Engaging men and boys has emerged as a vital strategy for ending gender based violence, including in refugee and post-conflict settings. While prevention and response activities are essential, the humanitarian community and host country service providers understand that they must move beyond simply addressing each individual case of sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) and begin to address the societal, cultural, economic, religious and political systems that either perpetuate or allow for violence based on gender to continue. This requires attitudinal change, systems change and behavioral change – largely on the part of men and boys who continue to be the vast majority of perpetrators.
This report comes from a workshop held in Cape Town, South Africa, over 22-25 September, 2008.