Engaging Men in Women’s Empowerment and Rights Achievement: An Exploratory Study

The study aimed to identify ways in which men are already contributing to struggles to secure women's rights and engaging with initiatives to empower women outside of the private realm of the household. The study involved primary data collection for four case studies, including one on men's engagement through activism and advocacy initiatives, two examining men's engagement with projects that have a women's empowerment and rights achievement objective, and one considering gender relations more broadly in an urban labor market sector. The study analyzed data collected from 14 focus group discussions, 39 semi-structured interviews, and a selection of more informal conversations. The study suggests that men in Afghanistan are already engaged in and supporting women's empowerment and rights achievement. This includes men in families that support female family members' education, careers, and personal ambitions; men in the workplace treating their female colleagues as equals and contributing to the women's rights and empowerment goals of programs on which they work; male elders defending women's rights in their communities; and men deliberately advocating for changes to legislation in support of women's rights. The study highlights the importance of recognizing that men's role and place in society are gendered, allowing for a shift away from understanding gender as being only relevant to women. This shift in focus and understanding can facilitate projects and programs becoming truly gender mainstreamed, rather than just adding a component for women to projects and programs designed for men. The study also emphasizes that projects do not need to be specifically, or only, working on women's rights or women's empowerment to engage men in women's empowerment and rights achievement. A gender mainstreaming approach to any program can incorporate men's engagement in women's empowerment and women's rights. To do this, the design process of a program needs to incorporate women's needs, interests, and contributions, as well as how men can be motivated and enabled to contribute to their realization. The study identifies knowledge as the most important factor motivating men to engage in women's empowerment and rights achievement. This may be knowledge of women's struggles and suffering; knowledge of alternative gender systems as gained through exposure to other countries, literature, and/or the media; knowledge of women's rights in the Sharia and evidence of women's capabilities; and the benefits of women's empowerment to society, individual communities, or businesses. The study also highlights the challenges faced by men and women working together in Afghanistan, including unfounded accusations of sexual impropriety due to the strict sex-segregation of social space outside of the family.