Gender and social inclusion aren’t optional; they’re the backbone of lasting change. Yet, too often this work is outsourced to external parties. The following blog, by Patricia Bamanyaki and Mairi Dupar, explores how to overcome this challenge. It forms part of a series sharing insights from CDKN’s recent Locally led adaptation learning and reflection workshop.

Two weeks ago, in Machakos, Kenya, 45 local adaptation leaders and CDKN team members gathered to unpack ‘what’s working’ and ‘what’s not working’ for locally led adaptation (LLA) in diverse African contexts. A strong theme of the workshop was that gender and social inclusion (GESI), including women’s and young people’s leadership, is the backbone of LLA. It is fundamental to its long-term efficacy. 

But too often, when communities and local civil society organisations apply for external funding, they struggle to articulate the ‘GESI’ narrative for funders. They employ outside experts to tell the story and secure the funds. Even when funds are secured, they still have to rely on external experts to deliver on GESI, which comes at a cost and with limited potential for real changes in communities. 

Is this the way it should work? Or is it time to stop outsourcing GESI and build true internal capacity for it? 

‘GESI’ mandates are made with good intentions 

Gender analyses and gender action plans are a mainstay of virtually all international donor funding these days – whether it’s the big international funds such as the Green Climate Fund, Global Environmental Facility and Adaptation Fund or the smaller bilateral and philanthropic finance flows, including the Dutch/Canadian Step Change Programme of which CDKN is a part. 

There’s good reason for this. There is compelling evidence, across scientific literature, climate programmes such as CDKN, and people’s lived experience, that women and girls, boys and men are differently exposed to climate change because of their gendered roles.  

We can see this difference if we imagine how a heatwave could affect different members of a community. Typical ‘women’s jobs’ may involve cooking in an overheated kitchen under a hot tin roof, and typical ‘men’s jobs’ may be in building construction outside: both groups are exposed and vulnerable but in different ways, and the strategies for reducing risk and building resilience are different.  

What is more, society’s responses to climate shocks and stresses can take a gendered dimension – from the good (elevating women’s leadership) to the bad (gender-based violence) as recounted to CDKN by community-based women activists across the Global South in the Stories of Resilience. 

There’s a strong rationale, then, for why donors ask finance applicants to analyse the gendered dynamics of climate change vulnerability, and forge action plans that involve climate-affected groups meaningfully in solutions. 

But capacity must be consolidated from the ‘ground up’ 

The problem with current approaches to climate investment is that GESI expertise is often ‘outsourced’ to external consultants – according to participants from across Africa who took part in CDKN’s LLA workshop. 

Reliance on ‘outsourcing’ GESI analysis and planning is a recipe for weak community ownership and poor capacity in the long term.  

Stronger capacity for gender and socially inclusive programmes must be developed internally by local state and traditional authorities and civil society institutions. This capacity is a critical part of the transformational adaptation that frontline communities need.   

So, what steps can be taken to develop that strong internal capacity? 

Participants highlighted that: 

• External GESI expertise can be used intentionally to strengthen subnational or local institutions’ internal capacities in the long term, i.e. with legacy in mind. That is exactly what the CDKN Ethiopia team has been doing, with a long running programme of ‘training of GESI trainers’ among national government officials, civil society and youth networks for climate action with the expectation that they will cascade skills at subnational level. 

• Men and boys can act as allies in boosting women’s meaningful co-leadership for climate change adaptation.  ‘GESI’ issues are too often seen as women’s domain and male engagement is lacking – but in fact, GESI is everyone’s business and benefits everyone. The CDKN programme in Namibia is doing this by engaging men and women in identifying risks, vulnerabilities and priority solutions that are GESI responsive.  

• Programme design and implementation from the ground-up should address people’s intersectional identities and how intersectionality shapes people’s vulnerabilities and their capacities for climate action. For example, women may experience climate shocks and stresses differently from men in their community, but there are differences among women, too. E.g. younger versus older, married versus widowed or single, living with or without disabilities and long-term health conditions?  What are their priorities, and do they need different forms of support to become more climate-resilient? Achieving this calls for intentional investment in multi-dimensional gender disaggregated data collection. 

• ‘Inclusion’ should not be a code word for passive ‘participation’ but should translate into meaningful engagement for diverse groups of people, in crafting climate solutions. Women and youth participation in decision making processes is low due to their lack of confidence and deeply engrained cultural norms. Sometimes, this means creating separate places and spaces for people to talk where they feel safe: e.g. dedicated women and youth forums. Then, participants can feed their opinions back into the main forum with more confidence. It may also mean strengthening their capacities (knowledge and skills) to effectively participate in formal decision-making spaces. If women’s and youth groups already exist, then these can also act as a locus for organising for adaptation action.

• Practical forms of facilitation to enable excluded groups to attend meetings is also important for strengthening their input and fostering everyone’s GESI capacity. This may mean providing child minders, breastfeeding spaces, aids for the visually impaired, toilets that are accessible for all including those with disabilities. None of these barriers can be dismantled overnight, but with patient dialogue and effort, all these barriers to inclusion can be addressed over time and even simple measures such as choice of meeting time and venue can boost inclusion in the short term. Ensuring accessibility and time poverty considerations of the excluded groups is vital. 

Ultimately, projects and programmes must be tailored to local contexts, taking into account cultural considerations and using local people’s knowledge and world views as the starting point for to foster adaptation action. Tools and approaches used should match the unique experiences of target groups, e.g. by literacy level, age, roles and responsibilities. This ‘fit’ can be achieved when local people own and articulate the GESI narrative. 

Many, attainable measures such as those described above can make adaptation action more inclusive and effective at the local level today; while strengthening community and institutional capabilities for GESI integration and empowering different members of the community to write their own narrative.   

For materials and group exercises on gender and social inclusion that can be readily adapted for local use, visit www.cdkn.org/gendertraining (for Ethiopian versions with Amharic translation, visit https://cdkn.org/resource/gender-training-pack-for-ethiopian-practitioners ) 

For a CDKN analysis of climate finance projects, including a critique of poor internal capacity, read: Guide to strengthening gender integration in climate finance projects | Climate & Development Knowledge Network