TY - JOUR
T1 - Community understandings of and responses to gender equality and empowerment in Rakai, Uganda
AU - Mullinax, Margo
AU - Higgins, Jenny
AU - Wagman, Jennifer
AU - Nakyanjo, Neema
AU - Kigozi, Godfrey
AU - Serwadda, David
AU - Wawer, Maria
AU - Gray, Ronald
AU - Nalugoda, Fred
N1 - Funding Information:
RHSP research assistants trained in qualitative methods conducted focus group discussions between January and February 2008 to assess community-level knowledge and attitudes about IPV, gender equality and the SHARE project. The study was approved by the Science and Ethics Committee (SEC), the Institutional Review Board (IRB) for the Uganda Virus Research Institute, the Uganda National Council of Science and Technology (UNCST) and the IRB of the World Health Organization, which provided funding for this research. The purpose of these groups was to understand: societal and normative-level changes relating to gender and IPV; community opinions about the SHARE intervention; community members’ perceptions of equality and the current state of women in their community.
PY - 2013/4
Y1 - 2013/4
N2 - Women's rights and gender empowerment programmes are now part of the international agenda for improving global public health, the benefits of which are well documented. However, the public health community has, yet, to address how people define and understand gender equality and how they enact the process of empowerment in their lives. This study uses safe homes and respect for everyone(SHARE), an anti-violence intervention in rural Rakai, Uganda, as a case study to investigate perceptions of gender equality. Investigators analysed 12 focus groups of adult women and men to explore how macro-level concepts of gender equality are being processed on an interpersonal level and the effects on health outcomes. Respondents generally agreed that women lack basic rights. However, they also expressed widespread disagreement about the meanings of gender equality, and reported difficulties integrating the concepts of gender equality into their interpersonal relationships. Community members reported that equality, with the resulting shift in gender norms, could expose women to adverse consequences such as violence, infidelity and abandonment with increased sexual health risks, and potential adverse effects on education. Efforts to increase women's rights must occur in conjunction with community-based work on understandings of gender equality.
AB - Women's rights and gender empowerment programmes are now part of the international agenda for improving global public health, the benefits of which are well documented. However, the public health community has, yet, to address how people define and understand gender equality and how they enact the process of empowerment in their lives. This study uses safe homes and respect for everyone(SHARE), an anti-violence intervention in rural Rakai, Uganda, as a case study to investigate perceptions of gender equality. Investigators analysed 12 focus groups of adult women and men to explore how macro-level concepts of gender equality are being processed on an interpersonal level and the effects on health outcomes. Respondents generally agreed that women lack basic rights. However, they also expressed widespread disagreement about the meanings of gender equality, and reported difficulties integrating the concepts of gender equality into their interpersonal relationships. Community members reported that equality, with the resulting shift in gender norms, could expose women to adverse consequences such as violence, infidelity and abandonment with increased sexual health risks, and potential adverse effects on education. Efforts to increase women's rights must occur in conjunction with community-based work on understandings of gender equality.
KW - IPV
KW - gender equality
KW - interpersonal negotiation
KW - unintended health outcomes
KW - women's empowerment
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U2 - 10.1080/17441692.2013.768686
DO - 10.1080/17441692.2013.768686
M3 - Article
C2 - 23463914
AN - SCOPUS:84876341674
SN - 1744-1692
VL - 8
SP - 465
EP - 478
JO - Global public health
JF - Global public health
IS - 4
ER -