Forced marriage - an international, but not cultural, issue

Forced marriage is an international issue, at least partly because some young women are taken to their family’s home country and their passports taken away to force them into marriage; they are also put under physical and emotional pressure to consent to a family’s wishes. This is different from an arranged marriage, in which both man and woman consent, but the family (usually the parents) play a big part in bringing the couple together. My experience is that increasingly parents are anxious about accepting the responsibility for this in Western societies, even where the family's historic culture has supported arranged marriage. However, it's still widespread among British Asian communities, and supported by many in both the current marrying generation and among many of their parents.

In the UK, a useful House of Commons Library research briefing covers the current government consultation on forced marriage. As always with Library briefings, it also covers a wide range of official and non-official documentation. If you followed back all the sources, you would be very well-informed indeed.

The English government is thinking about criminalising (as the Scottish Parliament has) forced marriage – at the moment it is a civil offence, that is an offence against the victim, who has to take action in the courts. The recent The Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Act 2007 allows the courts to intervene with various protective orders. There are international processes for retrieving people from families who have in effect kidnapped them.

The paper makes the point that consent (informed and unpressurised consent) is required for marriage in all major world religions. However, some of the political and professional anxiety in pursuing these cases may well come from a feeling that we should not interfere in cultural matters. But it’s like violence towards children or women, it may be a commonplace in some cultures, but it’s an unacceptable trespass on the victim’s human rights and should not be condoned.

However, it's a pity that in his speeches the Prime Minister has discussed it alongside immigration issues. Neither forced marriage (illegal) nor arranged marriage (legal) ought to be a factor on thinking about our minority ethnic groups and their cultural preferences.

Research Briefing on Forced Marriage in the UK