Implementing Multiple Gender Strategies to Improve HIV and ... - ICRW

• Engaging a cross-section of actors helps build the critical mass to
change social norms.
Challenges and
Unforeseen
Outcomes
• Developing relationships of trust with community members takes time.
• Community members are used to having NGOs take the lead and act
as experts. Some community members find it unusual and difficult to
become the activists and drivers of change.
• While it is important to be comprehensive and holistic, activities should
be conducted within organizational capacity. Organizations should be
encouraged to partner with others to implement SASA! and to choose
carefully the strategies and stakeholders they will work with, rather than
over-reaching by trying to implement a variety of activities with a large
number of groups.
Recommendations
for Replication
• For successful replication, committed staff members and established
connections to the community are needed, and there must be a
willingness and ability to foster positive and respectful relationships with
community members.
• A rights-based approach to violence against women must be
understood by staff and promoted by leadership within the
implementing organization. A rights-based approach recognizes that a
life free of violence is a fundamental human right.
• Adequate funding to support the scope and context of activities needs
to be committed from the outset as once intense community
engagement begins, it is essential to sustain the process.
• Often, implementers want to skip through phases—e.g., begin with the
action phase to find solutions to violence against women. But it is
important to stress the process and invest time in helping communities
systematically through this effort.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Program
References and
Resources
Michau, L. The SASA! Activist Kit for Preventing Violence Against Women
and HIV. Kampala: Raising Voices, Dec. 2008.
Michau, L. The SASA! Way to Preventing Violence Against Women. 2008.
http://www.kit.nl/net/KIT_Publicaties_output/ShowFile2.aspx?e=1465.
Accessed October 21, 2008.
Michau, L., and D. Naker. Mobilizing Communities to Prevent Domestic
Violence: A Resource Guide for Organizations in East and Southern Africa.
Kampala: Raising Voices, 2003.
Raising Voices. Preventing Violence Against Women: SASA Study. 2008.
http://www.raisingvoices.org/sasa/sasa_study.php. Accessed October 21,
2008.
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