Heliyon 7 (2021) e08552

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Heliyon
journal homepage: www.cell.com/heliyon

Research article

There is no trustable data: the state and data accuracy of violence against
women in Indonesia
Khaerul Umam Noer a, *, Siti Chadijah b, Endang Rudiatin c
a
Department of Public Administration, Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, University of Muhammadiyah Jakarta, South Tangerang, 15419, Indonesia
b
School of Graduate Program, University of Muhammadiyah Jakarta, South Tangerang, 15419, Indonesia
c
Department of Social Welfare, Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, University of Muhammadiyah Jakarta, South Tangerang, 15419, Indonesia

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: The number of violence against women in Indonesia continues to increase every year, this can be seen from data
Violence against women released by the National Commission on Violence Against Women and the State Ministry of Women's Empow-
Domestic violence erment and Child Protection. The problem is, although the two state institutions regularly release data on violence
Women's rights
against women, the data released does not nationally represent the data on violence. This study aims to find
Human rights
reasons on why data on violence in Indonesia cannot be used as material for policy making. By using ethnographic
methods in the National Commission on Violence Against Women, the Ministry, and six partner institutions, this
study found a number of facts why the data on violence in Indonesia is so unreliable. At the ministry level, the
main constraints are with the forms that are difficult to fill in, the model of tiered bureaucracy that is useful for
reporting, but with the higher the level, the less violence data there are, the limited number of registrar. Whereas
National Commission on Violence Against Women data are constrained by a centralized and voluntary data
collection model, that more than 65% of partners do not return the data collection forms. This results in both the
Ministry and the Komnas Perempuan data being just the tip of the iceberg of the problem of violence against
women in Indonesia.

1. Introduction
This paper is based on one fundamental statement: Indonesia's state of
emergency on violence against women. The National Commission on
Violence Against Women (NCVAW, hereinafter stated as Komnas Per-
empuan) End Year Notes during 2019 recorded 431,471 cases of
violence, an increase of 6% from 2018 of 406,178 case (NCVAW, 2019,
2020). From these data, 87% of those cases of violence are sexual
violence against women. The Ministry of Women's Empowerment and
Child Protection (hereinafter abbreviated as MoWECP) recorded that in
2019, there were 1,567 cases of violence against women (MoWECP,
2020). It is surprising, that the two state institutions produce very much
different data. Even if we use the Komnas Perempuan's data, when
compared to the total population of Indonesia which is more than 267
million, the number of reported violence is only 0.2% of the population.
This is worrying, because as released by UN Women (UNWOMEN, 2017),
violence in Indonesia reaches 6% of the population, or around 16 million
victims annually.
Violence against women that occurs in various forms and in all en-
vironments is a violation of human rights (ASEAN, 2016; EIGE, 2016;
Ellsberg and Heise, 2005; UNWOMEN, 2017). Violence against women
occurs regardless of age, class, race, and ethnicity, and affects not only
women in Indonesia but also throughout the world. Globally, it is esti-
mated that 30% of women over the age of 15 experience physical and
sexual violence from their intimate partner during their lifetime (Devries
et al., 2013; Garcia-Moreno et al., 2006; UNFPA Indonesia, 2013; Wood
et al., 2021). However, violence data, even with the highest number from
Komnas Perempuan, is only 0.2% of the population. This is the starting
point of this research, on why data on violence against women in
Indonesia is so inaccurate and cannot be used to represent violence na-
tionally, and in turn complicates the formulation of policies that seek to
eradicate violence against women.
There are various studies on the causes of the high rate of violence
against women (Ameral et al., 2020; Chirwa et al., 2020; Javaid, 2020;
Kadir Shahar et al., 2020; Stake et al., 2020), but research that examines
how data on violence carried out by the state can be said to be completely
absent. The state plays a very important role in efforts to eliminate acts of

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: umam.noer@umj.ac.id (K.U. Noer).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2021.e08552
Received 27 July 2020; Received in revised form 19 December 2020; Accepted 1 December 2021
2405-8440/© 2021 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-
nc-nd/4.0/).
K.U. Noer et al.
violence against women, and the issue of data on violence is the first step
in shaping policies at the state level (Garcia-Moreno et al., 2006; McGill
et al., 2020; McKool et al., 2020). This research tries to explore why it is
difficult for Indonesia to eradicate violence against women, and to
answer this question, it begins with one basic fact: there is no standard
step to record violence, which has an impact on one main problem: there
is no valid and accurate data on violence against women in Indonesia.
In Indonesia, there are currently two institutions that play the role of
coordinators of data collection on violence against women that become
national data references: the MoWECP with the Online Information
System for the Protection of Women and Children (MoWECP Symphony)
and the National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas
Perempuan) with a data collection system through its annual End of Year
Notes (Catatan Akhir Tahun/Catahu). In practice, these two institutions
consistently publish their data every year, which is obtained from various
service provider partner institutions throughout Indonesia. However,
several state institutions that handle cases of violence against women
also make data collection such as law enforcement agencies, the Ministry
of Social Affairs, the Indonesian Child Protection Commission, other non-
governmental organizations engaged in the protection of children or
provide services to handle cases of violence. In addition to inputting data
to the Komnas Perempuan and MoWECP, these institutions/organiza-
tions also input violence data for the purposes of collecting data on each
their respective institutions.
The problem is, the data made by the Komnas Perempuan and the
MoWECP are invalid, even absurd. For example, the Komnas Perempuan
recorded that the Provinces of Maluku, North Maluku, Papua and West
Papua had zero violence. The same thing also comes from MoWECP data.
This is certainly not realistic where in these regions, especially Papua and
West Papua, HIV/AIDS prevalence and sexual violence are very high. Not
to mention the many rules of customary laws that harm women's rights or
discriminate against women. In comparison, a comprehensive study of
violence in Papua found that 60% of men who had partnered claimed to
have committed physical and/or sexual violence against their intimate
partners and nearly 44 percent of men who had ever partnered stated
have raped their partners (Sunarsih and Triani, 2020; UNFPA Indonesia,
2013; UNWOMEN, 2017; You, 2019). These figures reflect high rates of
violence in Papuan society and exclude the possibility of the absence of
violence. Even Komnas Perempuan itself admits that the rate of violence
in Papua and Maluku is very high (NCVAW, 2018), but strangely there is
not a single data on violence that is presented in their Year End Notes.
If we look at the data on violence against women that occurred in
more than a decade, we can see that the trend of has increased from year
to year. Komnas Perempuan noted that in 2018 there were 406,178 re-
ported cases of violence against women, and this figure had increased
sharply from 348,446 cases in 2017, and 259,150 cases in 2016
(NCVAW, 2017, 2018, 2019). Likewise, the distribution map of cases of
violence per province has expanded. In addition, according to the survey,
one in three women in the world (Devries et al., 2013; UNWOMEN,
2017) and one in three women in Indonesia (MoWECP, 2020; MoWECP
& CBS, 2017) have experienced violence in their lives, either caused by a
partner or someone they know. However, although statistics on cases of
violence are available, they do not indicate the true magnitude of the
problem. The lack of credible data in Indonesia and the many cases of
violence against women throughout Indonesia that are not reported have
become a major obstacle in taking effective action in eliminating violence
against women (Irianto and Cahyadi, 2008; MoWECP, 2019; UNFPA
Indonesia, 2013).
There has been much criticism about the unreliable data on violence
in Indonesia (Kadir Shahar et al., 2020; Parikesit and Maryam, 2018;
Syukur, 2011), especially the validity and reliability of data on violence
against women produced by institutions such as the Komnas Perempuan
and the MoWECP. Data on violence against women collected by the
Komnas Perempuan does not guarantee the accuracy of the data because
the largest source of data collected is from the religious court instead of
from the police data. Even though the data collection of cases of domestic
2
Heliyon 7 (2021) e08552
violence shows data that continues to increase throughout the year, the
data does not collect basic information on how many women victims of
domestic violence were killed by their husbands or partners. In this case,
the government is still collecting data that is general and not detailed. On
the other hand, the validity of data in the Religious Courts referred to by
Komnas Perempuan is also questionable, because 85% of those is data of
divorce with violence even though in practice there are differences in
perception that not all divorces are caused by violence. This can be seen
from the classification of court decision data by the Supreme Court which
confused the cause of divorce cases (Kodir and Azizah, 2013; Syukur,
2011).
This paper aims to explain difficulties in data collection on violence in
Indonesia. With a focus on how the model of data collection on violence
by Komnas Perempuan and MoWECP, compares the two models, as well
as finding the best solution in building a more holistic and integrative
data collection. Violence data still needs to be addressed by various
parties, considering that the statistics of the figure need to be read as an
iceberg phenomenon that does not describe the true state of violence
against women in society (Irianto and Cahyadi, 2008; Noer, 2012; Noer
and Madewanti, 2020).
2. Method
This research uses ethnographic methods, by conducting in-depth
interviews with the Komnas Perempuan's research division, the
MoWECP's data collection division, and directly visiting the Integrated
Service Center for Women's Empowerment and Child Protection (here-
inafter abbreviated as ISCWECP) in two provinces: Jakarta and West
Java. In West Java, the team focused in five cities: Depok, Bekasi, and
Bogor. In addition to conducting interviews, the research team also
conducted direct observations to see how the Komnas Perempuan, the
MoWECP and ISCWECP collecting the data, technical and detailed
implementation of data collection, and how the data was tabulated. In
addition, the team also reviewed various policy documents on data
collection on violence against women in Indonesia, starting from the
regional level to the central government.
2.1. The MoWECP's symphony
The Ministry of Women's Empowerment and Child Protection
(Kementerian Pemberdayaan Perempuan Perempuan dan Perlindungan
Anak/KPPPA) was established in 1978, previously named the Deputy
Minister for Women's Role. Initially the MoWECP focused more on the
economic empowerment of women in the household, but since 2009,
under Linda Amelia Sari, the ministry expanded its scope of work, not
only to economic and social issues for women, but also protection for
children.
The MoWECP has its task of organizing the affairs of women's
empowerment and child protection in the government to assist the
President in organizing state government. In carrying out the tasks, the
MoWECP has four functions: (a) the formulation and determination of
policies in the field of women's empowerment and child protection, (b)
coordinating and synchronizing the implementation of policies in the
field of women's empowerment and child protection throughout prov-
inces and cities, (c) management of state property/assets, and (d) su-
pervision of the implementation of tasks within the MoWECP.
In formulating and determining policies, coordinating and synchro-
nizing policy implementation, and supervision related to women's
empowerment and child protection, this task includes protection of
women and children from violence against them. The violence data
collection model conducted through the Online Information System for
the Protection of Women and Children (MoWECP Symphony). The
MoWECP0 Symphony is carried out in stages, starting from partner data
in each city, to Integrated Service Center for Women's Empowerment and
Child Protection (Pusat Pelayanan Terpadu Pemberdayaan Perempuan dan
Perlindungan Anak [P2TP2A]/ISCWECP) data in each city, up to the
K.U. Noer et al.
provincial level ISCWECP, and ends at the national data level. The na-
tional data is then processed into MoWECP Symphony data (Figure 1).
Considering the complexity of the bureaucratic pathway, thus since
2002, the government established the P2TP2A/ISCWECP which in 2002
was later reinforced through the Regulation of the Minister of Women
Empowerment Number 5/2010 concerning Guidelines for the estab-
lishment and development of an integrated Service Center. ISCWECP has
been formed in 34 provinces and 390 regencies/cities in Indonesia
(MoWECP & CBS, 2017). The existence of ISCWECP as an embodiment of
an integrated service mechanism between the Government and the
community with the composition of its membership consists of various
elements such as the Police, Attorney's Office, Court of Law, Regional
Office of Law and Human Rights, Regional Office/Office of Religion,
Regional Development Planning, Office of Health, Office of Social Affairs,
Office of Labor, Office of Education, as well as community organizations,
religious institutions, professional institutions, and academics.
In addition to providing case handling services, ISCWECP also pro-
vides data collection and documentation of cases handled by each
agency/institution. This is where the MoWECP obtains some of the
violence data published annually. In 2010, the MoWECP issued the
Guidelines on the System for Data Recording and Reporting on Violence
against Women and Children which must be used by all levels of gov-
ernment, from the central government to the regional governments. This
also includes all organizations that are partners and are members of
ISCWECP. It is at this point that the issue becomes crucial to underline,
that even though there is a format that must be filled in, factually, data
collection and documentation have not gone well.
There are two reasons why this system is not working well. First, the
recording model carried out by ISCWECP is very bureaucratic and time
consuming. With a tiered reporting model, violence data collection
should be easier to do, but the reality is not as imagined. The higher the
level of reporting, the fewer cases are recorded. There are many incidents
where cases of violence are very high in one city, but when they go up to
the provincial level, the case data number is reduced. This causes the
emergence of the pyramid model, where the higher the level of gov-
ernment, the less violence data recorded.
To understand why this is happening, it is important to look at what is
happening at the lowest level: ISCWECP at the city level. Periodically,
once a year, city level ISCWECP must report the data to provincial level
ISCWECP. There are 28 forms pages, with more than 76 columns that
must be filled for each reporting period. Each report must include com-
plete report details for each case, each case requiring no less than 12
sheets of form, with 53 columns to be filled in, not including image
documentation, post mortem evidence, Minutes of Police Examination,
trial transcripts, verdicts and other reports. Which means that, in each
reporting period, if one ISCWECP reports six cases, there will be at least
28 pages of case summaries with 72 pages of cases details, not including
dozens of pages containing images, post mortem evidence, trials, and so
forth. ISCWECP report in Depok City, for example, in 2017, reported 34
cases of violence. If we look at the ideal conditions of reporting, where
there should have been 408 pages of reports, but in fact the report only
contained 196 pages, and even then it is very incomplete.
If the average city sent out a 200-page report, and West Java has 27
cities, then the ISCWECP annual report of West Java Province should
have been of 5,400 pages thick. But in 2017, reports of violence in West
Java actually only had 1,486 pages, and the number of cases also
Figure 1. The flow of data reporting on violence of MoWECP symphony.
3
Heliyon 7 (2021) e08552
decreased. ISCWECP of West Java Province only reported 302 cases, but
the cumulative data from partners and city level ISCWECP, there should
be 487 cases reported, meaning that there are 185 cases of violence that
were lost somewhere. In the interviews, ISCWECP tends to reason that
this happened because lower-level cases are not recorded and kept so that
they are not reported to the top level. This brings us to the second
problem.
Second, the reason why ISCWECP does not have an adequate
recording system is due to the absence of individuals who have special
competence in recording using the database and documentation system.
This reason arises more because of the complicated data collection model
carried out by ISCWECP. This is because the ISCWECP data collection
system is sourced from data collected from service providers and other
working partners, which in many cases are very incomplete. Often times,
the data only contain the name of the victim, the date of the incident, and
the scene of the incident. There are no detailed data regarding witnesses,
details of events, and events that occurred before and after the incident.
In many cases, often the report is not accompanied by a full report on the
post mortem, or only reported a few days, even weeks, after the incident,
so there is no accurate data regarding the violence committed by the
perpetrator to the victim.
Data collected in ISCWECP cannot be categorized as data that shows
the performance of ISCWECP in providing services to victims of violence.
There is no data collection system in ISCWECP that can specify how many
acts of violence occurred, how many victims have been facilitated and
served by each institution services, as well as some of which are handled
by ISCWECP itself or together with its network. There is no detailed data
regarding the steps taken by ISCWECP services, how was the model being
used and results of the services, and there is no documentation of services
that involve health parties such as hospitals or clinics. The documenta-
tion of the follow-up on victims' complaints in the police was also very
limited, as was the documentation of cases handling in court. The data
available is only the court decision, but there is no documentation of the
proceedings of the case.
The results of assessment in ISCWECP in the Bekasi, Bogor and Depok
regions, when compared to ISCWECP in Jakarta for example, showed
that there was no standard case documentation system. Although
MoWECP has issued Guidelines on the System for Data Recording and
Reporting on Violence against Women and Children (Pedoman Sistem
Pendataan dan Pelaporan Tindak Kekerasan pada Perempuan dan Anak),
the implementation in each ISCWECP has its own method to collect the
data. In ISCWECP Jakarta for example, documentation is carried out
using the Gender and Child Information System (Sistem Informasi Gender
dan Anak/SIGA) application of MoWECP, but this model is also prob-
lematic, because in the North Jakarta and Kepulauan Seribu regions, the
local government still record manually both in hard copies and soft
copies, so it is not surprising if the form and the quality of the data
produced varies. In Bogor, the recording is still simple, only containing
the identity of the victim or the reporter, whereas the details of the case
and how the development of the case experienced by the victim is not
recorded and kept so that the case history and the condition of the victim
who reported the case cannot be traced back. In Bekasi, the officers used
the report book and there are staff who are specifically assigned to take
notes, but because the data entry officer did not know what the benefits
of the data collection one is doing, the data input was carried out in a
copy-paste model, that there are many different cases but details of the
K.U. Noer et al.
incidents are the same. In Depok, the data recorded in the report book
was further managed to become a source of data in the gender and child
profiles, but did not include details of incidents and witnesses.
Furthermore, other than the non-standard case data collection model,
one of the other crucial issues from the MoWECP data source is the lack of
human resource and facility support. In reality, MoWECP is fully funded
by the government, at the same time it is also the government that can
regulate the employment of each ISCWECP in the region, so there is no
reason for resource limitations at the regional level. But in fact, the
number of employees in charge of data collection and handling of victims
of violence in each region is very small when compared to the area and
population. For example, the Office of Women's Empowerment and
Protection of Bekasi Regency only numbered 26 people, in comparison to
a population of 3.5 million people. This means that each employee serves
134,615 residents. Even if the data is reduced to the number of house-
holds, there are around 869,454 households in Bekasi, it is still the fact
that the workload of one employee is serving around 33,440 households.
Another fundamental issue is that ISCWECP's performance in the re-
gions is very dependent on the existing officials, both for making work
plans, implementing programs, to monitoring and evaluation. It is not
rare at all where the ISCWECP is led by leaders who have a gender
concern and perspective, that ISCWECP can work optimally. But when
the person was transferred to another place and the successor does not
have such gender perspective, the ISCWECP's performance would decline
again. This certainly has an impact on reports of violence at the local
level, which directly affects reports of violence at the national level.
2.2. The Komnas Perempuan's end year notes
In addition to the MoWECP Symphony, data on violence against
women was also issued by Komnas Perempuan. The National Commis-
sion on Violence Against Women or Komnas Perempuan is one of the
National Human Rights Institutions in Indonesia. The main focus of
Komnas Perempuan is to uphold the human rights of Indonesian women.
Komnas Perempuan is an independent state institution formed through
Presidential Decree Number 181/1998, on 15 October 1998, which was
strengthened by Presidential Regulation Number 65/2005. Komnas
Perempuan was born from the demands of civil society, especially
women, to the government to realize the responsibility of the state in
responding to and dealing with issues of violence against women. The
demand is rooted in the tragedy of sexual violence that was mainly
experienced by ethnic Chinese women during the May 1998 riots in
various major cities in Indonesia.
Based on reports from the Fact Finding Team (Tim Gabungan Pencari
Fakta/TGPF) of the May 13–15 1998 Riot, the facts showed that there
were at least 85 cases of sexual violence against women, the majority of
whom are ethnic Chinese; 52 gang rapes, 14 rapes with mistreatment, 10
assaults and 9 harassments. Based on these findings, Komnas Perempuan
has a mandate to carry out monitoring, including fact finding and doc-
umenting of violence against women and violations of women's human
rights, as well as dissemination of the results of monitoring to the public
and taking steps that encourage accountability and handling of victims of
violence. Furthermore, Komnas Perempuan also provides advice and
considerations to the government, legislative and judicial bodies, and
community organizations to encourage the preparation and legalization
of a legal framework and policies that support efforts to prevent and
overcome all forms of violence against women, as well as protection,
enforcement and promotion of women's human rights.
With this effort, Komnas Perempuan from the beginning has always
provided an annual report on the data collection of cases of violence
against women through the Komnas Perempuan End of Year Record
annually. The data was compiled by Komnas Perempuan from three
sources: (1) District Court and Religious Court, (2) Komnas Perempuan
partner service institutions, and (3) the internals of Komnas Perempuan
itself, which in this case coming from two units: Service and Referral Unit
(Unit Pelayanan dan Rujukan/UPR) formed to receive reports from
4
Heliyon 7 (2021) e08552
victims who came directly to the Komnas Perempuan, and the Moni-
toring Unit that manages reports that come in via mail and electronic
mail (Figure 2).
There are at least three problems in the data collection conducted by
Komnas Perempuan. First, the violence data from the District Court and
the Religious Court cannot be fully used because it is very general. Court
data only covers divorce and domestic violence data that has been tried
and has legal force. No details of violence arose from trial cases, for
example what kind of violence happened, who were the victims and
perpetrators, or in what context the violence occurred. Details like this
are usually in the police, whose data are not actually used by Komnas
Perempuan. In addition, because trial data are cases that end in court,
there is no data regarding the handling of cases of violence that do not
reach the court, either through mediation or victims who withdraw their
reports. As a result, the violence data from the court is only the tip of the
iceberg of various cases of violence.
Second, although Komnas Perempuan's data collection model is ad-
vantageous because it cuts off the bureaucratic pathway which makes the
potential for data on violence lessens, or even lost, this data collection
model is very dependent on the willingness of partner service institutions
to submit data. Unlike the MoWECP Symphony data collection model,
which is carried out in stages, the Komnas Perempuan data collection
model is carried out directly in each region. Komnas Perempuan directly
requests data from all service partners in all regions, including ISCWECP
and various NGOs and CSOs engaged in protecting victims of violence.
The problem is, this data collection is voluntary, meaning that each
institution will be given a number of data collection forms but there is no
obligation or any mechanism from Komnas Perempuan to collect the
forms that have been given.
In 2018, Komnas Perempuan sent 751 forms to the service partner
institutions throughout Indonesia, but only 237 forms or 32% of the
forms were returned. In 2019, Komnas Perempuan sent 672 forms, but
only 239 forms or 35% were returned. It can be said that the forms’
response rate is very small, still under 50%. Thus, the low number of data
in an area cannot be read as a decrease in the number of violence in the
area or there are no cases of violence against women handled in the area,
but a low rate of return on data collection forms from partner institutions
instead.
There are two reasons why the participation rate of Komnas Per-
empuan's institutional partners is very low. First, by regulation, Komnas
Perempuan is not authorized to force all institutional partners to report
Figure 2. Data source of Komnas Perempuan anuual record.
K.U. Noer et al.
cases they handle. Reporting by institutional partners is completely
voluntary, so there is no obligation for institutional partners to report or
not. Second, many institutional partners do not report because of tele-
communication network problems. As an archipelagic country, not all
regions in Indonesia have an internet network, even though Komnas
Perempuan's report completely relies on data connections. Partners in
Eastern Indonesia, for example, where the internet network is almost
non-existent, do not report the data, other than the fact that sending or
not sending does not have any legal impact on them. The distribution of
data owned by Komnas Perempuan generally comes from institutional
partners located in Java and Sumatra, which in terms of data network
infrastructure are very well established. Meanwhile, data from the
Eastern Indonesia, such as East Nusa Tenggara, Maluku, and Papua are
often not available.
Third, internally Komnas Perempuan also opened report and service
posts for victims of violence, but the level of reporting was very low. This
problem lies with the Komnas Perempuan's institution is centered in
Jakarta. Komnas Perempuan does not have a regional representative
office, so everyone who wishes to report to Komnas Perempuan must visit
the Komnas Perempuan's office in Jakarta. Thus, this system is directly
limiting access for women in remote areas to obtain direct services pro-
vided by Komnas Perempuan. The only way for women in remote areas to
report to Komnas Perempuan is only through partner institutions, whose
reports of their handling will be given to Komnas Perempuan.
2.3. Why the data matters
Data collection is very important, because it is a source of information
about existing acts of violence, as well as how the handling of cases is
carried out and what the follow-up. Poor handling of cases can result in
the bad data collection cases as well, likewise, bad data collection will
result in poor handling policies as well. The issue of data collection will
be related to how and by whom the data is inputted. The unclear standard
mechanism of cases handling in service institutions or agencies makes it
difficult to do data collection especially when it is added by the lack of
human resources inputting the data. Even if each institution has officers
who specifically tasked to register, the officer does not necessarily have
an understanding of the importance of a complete and accurate data
collection (MAMPU, 2015; NCVAW, 2017). With such a tendency, it
cannot be denied that there is an increasing number of cases of violence
against women that are not reported or under-reported data by the public
or reported but the development of cases are unclear or stalled in law
enforcement officers because the data collection of cases that have not
been optimal.
Indonesia already has a number of laws and legislation that have
included women's rights as an integral part of human rights, including
Law 39/1999 on Human Rights, Law 23/2004 on the Elimination of
Domestic Violence, Law 12/2006 on Citizenship, Law 21/2007 on
Eradication of the Crime of Trafficking in Persons, and Presidential In-
struction 9/2000 on Gender Mainstreaming. The main problem lies in the
non-specificity of the various legislations regulating the state's obligation
to collect data on violence against women. This is what is trying to be
regulated in the Draft Law on the Elimination of Sexual Violence which
has not yet been ratified.
The Draft Law on the Elimination of Sexual Violence is very crucial
because it regulates the state's obligation to conduct a national and in-
tegrated data collection on violence. This law states that data collection is
part of the effort to prevent violence against women, and this is the duty
and responsibility of the ministry that coordinates government affairs in
human development and culture, or more specifically MoWECP as the
main actor.
As a policy that tries to eliminate sexual violence, including violence
against women, various articles in this law have been adapted to the
ratification of international conventions. The United Nations Declaration
on the Elimination of Violence against Women defines violence against
women as any act of gender-based violence that results in, or possibly
5
Heliyon 7 (2021) e08552
results in physical, sexual or psychological suffering for women,
including the threat of such acts, the exercise or arbitrary deprivation of
freedoms both that happens in public as well as in private life. This
definition includes all forms of violence against women and is in line with
the definition in Law Number 2004 concerning the Elimination of
Violence against Women that identifies four types of violence against
women in the form of physical violence, psychological violence, sexual
violence, and neglect of households.
The Beijing Action Platform provides an important impetus for data
collection and research on violence against women. In particular, he
called attention to the lack of data on violence against women and urged
the government to build the national statistics capacity to collect such
data and disseminate these findings for changes in policies on violence
against women. EIGE states the source of data on violence against women
can be generated from various levels of data which then leads to official
data released by institutions/governments in a country (EIGE, 2016).
Starting from the prevalence and incidence of population-level, the
actual conditions in the community the data is then collected through
surveys and administrative records from various sectors then data that is
processed is produced by official institutions and issued periodically,
whether every year or in a certain time (Figure 3).
There are two ways to collect data on violence: through surveys and
administrative record data collection models. The main advantage of
recording violence through surveys is that prevalence rates can be
calculated, so that patterns or generalizations of violence cases can be
generated. The survey results can provide detailed information related to
victims of violence or perpetrators such as socio-demographic charac-
teristics, attitudes/behaviors, and experiences of past acts of violence.
The biggest problem of this model is the distribution of Indonesia's ter-
ritory that is very vast and population density that is uneven. If it is only
focused on the city, the survey model cannot capture the problem of
women in rural areas, and vice versa. Too wide demographic coverage
makes the survey model difficult, not to say impossible, to do.
With the limitations of the survey model, the state, through MoWECP
Symphony and Komnas Perempuan, chose to use the administrative data
collection model. The administrative data collection on violence against
women offers several advantages. First, these administrative records are
usually collected regularly which may involve a number of institutions/
Figure 3. Levelling of data collection of cases of violence against women
(Ellsberg and Heise, 2005).
K.U. Noer et al.
organizations. Because every report of a violent incident is recorded, the
data obtained can be more up-to-date. Second, in terms of funding,
administrative records are certainly cheaper and more cost-effective
compared to surveys that must be conducted every year with rather
large funds (MoWECP & CBS, 2017). The data collection model under-
taken by the MoWECP Symphony and Komnas Perempuan is an admin-
istrative data collection model, because it is based on direct reports in
each region.
There are some fundamental weaknesses in the administrative data
collection model. First, data from administrative records cannot be used
to calculate prevalence rate because administrative records are designed
and intended for recording purposes only, therefore the information is
limited and only provides information on the number of recorded cases.
In addition, the use of administrative records is also often constrained by
data coverage so that its use is very limited. Second, the definition used
does not follow international standards so that it may produce figures
that cannot be compared with other countries. Third, inconsistencies in
the application of data collection and quality assurance as well as missing
data due to mistakes of officers.
The issue of data collection is very crucial. In 2016, the UN developed
the UN Secretary-General's Database on Violence against Women. In
accordance with the adoption of the Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Devel-
opment, UN Women updated and redesigned the database and re-
launched it as the Global Database on Violence against Women
(UNWOMEN, 2017). The Global Database on Violence Against Women is a
one-stop site that contains information on what the Government will do to
address violence against women, such as: (1) institutional mechanisms for
research and statistical data; (2) regulations/policies related to violence
against women; (3) budget; (4) services/offices; (5) prevention; (6) Pro-
grams for perpetrators of violence; (7) regional/international initiatives;
and (9) monitoring and evaluation. Also, in the global database, each
country provides the following prevalence data: (1) physical and/or sex-
ual partner violence in the last twelve months, (2) lifetime physical and/or
sexual partner violence, and (3) lifetime non-partner sexual violence.
Whereas, the UN Women and Criminal Justice Sector have more
detailed standards with a focus on data of perpetrators, victims, obstacles
and recommendations. Through this mechanism, UN Women asks the
governments to make a more accurate data collection policy. In 2018, the
Coordinating Ministry for Human Development and Culture initiated the
One Data Indonesia (Satu Data Indonesia) program in which this policy
was carried out to support data-based decision making processes. To
realize this, it is necessary to fulfill a government data that is accurate,
open, and interoperable or easily shared between data users.
In the One Data Indonesia policy there are four basic principles,
namely: (1) data standards; (2) standard metadata; (3) data interopera-
bility; and (4) data references. This program applies the principle of open
data in releasing the data. This aims to increase government transparency
and accountability, as well as to increase community participation in
overseeing the development's implementation process. By referring to
the concept of one data, it is expected a standardized data collection to be
carried out in the data collection of cases of violence against women.
The problem in data standardization lies in which data sources will be
used. One Data Indonesia does not clearly refer to the data source as well
as the data collection model that will be used. MoWECP uses data from
ISCWECP, with a tiered model that tends to be difficult to operationalize,
resulting in potential loss of data in the reporting process. Komnas Per-
empuan uses data from partner institutions, in many ways it is clearer but
because it is voluntary, many partner institutions are reluctant to send
data. On the other hand, there is also police data, court data, data from
the Ministry of Social Affairs, to data from NGOs/CSOs that can be used
but have never been considered by MoWECP or Komnas Perempuan.
At this point there actually a meeting point has emerged between the
MoWECP data collection model and the Komnas Perempuan data
collection model, because one of the main foundations made was inter-
operability of data, in the sense that existing data must come from valid
sources and could be used by all interested parties. The problem is, it has
6
Heliyon 7 (2021) e08552
been 18 months since the decision of the One Data Indonesia program,
but until now it is still unclear how the data collection of women's
violence in Indonesia is conducted.
The problem of data collection on violence is a classic problem that
has never been resolved in Indonesia. The chaos in data collection means
that the handling of sexual violence is never optimal. The government
and the lawmaker have yet to finish discussing the sexual violence law,
which is a more detailed description of the law on eradicating domestic
violence. One Data Indonesia actually has the potential to solve prob-
lems, especially with the data interoperability dimension, which should
not only be data accessible by various parties, but also various parties
who can contribute data. So that One Data Indonesia plays more of a role
as field data collectors whose results can be tabulated as daita of national
violence. However, it is important to observe, if One Data Indonesia is
successful, what about the roles of MoWECP and Komnas Perempuan
which have the mandate to record violence against women?
3. Conclusion
In early 2020, the Komnas Perempuan published an Annual End Year
Notes, which for the umpteenth time, the data was very different from
the MoWECP Symphony data. Both systems, the MoWECP Symphony and
the Komnas Perempuan year End Notes each has a number of advantages
and disadvantages. The main strength of MoWECP Symphony data lies in
the guideline of recording and reporting system on data of violence
against women and children in 2010, which is mandatory, in accordance
to the guidelines on data collecting and reporting, carried out in stages
and coordinated, and because it is mandatory, there will be a warning
because it has become a part of institutional performance standard. The
main disadvantage of the MoWECP model is that there is no verification
mechanism that ensures whether the data collected and reported is in
accordance with the existing guidelines, and ensures the validity of the
data at the local level all the way to the national level. This is due to the
lack of monitoring and evaluation of data collection conducted by the
region, whether or not it is in line with the MoWECP guidelines. In
addition, the recording of violence against women of MoWECP is still
mixed between men and women, not to mention the data on child
violence which is also unclear in the details of the report.
The system developed by Komnas Perempuan has its advantages in
the data collection system that is in collaboration with partner in-
stitutions, both central and regional. This system is more reliable due to
the real time case handling data from partners and ISCWECP. However,
the main weakness of this system lays in the voluntary reporting basis
and that there are no sanctions, which results in a forms’ very low rate of
return, whereby in practice only 10–30% of partner institutions return
the forms to Komnas Perempuan each year. In addition, there is no
organizational structure that reaches all the way to the regions, and there
is no monitoring and coordination for institutions that do not return the
data collection forms so that the data collection processes have not been
coordinated and tiered.
By mapping the problems faced, both in the data collection system
carried out by MoWECP and Komnas Perempuan, this study provides an
overview of the complexity of the problem of data collection on violence
against women in Indonesia. These two models, the MoWECP and
Komnas Perempuan, basically can be integrated through the One Data
Indonesia model. There are two basic problems that must be solved in the
One Data Indonesia model. First, according to the law, the most autho-
rized party in violence data collection is the MoWECP. The problem is,
the MoWECP tiered data collection system is very bureaucratic and too
detailed so that it is very difficult to fulfill. Komnas Perempuan's data
collection model is much easier and more efficient to implement. Second,
another problem lies in the disparity in information technology, where
internet access in Indonesia is very uneven. This condition can be solved
by collaborating with internet providers. However, the main challenge
lies in sectoral ego that is still strong in each institution. This becomes an
obstacle in making an integrated violence data collection, which in turn
K.U. Noer et al.
will make it difficult to make policies to handle and eradicate cases of
violence against women in Indonesia.
Declarations
Author contribution statement
Khaerul Umam Noer: Conceived and designed the experiments; Per-
formed the experiments; Analyzed and interpreted the data; Contributed
reagents, materials, analysis tools or data; Wrote the paper.
Siti Chadijah: Conceived and designed the experiments; Performed
the experiments; Wrote the paper.
Endang Rudiatin: Performed the experiments; Analyzed and inter-
preted the data; Contributed reagents, materials, analysis tools or data;
Wrote the paper.
Funding statement
This work was supported by Kementerian Riset, Teknologi dan Pen-
didikan Tinggi (225/SP2H/LT/DRPM/2019 between DRPM with
LLDIKTI III, Contract Number 95.ADD/LL3/PG/2020 June 8, 2020 be-
tween LLDIKTI Wilayah III with Universitas Muhammadiyah Jakarta;
and Contract Number 74/R-UMJ/VII/2020 July 9, 2020 between Uni-
versitas Muhammadiyah Jakarta with research team).
Data availability statement
Data included in article/supplementary material/referenced in
article.
Declaration of interests statement
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Additional information
No additional information is available for this paper.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thanks to Directorate of Research and Community
Development of the Ministry of Research and Technology/The National
Research and Innovation Agency. We would like to thank the Ministry of
Research and Technology/The National Research and Innovation Agency
Republic of Indonesia, LLDIKTI 3, the Rector of University of Muham-
madiyah Jakarta, the Research and Community Development Agency of
University of Muhammadiyah Jakarta, and the Dean of the Faculty of
Social and Political Sciences for all their assistance and facilitations
during research and writing this paper.
References
Ameral, V., Reed, Palm, M, K., Hines, D.A., 2020. An analysis of help-seeking patterns
among college student victims of sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking.
J. Interpers Viol. 35 (23–24), 5311–5335.
Heliyon 7 (2021) e08552
ASEAN, 2016. ASEAN Regional Plan of Action on the Elimination of Violence Against
Women.
Chirwa, E., Jewkes, R., Van Der Heijden, I., Dunkle, K., 2020. Intimate partner violence
among women with and without disabilities: a pooled analysis of baseline data from
seven violence-prevention programmes. BMJ Glob. Health 5 (11), 1–13.
Devries, K.M., Mak, J.Y.T., García-Moreno, C., Petzold, M., Child, J.C., Falder, G., Lim, S.,
Bacchus, L.J., Engell, R.E., Rosenfeld, L., Pallitto, C., Vos, T., Abrahams, N.,
Watts, C.H., 2013. The global prevalence of intimate partner violence against women.
Science 340 (6140), 1527–1528.
EIGE, 2016. Administrative Data Collection on Violence Against Women Good Practices.
Ellsberg, M., Heise, L., 2005. Researching Violence Against Women: A Practical Guide for
Reseachers and Activist.
Garcia-Moreno, C., Jansen, H.A.F.M., Ellsberg, M., Heise, L., Watts, C.H., 2006.
Prevalence of intimate partner violence: findings from the WHO multi-country study
on women’s health and domestic violence. Lancet 368 (9543), 1260–1269.
Irianto, S., Cahyadi, A., 2008. The Collapse of Civil and Criminal Barriers: A Case Study of
Violence Against Women. Yayasan Obor.
Javaid, A., 2020. “Can You hear me? I’m right here”: voluntary sector’s treatment of rape
victims. Sex. Res. Soc. Pol. 17 (4), 582–593.
Kadir Shahar, H., Jafri, F., Zulkefli, Mohd, A, N., Ahmad, N., 2020. Prevalence of intimate
partner violence in Malaysia and its associated factors: a systematic review. BMC
Publ. Health 20 (1), 1–9.
Kodir, F.A., Azizah, U., 2013. Reference for Religious Court Judges Regarding Domestic
Violence. Komnas Perempuan.
MAMPU, 2015. Literature review violence against women in Indonesia. In: Policy
Oriented Research on Government Services and Law on Violence Against Women in
Indonesia.
McGill, E., Marks, D., Vanessa, E., Penney, T., Petticrew, M., Egan, M., 2020. Qualitative
process evaluation from a complex systems perspective: a systematic review and
framework for public health evaluators. PLoS Med. 17 (11), 1–27.
McKool, M., Freire, K., Basile, K.C., Jones, K.M., Klevens, J., DeGue, S., Smith, S.G., 2020.
A process for identifying indicators with public data: an example from sexual violence
prevention. Am. J. Eval. 41 (4), 510–528.
MoWECP, 2019. Ministry of Women Empowerment and Child Protection: Gender
Equality Outlook 2018.
MoWECP, 2020. Ministry of Women Empowerment and Child Protection: Gender
Equality Outlook 2019.
MoWECP and CBS, 2017. Ministry of Women Empowerment and Child Protection on
Thematic Gender Statistics: End Violence against Women and Children in Indonesia.
NCVAW, 2017. Komnas Perempuan’s (The National Commission on Violence against
Women) End Year Notes 2016.
NCVAW, 2018. Komnas Perempuan’s (The National Commission on Violence against
Women) End Year Notes 2017.
NCVAW, 2019. Komnas Perempuan’s (The National Commission on Violence against
Women) End Year Notes 2018.
NCVAW, 2020. Komnas Perempuan’s (The National Commission on Violence against
Women) End Year Notes 2019.
Noer, K.U., 2012. Land, marriage and social exclusion: the case of madurese exile widow.
Proc. Soc. Behav. Sci. 65 (ICIBSoS), 180–185.
Noer, K.U., Madewanti, N.L.G., 2020. Too many stages, too little time : bureaucratization
and impasse in the social safety net program in Indonesia. J. Studi Pemerint. 11 (3),
370–400.
Parikesit, T., Maryam, R., 2018. Urgency Applying Domestic Violence Screening on
Divorce Mediation Cases in Religious Court. Universitas Indonesia.
Stake, S., Ahmed, S., Tol, W., Ahmed, S., Begum, N., Khanam, R., Harrison, M.,
Baqui, A.H., 2020. Prevalence, associated factors, and disclosure of intimate
partner violence among mothers in rural Bangladesh. J. Health Popul. Nutr. 39 (1),
1–11.
Sunarsih, E., Triani, S.N., 2020. Kekerasan terhadap perempuan dalam novel isinga:
roman Papua karya dorothea rosa herliany. Diglosia: J. Pendidik. Kebahasaan
304–314. http://www.jurnal.unma.ac.id/index.php/dl/article/view/2222.
Syukur, F.A., 2011. Mediation of Domestic Violence Case Theory and Practice in the
Indonesian Court. Mandar Maju.
UNFPA Indonesia, 2013. The Role of Data Adressing Violence against Women and Girls.
UNWOMEN, 2017. United Nations Secretary – General’s Coordinated Database on
Violence Againts Women, Questionnaire to Member State.
Wood, S.N., Glass, N., Decker, M.R., 2021. An integrative review of safety strategies for
women experiencing intimate partner violence in low- and middle-income countries.
Trauma Violence Abuse 22 (1), 68–82.
You, Y., 2019. Relasi gender patriarki dan dampaknya terhadap perempuan hubula suku
dani, kabupaten jayawijaya, Papua. Sosiohumaniora 21 (1), 65.