• Remedial strategies

Strategies and actions for ending violence against women and reducing HIV and AIDS infection

This case study presents the Institutes’ experience in engaging young men as ‘change agents’ in gender-based violence prevention and the promotion of sexual and reproductive health. The change agents (or peer promoters) are young men from low income areas of Rio de Janeiro who reach other young men with educational materials, condoms, a lifestyle magazine and a play about reducing violence against women.

Successes and lessons learnt:

• rousing the public imagination about including young men in gender violence prevention and sexual and reproductive health: audiences (male peers, policymakers, groups of advocates) have been moved upon meeting a group of young men from a low income setting talking about gender-based violence and sexual and reproductive health and why these are also their issues
• getting the issue on the public agenda: at the national level in Brazil, the Ministry of Health is supporting efforts to reach and engage young men. At the local level, demand for these research findings, publications and training has grown in the last year. At the city level in Rio de Janeiro, the city’s health department has included discussions about engaging adult and young men in sexual and reproductive health, in part because of this projects efforts
• finding and maintaining allies: forming alliances and partnerships was often slow, but it was necessary to achieve success in the face of limited funding and to have greater impact
• combining research with practice and getting other organisations to take on the ideas: it has been important to disseminate the research and program results so that organisations at the national level take on these ideas and findings
• promoting young men’s engagement in gender violence prevention and in sexual and reproductive health from a perspective that focuses on potential not deficit: this project has worked to emphasise the point that some men, including those in low-income settings, oppose violence against women and that many already participate in reproductive and sexual health concerns. By recruiting adult and young men who are willing and interested to participate in gender violence prevention and in promoting sexual and reproductive health, the project has shown the tremendous potential of men to be engaged, respectful and non-violent partners
• presenting new models of what it means to be a man: group discussions and role modelling have led to youth questioning gender stereotypes
• accepting and coping with adolescent parenting

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