CAMPAIGNS AS A (POSSIBLE) INSTRUMENT IN COMBATING VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN IN CONTEMPORARY SERBIA

Abstract

The paper is based on the critical rethinking of the social and political processes involved in the policies of representation and the construction of gender identities in the media, in the particular context of violence against women, including the treatment of responses of the wider public to the increase in this type of violence. The subject of this research are campaigns targeting different forms of violence against women. They are analyzed on three levels: 1) in relation to different forms of violence against women, 2) in relation to the initiators of these campaigns, 3) in relation to the meanings generated and constructed by the specific media messages. The paper analyzes several campaigns launched between 2013 and 2019: “STOP NASILJU” [“Stop the violence”], “potpisujem. org”, and the global #MeToo campaign. These were chosen as representative of different social actors operating on different institutional, ideological and practical premises: 1) a feminist organisation, 2) a state-sponsored high-circulation daily newspaper, 3) a grassroot campaign that has brought together women from the online and offline spheres, encouraging them to share their experiences of sexual harassment.