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Luisa Dietrich, Gender & Conflict Analyst Simone E. Carter, Research & Assessment Coordinator MAY 2017

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

This gender and conflict analysis of ISIS-affected communities of Iraq aims to improve understanding of gender dynamics in the context of conflict and displacement. This report sets out to identify the differential impact of ISIS occupation on women, girls, men and boys in order to explore shifts in prevailing gender norms held by study participants in Anbar, Salah Al Din and Nineveh governorates of Iraq.

The objective is to enhance the understanding of the social pressures women and men experience when aiming to conform to context-specific gendered expectations of masculinity and femininity, in order to derive concrete recommendations for genderresponsive and conflict-sensitive humanitarian and recovery programming. Furthermore, this proposes concrete recommendations to adapt humanitarian and recovery programming to mitigate gendered drivers of conflict and tensions, while enhancing gendered drivers that contribute to stability and community cohesion.

Methodology

This research used the Saferworld’s Gender Analysis of Conflict Toolkit, which aims to integrate gender perspectives into conflict analysis, providing a foundation for gender-responsive programming in humanitarian and recovery settings. Consequently, the toolkit intends to fill the gap between conflict analysis that lacks a strong gender lens and a gender analysis that lacks a strong conflict lens.

Qualitative data following the toolkit’s structure were then complemented with quantitative data asking similar questions collected concurrently with Oxfam’s Multi-sectoral Needs Assessment (thereby using one quantitative dataset to conduct two studies simultaneously and reduce the study burden on populations).

Data were collected from a 629-household survey, 24 Focus Group Discussions and 32 Key Informant Interviews across Salah Al Din, Anbar and Mosul.

The sample size for the household survey provided a 95% confidence interval with a 5% margin of error.1 Quantitative data were analysed using Marketsight software and analysis of qualitative data relied on Atlas-Ti software, which allowed the uploading and coding of the qualitative data reporting templates. Theoretical saturation was reached with qualitative data and preliminary findings triangulated during validation.

Findings

From 2014 onwards, ISIS imposed a strict social control over communities in Iraq. In response to the disruption of the social fabric, the retraction of safe public space, the conflict-induced disintegration of household units and the regulation of marriages, household members increasingly withdrew to the domestic space, which resulted in increased household tensions.

This research found that prevailing gender norms among study participants are based on a gendered difference and a gendered division of labour that tends to assign men responsibilities as protectors and providers, while designating domestic roles and responsibilities that centre on the wellbeing of their families to women. Under the ISIS occupation, study participants experienced the imposition of a set of radicalised gender norms, which included the strict separation of women from unrelated men in public spaces, as well as rules about attire and daily practices that were enforced by brutal means. Consequently, study participants tended to comply with ISIS, but have sought to revert to their prevailing beliefs and attitudes, framed around gendered division of labour and gender roles, without continuing to abide by rules imposed under ISIS occupation. The current context of displacement constitutes a space where gender roles, responsibilities and practices are being re-negotiated, thereby generating entry points for gender-responsive, as well as gender-transformative humanitarian and recovery interventions.

The exploration of gender norms that mitigate conflict and contribute to stability and community cohesion revealed that female study participants, in line with prevailing gender norms around domestic responsibilities, extended their scope of practices in the course of ISIS-occupation to interpret well-being of the family in terms of protecting their children from joining ISIS, keeping their families safe and stressing the importance of education in a context where the formal school system had been dismantled. The acknowledgement of women’s diverse roles in keeping their families safe and shifts in intra-household power dynamics, constitute a possible entry point to strengthen women’s participation in contexts of displacement, as they strive to resume paid work, report an increase in joint household expenditure decision-making within the household or expressing their interest in being more involved in community decision-making.

Study participants indicate that men face considerable constraints in living up to their expected roles as the main household providers. ISIS-occupation exacerbated pressures on men who refused to join ISIS by restricting movement and forcing the closure of businesses, while the ban on women in public spaces resulted in men assuming the responsibilities of sole household providers. While access to livelihoods remains the greatest concern in displacement contexts, the humanitarian and recovery community can contribute to more flexible gender roles when promoting culturally acceptable opportunities (for women), collaborative (between husband and wife) or collective (women’s cooperatives) income generation options. Furthermore, this research shows that male study participants have also extended their understanding of their roles as protectors to serve as role-models within the family in order to mitigate potential future tensions arising from and contributing to community reconstruction efforts.

Recommendations

The humanitarian and recovery community can contribute to building back better and being more accountable to the affected population. They can adapt their programme interventions to ensure not only equal and equitable access to humanitarian and recovery assistance for men and women, but also that they include shifts in gender norms that comprise beliefs, attitudes and actual behaviours in their context analysis and programme design and implementation in ways that contribute to a more egalitarian renegotiation of gender roles.

Finally, gender-responsive and conflict-sensitive humanitarian and recovery programming can address the gender drivers that fuel conflict, exacerbate tensions, and increase vulnerability of the affected population, while enhancing those gender drivers that contribute to building trust, strengthening community cohesion and building resilience.

The authors propose a two-pronged approach for recommendations for humanitarian and recovery programmes:

1. Address gendered drivers that fuel community tensions.

• Diversify income generation opportunities to counter constructions of men as sole income providers.

• Contribute to shifts in unpaid care work by reducing the stigmatisation of men.

• Enhance targeted interventions to reach vulnerable (single/unmarried) women increasing peer-support structures.

1. Enhance gendered drivers that build trust.

• Generate safe spaces for women and girls to support their collective organising efforts.

• Seize opportunities to enhance women’s meaningful participation at community level.

• Work with men and boys on the promotion of alternative gender roles as positive role models.

• Create and rehabilitate safe public spaces that enable the joint work of community members.

• Support local women’s rights defenders and their organisations in working with survivors of SGBV.

• Contribute to an inclusive, women-led and accountable Women, Peace and Security Agenda