Here in Uganda, the men are definitely the decision-makers, the ones with the power. While urban areas are becoming more gender-equal than before, most people still consider women and men to hold very distinctive gender roles, with the household work left to the women but the household decisions and prestige being given to the men. Women are seen as weak, yet they are the ones doing most of the manual labor for the home, such as fetching water (jerry cans are heavy!) and firewood. The women care for the children, but if the couple ever separates, the children generally belong to the father (who never actually cares for them – he either hires someone or already has another wife). Here, there is no such thing as rape within marriage, legally or culturally. Men pay a bride price (often paid in cows or other in-kind payments), which means the man has a huge amount of leverage over his wife.  She belongs to him, and has no right to refuse something like sex.  While becoming less common, “marriage by abduction” does happen, in which a man kidnaps a girl who has refused to marry him and rapes her. The girl’s ‘purity’ is then ruined, and out of shame, she accepts to stay as his wife – she usually feels she has no choice, as many families and communities would disown her at this point, and few other men would want her. If a woman wants to use a condom with her partner or go for HIV testing, she is accused of sleeping around (even though it is commonplace for men to have extramarital affairs, thus putting women at risk for HIV infection from their own husbands. 42% of all new HIV infections in Uganda are intramarital).

As a female Peace Corps Volunteer, my struggle is mainly from issues of harassment. Many Ugandan women (unfortunately) have become used to sexual harassment or even assault, so consider it a normal part of life. For myself and my fellow female PCVs, however, harassment is probably one of the biggest issues we face. It can be everything from cat calls (“Hello baby!”, “I love you!”, “My size!”) and blatant inquiries for sex to sexual assault. I have never been assaulted, but several of my friends have. The emotional effects have serious consequences for us as volunteers – some are afraid to leave their houses for fear of unwanted attention or worse. I find that I avoid most Ugandan men, which is something I wish I didn’t resort to because of the potential for positive, professional relationships. Unfortunately, I’ve heard too many stories of female PCVs thinking that they have great friendships and working relationships with co-workers, only to later be propositioned for sex. I have faced very few issues in my small village – everyone knows me and respects/looks out for me. The main challenges occur when I go to bigger cities.

As a Peace Corps Volunteer, I’m trying to improve the lives of the girls and women around me. I’m going to start teaching life skills (such as setting life goals, communication skills, decision-making, healthy behaviors, etc.) to girls in my community soon. As a health volunteer, I’m promoting family planning options, such as condoms or birth control, to try to curb the high fertility rate of about 7 children per woman, but I believe that the only way to truly reduce family size is to empower women and give them other options in life besides having lots of children. Make sure they get a good education and are able to make their own life decisions, allowing them to pursue a career or envision a different path for themselves, and then they will probably choose to have fewer children. This opinion was solidified after reading Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristof and WuDunn – highly recommended book. Peace Corps Volunteers in Uganda have started an annual program called Camp GLOW – Girls Leading Our World – which is a week of empowering activities for young girls which I hope to be really involved with at the end of 2011; I can even nominate girls from my village to attend. Of course, to empower women, you must involve men and change their ideas about gender roles, so ‘women empowerment’ should involve both men and women. I’m helping to organize and facilitate an HIV/AIDS and Gender Inequality Workshop at my organization, The Hunger Project, to demonstrate the link between the lack of women’s rights in society and the spread of HIV/AIDS. While I won’t single-handedly change the gender roles and treatment of women in Uganda, I hope I can help improve the lives of a few women and girls around me.

As the world has broadcast overwhelming attention to the recent US election and win of Sen. Barack Obama, little notice has been paid to status of terrorist groups that provoked the current intervention in Iraq and War on Terror. Indeed, CIA director Michael Hayden reported this week that while Osama bin-Laden may be cut off from the daily operations al-Qaeda, the organization still poses a significant threat against the United States. Furthermore, he notes that al-Qaeda’s influence has grown in the Middle East and Africa, with special attention to the surge of support in Somalia and Algeria, where extremist groups in both areas have joined with al-Qaeda.

Although gendered perspectives are often applied exclusively to women and girls (sometimes by feminists themselves), I am perplexed as I consider the possibilities facing young men around the globe today. In the aftermath of 9/11, some writers, such as Lionel Tiger, have focused on the specific role of young, Muslim males in recruitment of terrorist organizations, such as the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Yet questions about young men have dissipated over the past seven years, despite the fact that recruitment has increased within ‘Islamist’ terrorist organizations and that young remain important, though invisible, in all parts of the world. In his article from 2001, Tiger, a professor of anthropology, writes,

One of the most difficult tasks for any social system is figuring out what to do with its young males. These are invariably the most impressionable, energetic, socially exigent, and politically inept members of any group. They cause trouble for their elders and ruthlessly hassle each other. They pose chronic danger to public order when they drive, drink and take drugs.

Though Tiger’s article highlights the dilemmas young Muslim men face (granted, in a problematic way that seems to generalize young men while ignoring that men of many cultures also face difference challenges and influences), he is correct to recognize that young males are vital as well as vulnerable in populations.

But then why do we (as students, academics and practitioners) continuously forget young men? In development work, the focus remains on providing services and assistance to vulnerable populations such as ‘women’ and ‘children’. Don’t we see that highlight ‘women’ and ‘children’ as vulnerable creates distinctions that girls and women are forever victims while ‘men’, rather than boys, can never be victimized? While this type of thinking is problematic for too many reasons to count, at its fundamental roots, conceptualizing male identity without vulnerability is simply an inaccurate depiction. It is essential that international development projects directly incorporate the potential of young men, especially in African countries where militancy and violence can be attractive and overbearing influences. Arguably, focusing specific and directed attention on young men and boys may even be ways to stop and prevent conflicts, depending on what techniques are used.

Focusing on young men is certainly not to suggest that women and girls are not important or vulnerable populations. It is crucial, however, that academics and practitioners alike recognize that young men face their own challenges that also need targeted solutions and assistance. And as more organizations that recruit civilians into militias creep into the African continent (on top of the ones that were already there), it is truly important that international development practices create safe, sustainable spaces for young men to participate in their communities outside of violence.