YOUNG MEN AND VIOLENCE: Building voices of resistance Gary Barker, PhD, International Director Promundo Brazil – Rwanda – US – Burundi – Portugal

Topics  Reflect about key vulnerabilities of young men and how those affect violence  Understanding the resistance to violence that we see every day  How to talk about what boys and men really care about and build their natural resistance to violence

What does being a young man have to do with violence?  Leading causes of death for young men: traffic accidents, homicide, suicide  450,000 homicide deaths annually, 50,000 deaths from conflicts, 80,000 from suicide  80% of these are men When we talk about lethal violence we are talking mostly about young men

Brazil’s Missing Men (IBGE, 2011): Effects of persistent, high rates of homicide and traffic accidents (in millions)

Few make it through boyhood unscathed (International Men and Gender Equality Survey or IMAGES – Promundo and ICRW)

The making of defensive, bullying boys: Boys who are victims of violence in the home have lower self-esteem

Men’s use of physical violence against female partner - IMAGES 7

Correlates of Men’s use of violence against a female partner - IMAGES 8

Men’s use of sexual violence linked to childhood sexual victimization (Men 15-59, IMAGES, 2011, ICRW and Promundo)

The multiple ways violence pays forward: Witnessing violence and delinquency

What explains the resistance to violence?  Involved, gender-equitable parents or caregivers  Close connections with someone who openly resisted violence  Supportive peer groups – resistance in groups easier than doing it alone  Higher reflective abilities – thinking about “what if”  Other male identities  Caring about or for someone else or something bigger than you

Education Sector: Program H/M in schools Structured consciousness raising” about gender and violence using a Paulo Freire approach Activism and community campaigns led by youth “resistors” Training of teachers via online training portal reaching 2000 teachers in 3 states in Brazil

Results of Program H/M: 22 countries 9 quasi-experimental evaluation studies found:  Reduction in violence-supportive attitudes among young men;  Decrease in bullying behavior (Bosnia), sexual harassment (India), and physical violence against female partners (Brazil);  Increased condom use (Brazil, Chile, India);  Reduced disruptive classroom behavior (Brazil, Balkans);  All compared to no change or negative change in control groups

Program F: Using Football to Change Norms Related to Sexual Exploitation

Living Peace: Trauma support, voices of resistance in post-conflict settings

Why the campaign?  Approximately 4 out of 5 men will be fathers at some point in their lives  New global campaign in more than 25 countries to tap into the intergenerational transfer of caring

What does a resistance approach look like?  Mapping the resistance – individuals, practices, sources of non-violence in communities  Engaging the resistors and the survivors and building on their resistance  Working from an assumption of shared desire for non-violence  Reinforcement of all of these with policy and services structure changes  Psychosocial support boys (and girls) and women and men who have witnessed or experience violence Talking about issues that men and boys care about and care for – from “I don’t care” to “I care”