“Why are you giving the girls more attention?”

Two young boys looked up at me earnestly, unfazed by their own bluntness.

They had caught me just as I was just getting off the bus at a school in rural Western Kenya, where I had been working that summer. At the time I thought I had provided them with a good explanation: girls were further down the ‘empowerment ladder’ than boys, so we had to give girls a boost for them to have a chance at equality. The boys listened and then traipsed off, unsatisfied by my answer.

Over the last few years, I have replayed this scene in my head with some measure of guilt. I too have become unsatisfied with the narrative I offered those boys. What I’ve learned since, is that the attitudes of those boys will shape the future of the girls and women in their lives, as well as their own. We need to include boys and men in the fight for gender equality. 

The #MeToo movement has reignited crucial conversations around feminism, barriers to women’s empowerment, and gender stereotypes. Women and girls are increasingly challenging perceptions and beliefs that dictate what they can and cannot do. But this questioning of gender roles has not necessarily been the same for men and boys; they are often thought of as not possessing gender, as gender being a “women’s issue”.

In ignoring how gender impacts boys and men, we are overlooking an essential part of what enables gender inequality to persist.

An example of this can be seen in a field that we may not consider immediately relevant: preventing violent extremism. While the motivations that drive radicalisation are complex, it is significant that the perpetrators are predominantly men and boys. Yet we do not adequately consider how societal expectations and definitions of masculinity may affect decisions to join violent extremist groups and participate in violence.

At UNDP, we are beginning to further explore how gender impacts men and boys’ behaviour in development contexts. UNDP recently joined forces with UN Women to take a closer look at how masculinity and gender identity shape violent extremism. With support from the European Union’s Service for Foreign Policy Instruments and the Government of Japan, our latest research finds that masculinities significantly influence why men and boys are drawn to extremist groups and how these groups recruit and operate.

By looking at how masculinity impacts behaviours, we may gain new insights and interventions that have previously been overlooked.

We must recognize that the consequences of addressing gender inequality by only targeting women and girls could potentially expose them to further harm. As gender equality, on some counts, gains a foothold in Asia-Pacific, the resulting changes are eliciting a backlash from some men and boys who are pushing back against changing power dynamics and roles. When I think back to the two boys that approached me, who would now be teenagers, I wonder if they are grappling with what it means to be a man.

Gender inequality is a complex issue that does not have a simple solution. But perhaps one of the ways to make strides in gender equality lie in reinforcing positive notions of masculinity  from a young age.

Read the joint UNDP - UN Women report "Conflicting Identities: The Nexus Between Masculinities, Femininities, and Violent Extremism in Asia" .

Contact
Isabella Caravaggio
Project Officer for Preventing Violent Extremism
UNDP Bangkok Regional Hub
(isabella.caravaggio@undp.org)