Public awareness of the specific kind of violence being inflicted upon women and girls was still lacking until into the eighties. Cruelty such as genital mutilation, dowry murder, the trade in women, forced prostitution, abortion of female foetuses etc. were all accepted as cultural peculiarities.

This is an article from a book that analyses the Fifth woman initiative and how marketing the correct way can reach the audience and have its positive (or negative if done incorreclty) effects.

The first nationwide campaign on the violence against women Fifth Women has had deep impact on the public opinion. The message "Every fifth woman is abused" has become to a fact often repeated in media and news. The women NGOs that launched in the year 2001/2002 the campaign on violence against the women "The Fifth Woman" founded the umbrella NGO "Initiative Fifth Woman".

"although accession offered women's movements political opportunities to put pressure on their governments, the adaptation to EU regulations is characterized by top-down reforms and the unequal compliance of national governments." The European Union is unique in that it brings many different countries with different cultures together under some overarching policies. Women's organizations have been dealing with the difficulties of making all the member state's governments commit to women's issues being on their agenda. Also, they have been working towards violence against women initiatives and trying to get the different governments to support them.

"V-Day is a catalyst that promotes creative events to increase awareness, raise money and revitalize the spirit of existing anti-violence organizations. V-Day generates broader attention for the fight to stop violence against women and girls, including rape, battery, incest, female genital mutilation (FGM) and sexual slavery." V-Day is a movement started by Eve Ensler. This organization promotes awareness and education through performance as well as carries out campaigns worldwide. Their purpose is to generate media coverage and instigate dialogues especially with the younger demographic. This way they have been making an impact and contributing to end violence against women and girls.

"The simple statement, 'I Am an Emotional Creature,' becomes a challenge to the myriad ways in which girls are looked at but not seen, talked about but not listened to, used, discarded, violated, exploited, maimed, and at the extreme killed. Like a woman claiming her body, a girl claiming her emotions breaks a silence and unleashes a vast resource of clean energy, an energy that can inspire all of us to transform and heal the world."-Foreword Excerpt This new book is part of a bigger movement that seeks to end violence against women worldwide. This book is from the same author of the Vagina Monologues and seeks to raise awareness on the current state of the lives of girls and the, sometimes horrific, experiences girls around the world have growing up. I bookmarked this book's site because this book is one of many creative ways in which people are seeking to contribute to solving the problem of violence against women. By writting this book she is appealing to masses of girls that are more prone to reading this book than doing research on the phenomena of Femicides. It is reaching out to a different demographic and empowering them by raising awareness on this issue.

This is article was on the front page of the Economist on March 4th, 2010. This article has a great deal of information on the current phenomena seen on how "technology, declining fertility and ancient prejudice are combining to unbalance societies" This article focuses on China, India and South Korea but touches on the general issue a lot. This article is a good resource to understand how violence against women can start even before they are born. Furthermore, you can see the political prejudices that go into it.

This was an effort of the UN in 1979. It was intended to start a kind of International Bill of Rights for Women. This initiative defines and describes what is and isn't discrimination against women and sets out agendas for all national governments to follow.

From this initiative the Treaty for the Rights of Women emerged and international movements and organizations are urging and pressuring governments around the world to ratify this and commit to ending discrimination and violence against women.

"Violence against women and girls represents a global health, economic development, and human rights problem. At least one out of every three women worldwide has been beaten, coerced into sex, or otherwise abused in her lifetime, with rates of domestic violence reaching 70% in some countries. The International Violence Against Women Act (I-VAWA) is an unprecedented effort by the United States to address violence against women globally." (Amnesty International USA)

The United States has taken a global initiative to end violence against women. Amnesty International provides good resources about this initiative as well as others around the world. It provides background and resources on Violence Against Women efforts.

There is also the SVAW campaign which provides worldwide facts on the severity of violence against women in different regions of the world.
"Amnesty International will show that the right of women to be free from violence is integral to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. As long as violence against women continues, the promise to humanity of the Universal Declaration cannot be fulfilled."(Amnesty International USA-SVAW)