Browsing by Author "Jackson, Anthony Malunga"

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    Determinants of gender mainstreaming in sexual and reproductive health: a case of Selected Family Planning and HIV and AIDS Projects in Malawi
    (University of Dar es salaam, 2019) Jackson, Anthony Malunga
    The study examined gender mainstreaming determinants in Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH) especially Family Planning and HIV/AIDS projects in three districts in Malawi. The study had three objectives around (i) the influence of gender related laws and policies (ii) the preparedness of organisations and staff and (iii) the socio-cultural factors on gender mainstreaming strategy in Family Planning and HIV/AIDS projects. The study employed the convergent research design using a mixed methods approach to collect data using a survey (N=222), FGDs (N=14), in-depth interview with gender specialists (N=16), structured interviews with organisation staff (N=15) and individual interviews with community leaders (N=25). It was based on systems theory and rights centred approach. Overall, first objective findings showed that laws and policies at international and national level were indeed pre-requisite for gender mainstreaming in sexual and reproductive health. Largely, the laws are available, but are scarcely known and used by the organisations staff in the course of the design and implementation of the SRH projects. As a result, the laws have had no influence in the implementation of the projects. This was not consistent with the expectation of the projects that were intended to be implemented within a gender mainstreaming strategy and rights based approach. Secondly, on the second objective, it was found that both the organisations and the staff involved in the SRH projects were compromised in terms of embracing institutional gender culture and having adequate gender mainstreaming capacity respectively. As a result, the study established that the organizations staff did not do a gender analysis to understand the context of the SRH projects prior to the full implementation. This affected the opportunity for implementing gender transformative activities to challenge gender inequalities. The beneficiaries mostly got involved in initial project cycle activities like awareness rising than the expected whole project cycle involvement. Thus, participation and involvement was at tokenism level. The activities were largely Family