisation of FGD and during qualitative data collection. Before advertising the ToRs to recruit the firm, they will be discussed with the consultant to specify exactly type of data and information to be collected, number of target groups, etc.
4. Analyzing qualitative data issued from FGD from a socio-economic perspective.
5. Based on the National methodology and the qualitative report issued from FGD, creating a version of a « Violentometer » for Tunisian context to be used by the observatory in helping abused women to correctly identify the level of violence they were facing and better guide them;
6. Based on the National methodology and the qualitative report issued from FGD, conducting 4 work-shops in selected governorates to raise civil society organisations awareness against economic vio-lence;
7. Other tasks as assigned by the relevant Programme manager related to the above
Deliverables Timelines
1. Report to assess Law 2017-58 outcomes in terms of fighting violence against women and girls with a special focus on economic violence 13/11/2021
2. Technical guidance for the FGD 15/12/2021
3. Report to analyze the qualitative data issued from FGD from a socio-eco-nomic perspective 31/12/2021
4. First version of a Violentometer to be used by the observatory based on deliverable N°3 and the national methodology 31/01/2022

5. Final version of the Violentometer

6. Moderating 4 workshops in selected governorates to raise civil society or-ganisations awareness against economic violence. A unique report will be provided at the end of these 4 workshops
28/02/2022

Competencies

Core Values

Respect for Diversity;
Integrity;
Professionalism.

Core Competencies

Awareness and Sensitivity Regarding Gender Issues;
Accountability;
Creative Problem Solving;
Effective Communication;
Inclusive Collaboration;
Stakeholder Engagement;
Leading by Example.

Functional Competencies

Ability to communicate sensitively, effectively, and creatively across different constituencies;
Knowledge of local administrations in Tunisia;
Knowledge of gender equality and women’s empowerment issues;
Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive attitude;
Demonstrate and safeguard ethics and integrity.

Required Skills and Experience

Education

Master’s degree in social sciences;
A PhD in social sciences is an asset.
A first-level university degree in combination with two addi-tional years of qualifying experience may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.

Experience

At least 5 years of professional working experience in human rights, gender equality and development, and women’s eco-nomic empowerment;
Knowledge of Tunisian context in gender related issues;
Excellent communication skills and ability to articulate complex ideas to non-specialist audiences;
Relevant experience in preparing practical guides and conduct-ing FGD is an asset.

Language Requirements

Fluency in Arabic and French is required.
Knowledge of English is an asset.