Abstract
For more than fifty years, sexual violence prevention has attempted to address and effectively intervene in sexual violence. However, to date, we have not seen a meaningful decrease in sexual violence, nor have we seen a decrease in the same myths and misconceptions about rape since the beginning of second-wave feminism. Gillian Fletcher (2014) argues that the problem with our current prevention efforts is a black box at the heart of sexual violence prevention, the place where the articulation of change should be; we are missing how and why a prevention programme should achieve its goals. This thesis is my attempt to explore inside that black box.
To open the black box, I chart a path through current prevention approaches before presenting a case study of six sexual violence prevention programmes delivered or available in Aotearoa New Zealand. I take an interdisciplinary approach to draw on case study methodology and theory-driven evaluation tools. My six cases span a range of approaches to sexual violence prevention, including rape resistance, bystander intervention and consent education. Using the ‘theory of change’ evaluation method, the implied becomes explicit in the selected programmes via the creation of a programme logic diagram and by surfacing the underlying assumptions of each programme. An articulated theory of change that follows the logic of my selected programmes is my attempt to explore the ‘how and why’ that is often left unexamined inside the black box.
In my cross-case analysis of the six selected programmes, I analyse the underlying assumptions to explore how the different programmes construct sexual violence and then compare them against the key bodies of theory for sexual violence and pedagogy. My findings are that (1) sexual violence prevention programmes over-rely on consent, (2) sexual violence prevention programmes are haphazard in their use of theory, and (3) prevention programmes leave the social systems that create and maintain sexual violence unexamined. Finally, I use these findings to present my implications for developing sexual violence prevention programmes moving forward. These implications are: (1) developers of prevention programmes must recognise the limits of consent for preventing sexual violence, (2) sexual violence prevention programmes must centre gender, (3) sexual violence prevention programmes must centre colonialism, and finally, (4) sexual violence prevention programme developers should make use of interdisciplinary tools, such as a theory of change. In opening the black box, I highlight common theoretical inconsistencies within some popular sexual violence prevention programmes and, in doing so, aim to increase the effectiveness and accountability of our prevention efforts moving forward.