European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE)
European Institute for Gender Equality, Gedimino pr. 16, LT-01103 Vilnius, Lithuania
+370 5 215 7444
12/06/2019
The European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE) Gender Statistics Database collects non-comparable national data on gender-based violence. The topics covered include rape, sexual assault, other sexual offences (definitions vary across countries), intimate partner violence (IPV), stalking, and homicide.
For each type of offence, data cover the available national administrative figures recorded in the 28 EU Member States. Data are presented in Excel spreadsheets (one per Member State per type of offence), accessible via the Description section of the metadata of the relevant view.
Currently, internationally comparable data on most types of gender-based violence do not exist. Available data derived from administrative processes in individual Member States suffer from a series of problems such as differences in the legal and operational definitions of the crimes and the methodologies used in recording their prevalence. These inherent issues render comparisons between countries impossible.
For this reason, data for each type of offence are presented separately for EU Member States, with three separate Excel files for the United Kingdom, reflecting its devolved administrations (England and Wales (in one file), Scotland and Northern Ireland). The Excel files contain the available information on prevalence, as well as (if available) the national definitions of the crime.
In some cases, data within one country are not comparable. This is the case when different types of prevalence (e.g. victims, perpetrators) have been obtained from different sources because they are not systematically available from the same source.
In order to make the differences in data as clear as possible, each row of data is accompanied by a separate column in which a pre-defined selection of flags is indicated (e.g. relating to the statistical unit), a column in which the source is indicated, and finally a column which collects further comments that relate to the data.
For each country, data for the following types of offences are accessible from the Description section of the metadata of each relevant view as Excel files:
Section on statistical concepts and definitions provides general definitions of the offences but there are no common classification systems or definitions followed across the countries. Where relevant, the country Excel files include the national definition of the offence given the inherent differences in the legal and operational definitions of the crimes and the methodologies used in recording their prevalence.
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Definitions of offences may differ across countries and are included in the Excel files where available. EIGE maintains the following general definitions, as outlined in its glossary:
Rape: “Any non-consensual vaginal, anal or oral penetration of the body of another person where the penetration is of a sexual nature, with any bodily part or with an object, as well as any other non-consensual acts of a sexual nature by the use of coercion, violence, threats, duress, ruse, surprise or other means, regardless of the perpetrator’s relationship to the victim.”
Sexual assault (on women): “Any sexual act committed against a non-consenting woman, even if she does not show signs of resistance, with the exception of rape.”
Other sexual offences: Any other sexual offences for which data are available but which are not covered by rape and sexual assault (e.g. an aggregate of both).
Intimate-partner violence (IPV): “A pattern of assaultive and coercive behaviours, including physical, sexual and psychological acts, as well as economic coercion, which adults or adolescents may use against their intimate partners without their consent.” It includes “Any act of physical, sexual, psychological or economic violence that occurs between former or current spouses or partners, whether or not the perpetrator shares or has shared the same residence with the victim.”
Stalking (of women): Form of violence against women defined as repeatedly engaging in threatening conduct directed at a woman, causing her to fear for her safety.
Homicide, focusing on femicide: Femicide is the “killing of women and girls on account of their gender, perpetrated or tolerated by both private and public actors. It covers, inter alia, the murder of a woman as a result of intimate partner violence, the torture and misogynistic slaying of women, the killing of women and girls in the name of so-called honour and other harmful-practice-related killings, the targeted killing of women and girls in the context of armed conflict, and cases of femicide connected with gangs, organised crime, drug dealers and trafficking in women and girls.”
Currently, internationally comparable data on most types of gender-based violence do not exist. The existing data (based on administrative data collected in individual Member States) suffer from a series of problems such as differences in the definitions of the offences and the methodologies used in recording their prevalence. As a result, it is not possible to identify common statistical units across countries or make comparisons between countries
Nevertheless, some common units used – although their use and exact parameters (e.g. the content of an article of the national criminal law or the age of the victim and/or perpetrator) will vary between countries – are briefly discussed below. A detailed discussion of the incomparability of national crime and criminal justice statistics is available from Eurostat’s methodological guide.
The statistical population varies across countries and per indicator. For example, for one country, data on homicides might be based on the number of victims, and stalking may be reported as the number of cases, whilst for another country, this could be vice-versa.
The statistical population is indicated with flags and descriptions in the accommodating metadata and comments columns within the Excel file.
Data cover the 28 EU Member States. For each country, there is one Excel file per type of offence with the exception of the United Kingdom where data for each offence is presented in separate files for England and Wales (one file), Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Administrative data on gender-based violence related offences have been collected from 2011 to 2016. However, data availability varies across countries (see section on completeness).
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Number and percentages of the relevant statistical unit (see section on statistical units).
Currently, there is no fixed update schedule for national administrative data on gender-based violence related offences.
No legal acts are applicable. However, two separate legal instruments provide a broader mandate for countries to collect data on violence against women:
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There is no fixed release calendar. Data have been collected and published in 2016 and 2018 via the EIGE Gender Statistics Database.
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Data are disseminated to all types of users simultaneously via the EIGE Gender Statistics database.
There is no fixed frequency of dissemination.
No regular news releases.
The collection of national administrative data on gender-based violence related offences is part of ongoing efforts by EIGE to provide information and statistics on violence against women across the European Union. So far, EIGE has carried out three studies on the subject:
Micro-data are not made available.
Data are made available in EIGE Gender Statistics database and can be found under its ‘Gender-based violence’ entry point. For each type of offence, the relevant view shows Yes/No to indicate the availability of data for a particular country. The Excel files containing data per country are made available from links displayed in the Description section of the metadata tab.
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Data are collected from National Statistical Institutes or national authorities that collect data on gender-based violence such as ministries or the police. These sources are systematically recorded in the Excel files and the administrative data are validated with the national contact from the relevant organisation.
The data collection team also cross validates data by ensuring that the sum of breakdowns is not greater than the total. Where this is not the case, i.e. due to different sources being used for different statistical units, this has been made clear in the “comments” column in the Excel file.
In addition, data are also checked for breaks in series. In case a break is detected, this has, where possible, been clarified with the data provider and flagged or explained in the “comments” column in the Excel file.
Administrative data on gender-based violence related offences need to be viewed bearing in mind the inherent differences in definitions and methodologies used to record them. In this sense, there is limitation on the extent to which data are comparable between countries.
The quality of the administrative data is dependent on how well national administrative data collection processes are established, the extent to which the data are published as well as the extent to which metadata (explanatory information) is made available. For instance, good quality data are available for those countries that have well-established processes and regularly publish the data alongside elaborate metadata whilst for countries that publish statistics on an ad-hoc basis (sometimes by different organisations) with no explanatory information the quality of data is poor. That being said, the available data for most countries are considered to be of good quality, collected from reliable sources.
Comparable data on gender-based violence related offences across the European Union currently does not exist. The EIGE data collection brings together non-comparable data which, in the absence of comparable data, helps map data collections of individual EU Member States on the prevalence of gender-based violence offences. It therefore helps monitor Member States’ adherence to Article 4 of the Istanbul Convention, which foresees data collection and research on all forms of violence.
No user satisfaction surveys are carried out.
Completeness of data depends on the extent to which the relevant sources openly publish, or are willing to share, the statistics on the gender-based violence related offences. Data are generally complete for those countries that have well-established processes to register the offences and disseminate the data regularly.
The completeness of data is affected when national administrative processes do not record detailed information such as the sex of both the victim and the perpetrator and/or the relationship between them, or that do not recognise intimate partner violence or stalking as an offence.
In addition, it is important to note that not all criminal events (albeit cases, victims or perpetrators) are reported to the police. Hence, completeness of data might be affected by underreporting.
In principle, national administrative data on gender-based violence related offences accurately reflect the situation in each country. Though, it should be noted that the coverage is restricted to administrative data provided by relevant national sources which are in turn restricted to the quality of data collection processes and methodologies. This could potentially affect the overall accuracy of the data.
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While there is no fixed timeline for publication of data, typically, data have been published one-two years after the reference period (e.g. 2016 data published in 2018).
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Currently, internationally comparable data on most types of gender-based violence do not exist. Available data derived from administrative processes in individual Member States suffer from a series of problems such as differences in the legal and operational definitions of the crimes and the methodologies used in recording their prevalence. These inherent issues render comparisons between countries impossible.
For this reason, data for each type of offence are presented separately for EU Member States, with three separate Excel files for the United Kingdom, reflecting its devolved administrations (England and Wales (in one file), Scotland and Northern Ireland). The Excel files contain the available information on prevalence, as well as (if available) the national definitions of the crime.
In some cases, data within one country are not comparable. This is the case when different types of prevalence (e.g. victims, perpetrators) have been obtained from different sources because they are not systematically available from the same source.
In order to make the differences in data as clear as possible, each row of data is accompanied by a separate column in which a pre-defined selection of flags is indicated (e.g. relating to the statistical unit), a column in which the source is indicated, and finally a column which collects further comments that relate to the data.
The comparability of data over time is not only affected by the inherent differences in the definitions but also the different sources of information used throughout the years. Not all data are comparable across years as varying sources may have been used to populate prevalence of particular offences. For example, in some countries ad-hoc studies may have been used for one year whilst a national administrative source was used in another.
In addition, breaks in data collection exist for some sources. Where this is the case, this has been indicated in the flags and comments columns).
In the case of gender-based violence related offences, there is no other dataset compiling statistics on the prevalence of the crimes apart from national administrative sources that publish data.
Internal coherence is limited due to differences in the data collection procedures and definitions used by the national sources in recording the prevalence of offences.
Data are collected by a research team contracted by the European Institute for Gender Equality. There is no burden on Member States for the data collection.
Revision are applied retrospectively as part of new data collections.
There is no fixed revision schedule.
EIGE’s data on gender-based violence related offences is administrative data derived from the records that websites of national statistical institutions, police databases and other relevant national institutions (that collect and/or disseminate information) keep on the prevalence of the crimes.
There is no fixed data collection schedule.
Direct collection of data from official websites and national contacts.
See section on quality assurance.
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