No abstract

No abstract

Participatory interventions with men and boys to transform masculinities are increasingly common to improve health and reduce intimate partner violence and HIV-related risk. Yet, despite this, there has been little consideration of how facilitators' own masculinities shape interventions. In this analysis of Stepping Stones and Creating Futures, a gender-transformative programme delivered to young men (aged 18-30 years) in urban informal settlements in Durban, South Africa we explore how facilitators' masculinities were employed to engender change in the masculinities of participants. We argue facilitators had to negotiate two tasks existing in some tension, the first, overt and the main aim of the programme: namely, challenging elements of the youthful masculinity at play in the lives of participants, such as exerting violent power over women. A second task was more covert: namely, establishing facilitators' credibility 'as men' in order to do this work with participants. Through strategies including clothes, mobile phones, jokes and storytelling, facilitators demonstrated to participants their 'successful' masculinity and could then engage with participants around emotions, non-violence and consistent condom use. This enabled facilitators and participants to undergo a limited processes of change, without 'compromising' their sense of masculinity, and without fundamentally challenging men's patriarchal privilege.

With respect to research on violent conflict, violent masculinities and masculinities linked to military or military-style organizations have received considerable attention. Such forms of violent masculinity are often seen as hegemonic. Based on our research in Aceh, Indonesia, we suggest that the conflation of hegemonic forms of masculinity with militarization and violence overlooks the many ways in which civilian men use political mechanisms of hegemonic masculinity to create consent while remaining explicitly nonviolent and thus contribute to non-violent ways of managing conflict. Drawing on vignettes of Acehnese men's experiences, we identify three strategies of conflict prevention and management to achieve relative hegemony in non-violent ways: strategic appeasement, creating safe spaces and transforming militarized masculinities. The ways in which these men participate in peace-building contribute to reducing violence, yet do not necessarily challenge hegemonic masculinities. Our case study of conflictrelated masculinities in Aceh paints a nuanced picture of what comes to be seen as hegemonic in a given society at a given point in time and what can be contested. We demonstrate the importance of understanding conflict management through an approach that includes non-violent forms of masculinities and focuses on hegemonic masculinity as a political mechanism of consent creation.

No abstract