Guest post by Laura Wilson
Some development and humanitarian aid experts now argue that focusing on masculinity and emasculation during a complex emergency, rather than on women and girls, may be more effective at preventing or reducing gender-based violence. On January 15th, the United States Institute for Peace (USIP) held a panel discussion titled “The Other Side of Gender: Masculinity Issues in Violent Conflict” to address the role that gender-sensitive programming can play in ameliorating violence against both men and women during conflict.
The panel’s three speakers all called for a greater focus on masculinity in addressing a variety of issues, but panelist Marc Sommers (USIP, Fletcher School), who has conducted research comparing the needs and aspirations of young people in Rwanda and Burundi, was particularly emphatic in calling for an increase in male-oriented programming.
Sommers’ comments focused on education, and he drew on survey data from interviews conducted with youth in both countries about how they prioritize higher education within their future goals. His findings, somewhat surprisingly, reveal that the majority of young people in Burundi, which is less stable and less developed than Rwanda, expressed strong desires and intentions to pursue higher education despite a severe lack of schools and opportunities for learning. In Rwanda, however, which has been held up of late as a beacon of African development and democracy, the young people interviewed expressed much less interest in finishing high school or attending college.
Part of this difference may lie in the specifics of Rwandan culture. In Rwanda, boys are expected to build a house before they can marry. Without a house, a Rwandan boy cannot achieve manhood and start a family. So, pressure is great for young men to succeed economically. As a result, many drop out of school at a young age to work and save for this major investment. Sommers argues that these Rwandan cultural expectations effectively emasculate young men, leading to frustration and increased risk of GBV.
At the same time, Rwandan girls achieve womanhood through marriage. If young men are constrained in being able to contract a marriage, girls’ attainment of maturity is also put on hold. Other scholars writing on similar situations in other African contexts refer to this bottleneck as a “marriage crisis,” which appears to be particularly acute in Rwanda.
The solution, according to Sommers: development practitioners should focus on helping young men achieve adulthood through economic development, jobs, housing and land reform. The empowerment of women and girls and social stability in general will follow.
But, experts in academia and in the field continue to debate the degree to which masculinity should be incorporated into conflict prevention. For another perspective, we now turn to Naomi Cahn, professor of law at George Washington University and co-author of the upcoming book On the Front Lines: Gender, War and the Post Conflict Process.
Laura Wilson: Where and when have you studied gender-based violence in Africa?
Naomi: I lived in Kinshasa, Congo, from 2002-2004. Since 2002, I have conducted legal research on issues of gender and post-conflict reconstruction. Before joining the GW faculty in 1993, I worked in a law school clinic on domestic violence, and I also co-taught one of the first International Women’s Rights courses in the country. I am currently co-authoring a book, On the Frontlines: Gender, War and the Post-Conflict Process, which examines related issues.
Laura Wilson: What are your major findings about the best ways to reduce/prevent GBV?
Naomi: Promoting women’s independence and status, providing them with economic livelihoods and health care, promoting literacy, enacting laws, establishing shelters, and demilitarizing societies are some of the proven ways of helping women who face threats of GBV. GBV is one aspect of women’s subordinate status. It has also received a great deal of attention, but women face numerous other issues that are as seriously discriminatory in promoting their status.
Laura Wilson: Do you think focusing on the challenges that boys/men face will drain resources to support programs for women and therefore be counterproductive for women?
Naomi: In our book project, although we definitely pay attention to masculinities and recognize their centrality to the issues we think about, we also recognize the danger in such a focus. We worry about what will happen to women if donors and policy makers start to think about men. There is an obvious risk that this will replicate other biases that we know too well exists.
Laura Wilson: While masculinity is an important factor in conflict prevention, I agree with Naomi that the focus should not stray too far from women’s needs. Gender programming is a two-sided coin. On one side, development experts must acknowledge the special issues and challenges that men and boys face within different contexts, and especially during conflict. On the other side, to achieve gender equity in most places, projects must continue to put the needs of girls and women first, because the cultural, political, and economic barriers preventing them from independent action and self-determination are far taller than those facing men. Only when gender equity is realized should programming equally target men and women.
Laura Wilson is a candidate for an M.A. degree in international development studies at The George Washington University with a focus on gender, human rights and development. She received a B.S. degree in foreign service from Georgetown University in 2007. She is currently the program assistant for the International Development Studies program.
Image: Women in Action Cameroon, November 25 – December 10, 2008. Creative commons licensed Flickr content by user CWGL.
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