Abstract
As a very worthy contribution to the extant literature on gender studies, Men and Development: Politicizing Masculinities throws a different light on the whole gender debate. It emphasizes the need to reshape the existing gender discourse by considering the role of men. By so doing, the book offers insight into how men engage in alternative forms of masculinity as a response to their apparent lack of power, in part engendered by a myriad of women’s empowerment initiatives. The book edited by Andrea Cornwall, Jerker Edström and Alan Greig is a fascinating collection of presentations made at the ‘Politicizing Masculinities’ symposium at Dakar, Senegal in 2007. It offers an eclectic understanding of the way gender and development has been construed in different geographical regions of the world. It looks at structural factors that tend to obfuscate meaningful solutions to the whole gender and development debate. In doing so, it avers that development interventions that focus solely on women are unlikely to solve the structural disadvantages that women face.
In an easily comprehensible prose, the book is divided into three main sections: the first section challenges the prevailing norms surrounding gender and identities that have become dominant in the gender and development discourse. The second section focuses on the gender implications of neoliberal globalization. The third section offers a snapshot of improving entrenched attitudes and beliefs about masculinity through social movements and other initiatives. The central argument is that politicizing masculinity would be the panacea for reconstructing the way gender is understood.
From a multifarious lens, the first section of the book looks at how the failure to factor men into any gender programme could have undesirable effect on meaningful change. For example, HIV/AIDS campaigns that focus on abstinence create scope for some men to explore risky sexual behaviours as a way asserting masculinities. These men construct flouting abstinence or condom use as a demonstration of bravery and manliness. In Chimaoaraoke Izegbara and Jerry Okal’s chapter, youth in Malawi engage in dangerous sexual practices to manifest their masculinity. Having unprotected sex with multiple partners or engaging in undesirable sexual escapades was a way of asserting one’s manliness. Thus, campaigns on condom use have rarely made any significant impact. In the same section, Cheryl Overs opines that the criminalization of men who use sex workers deepens the stigma that sees men as the aggressors and women as victims. To Overs, contrary to popularly held assumptions, women can equally be guilty of promiscuity and men can be sex workers too. Other chapters in this section highlight the complexity of masculinity in the gender debate by drawing examples from India where some females assume male identities. These female-to-male transgender individuals acquire a sense of importance because of the social and economic dominance of becoming men.
The second section focuses on the gender implications of neoliberal globalization. On the one hand, masculine dominance in globalization is reflected in the modern social structure, transnational businesses, politics and religious bodies. On the other hand, the balance of power within the family has shifted in globalization as women enter the labour market as a result of their husbands’ inability to provide for the family due to unemployment. Globalization decimated Western ideas, that had became widespread under colonization, of men as family breadwinners. Margrethe Silberschmidt argues that neoliberal policies deprived men a vital measure of masculinity, namely their ability to work and cater for their families. Consequently, men seek alternative markers of masculinity: some find solace in intrepid sexual conquest and excessive alcoholism even at the peril of contracting HIV/AIDS. The author bemoans the inadequate focus of HIV/AIDS campaigns on destructive new masculine norms and the way in which neoliberal models of development, such as microfinance initiatives for poverty alleviation, make women the fulcrum of their initiatives. Both limit men’s opportunity to contribute to meaningful development. In a similar discussion under the same section, Robert and Penny Morrel discuss how South African men became disempowered through the notorious apartheid system. They suggest that men’s active involvement in activities such as campaigning for gender equality and community-based activities could contribute to their regaining a sense of their relevance to society as men.
The third section focuses on improving entrenched attitudes and beliefs about masculinity through social movements and other significant development initiatives. Gary Baker and his colleagues offer insights from their work with Promundo in Brazil. Based on the method of ‘critical reflection’, the organization helps deconstruct earlier beliefs about masculinity through education, television shows and public media campaigns. Raewyn Connel’s chapter uses the pricing and sale of anti-retroviral drugs to explain how the decisions of the affluent men who dominate the higher echelons of the corporate world have unbearable consequences on poor people, especially women. She suggests that the motivation for profit overshadows a genuine need to serve humanity. The most culpable, in Connel’s view, is the pharmaceutical industry which seems obsessed with profit without due regard for the lives of people living with HIV/AIDS in developing countries, where mostly women have to provide care and support for the countless number of patients—usually relatives—afflicted with the disease.
On the whole, the book is very useful and thought-provoking. However, there are little about how men’s identities are slighted by women-focused development projects. The authors could also have included more case studies on political activities that challenge entrenched patriarchy in most developing countries, especially in Africa. Throwing more light on the challenges faced by community-based organizations involved in efforts to reconstruct masculinity would have been helpful. And finally, clarity on the research methodology would have also been useful. Nonetheless, the book offers tremendous sociological insight into how gender roles that affect fundamental aspects of entrenched power relations in society have been ignored. It is a must read for anybody interested in gender and development, sociology and politics of development, among many other fields interested in gender studies.
Key conclusions gleaned from this book include that: masculinity is a social construction and is irrespective of one’s identified biological sex; engaging men in gender initiatives tends to diffuse misconceptions about the agenda of gender equality; men become active participants in the process of gender quality if they are involved; and, finally, that gender equality is also very much in men’s interest. The use of critical reflection in work with men deflates their strong inclination towards existing attitudes towards women. The book is a departure from the usual iteration of existing gender inequalities.