Accountability

We say we are committed to equality and social justice, but are we really? We say that engaging men and transforming masculinities contributes to women’s and lhbtqia+ emancipation, but is that really so? We say we are helping to transform conceptions of masculinity but is that really happening? These are the kinds of questions at stake in “accountability,” which is gaining traction in the global MenEngage Alliance.

Accountability is difficult to translate to Dutch. Its many possible meanings demonstrate its versatility. Accountability can mean “aansprakelijkheid”, “aanspreekbaarheid”, “verantwoordelijkheid”, “toerekenbaarheid”, “ter-verantwoording-roepbaarheid”. It’s about “je rekenschap geven”, “verantwoording afleggen”, walking the talk, practicing what you preach. . In other words, are you actually doing what you say you believe is important?

For example: Is it right if work to engage men is funded from budgets intended for emancipation of girls, women and lhbtqia* people? Is engaging men soon to be the latest hype that suppresses attention to girls and women? Do we really need to put men and boys so central where it should actually be about empowering girls and women?

And what about other inequalities? Are we paying enough attention inequalities between men, for example because of racism and homophobia? Are we not engaging in the stigmatization of vulnerable populations when they are seen as key target groups?

It is important that we take responsibility for what we do and that we are and can be held accountable. That we are aware of our fallibility, of the fact that we have blind spots that sometimes deprive us of the sharp sight of unintended negative effects of our work. That we are eager to learn, to grow, to develop.

Research shows that initiatives for engaging men are far from always successful in contributing to the emancipation of girls and women or in questioning and transforming ideas about masculinity and femininity. Especially when men’s vulnerability is the focus, there is a risk that attention to men’s responsibilities and privileges fades into the background.

We ask men what kind of man or human they want to be, we ask everyone what kind of men or humans they want to see in the world, and so we must also ask ourselves what kind of organization we want to be.

Accountability, according to MenEngage, is “the commitment and appropriate conduct that individuals and organisations working in the engaging boys and men field must have toward women’s rights groups and other social justice movements.” In other words, that we ensure that our work with men and on transforming masculinity truly contributes to social justice.

For accountable work with men…

• we must ensure that gender equality and social justice is the starting point of everything we do, and that we always contribute to the empowerment of women and other marginalized groups;
• we must be aware of our power and privileges as men and masculinity focused organizations and be open to criticism;
• we must take action to address individual and institutionalized practices that go against our principles, acknowledge any harm done and, where possible, compensate;
• we must respect and encourage leadership from women and people of other marginalized genders;
• we must ensure proper consultation and partnership structures with women’s rights organizations and organizations representing other marginalized groups;
• we must acknowledge the risks to our work (see below), be clear about our principles, show what we stand for and where we still have work to do, and be open to and respond to constructive feedback. That’s what this page is for.

Accountability involves both the organizational and personal level, and both preventing and responding to misconduct.

Our work on transforming masculinities stands on the shoulders of feminist and women’s (rights) organizations and the women’s movement. Our work should always contribute to their cause. Not for nothing do we define engaging men as, first, the contribution of men to the emancipation of women, other marginalized genders and (other) lhbtqia+ persons, and only second, as the liberation of men from traditional masculinities.

Since the rise of feminist men’s and masculinity focused movements, feminists have expressed concerns about those movements and their intentions and effects. Unfortunately, their concerns have been justified in some cases. Some examples of what can go wrong.

• Exhibit behaviors that we condemn. In recent years, stories have come out about transgressive behavior, abuse of power, sexism, homophobia, and more, by high-ranking men within several MenEngage organizations, UN Women and other idealistic organizations such as Oxfam and Amnesty.
• Taking up too much space. Think: a conversation about gender equality with a panel of only men.
• Evoking traditional masculinities and stereotypes to appeal to and engage men in our work. Such as “real men don’t beat their wives.” This exploits and reinforces problematic gender stereotypes rather than questioning and transforming them.
• Opportunistic motives: men who profile themselves as feminists are often applauded.
• When work on engaging men men receives funding, it is often at the expense of funding other initiatives, for example, for women’s or lhbtqia+ empowerment.
• Too little alignment with women’s and other social justice organizations leads to neglect of their interests.
• An overemphasis on men’s victimization of restrictive gender norms leads to their privileges being lost from view.
• As organizations grow larger, it is often difficult to continue to promote feminist core values.

• Emancipator is a feminist organization. We are committed to social justice, to a sustainable world in which everyone can thrive and develop in safety, freedom and equality. For this, gender and power structures as they currently exist must radically change.
• Recognizing that many problems in the world are caused by men and masculinity and men are not approached enough as gendered beings, we focus on engaging men and masculinities in gender and feminist issues. On the one hand, that is about engaging men in feminist issues, on the other hand it’s about making feminist organizations and movements understand that implementing a perspective on men and masculinities in their work is essential to achieving gender justice.
• We acknowledge that there is more to inequalities and privileges than gender. Therefore, in our work, we explicitly address the ways in which racism, heterosexism, validism and sanism, age discrimination, classism and other inequalities create oppression and marginalization of groups of people, and realize that all these axes of privilege and marginalization intersect.

• We strive for a more diverse, representative composition of the team that better matches the audiences, communities and networks we target.
• We aim to appeal to and engage an audience that is even more diverse in terms of gender, sexuality, color, class, age, education, place of residence, cultural background, etc. We strive for our work to be about all boys and men and not just focus on already marginalized groups such as non-white boys or men of lower socioeconomic status, practical education and/or non-Western background, but also address boys and men in privileged societal – white, straight, theoretically educated, relatively affluent positions.
• We strive to ensure that time and space and attention in our workshops, sessions and other meetings are shared fairly among attendees.
• We strive to communicate clearly so that what we convey is true to what we mean and can be understood that way. For example, one challenge is that we often talk about “men and women,” which sounds like we are adhering to a very binary idea about gender. At the same time, formulations such as “people socialized as men” or “the social construct masculinity,” while more correct, are neither convenient nor obvious to everyone. We strive to break down the dichotomy between men and masculinity on the one hand and women and femininity on the other, but at the same time we cannot escape taking that dichotomy as a starting point for our work.
• At the same time, we strive for our texts to connect with the very different audiences we deal with. This is not always the case now, partly due to a lack of professionalism and time wb. communication, partly due to a lack of diversity and representation in the team.
• We strive, in projects that focus on the vulnerabilities and marginalization of (groups of) men, to also pay attention to the fact that men are also always relatively privileged and should also be held accountable for their actions and take the responsibility that goes with their position.
• We strive to include our partners in our critical, gender-transformative and intersectional approach, and are aware that this can push us into a position of “men explaining to women how to do feminism”.
• We strive to be open to reporting undesirable situations or transgressive behavior, internally or with collaborative partners, and act accordingly. The form below is a first step towards this. Feedback is most welcome.

• We involve boys and men in gender issues by making them part of the solution, thus contributing to the emancipation of women and other marginalized groups.
• We address men’s privilege and responsibility but at the same time put masculinity and gender at the center of the problem, not individual men.
  We consciously and explicitly stand for a gender transformative approach.
• We manage to build a broad, diverse community of very different people and organizations who feel at home with us.
• We collaborate with a large number of organizations that work in different ways to promote and achieve gender equality, and that have all kinds of different target groups; through them, our message also reaches a wide range of audiences.
• We acknowledge that our work on engaging men and transforming masculinities stems from the women’s rights and feminist movements and we are open to critical friends from the women’s rights movement and feminist organizations.
• We are self-critical both individually and as an organization. We are aware of our shortcomings.