An overview of the campaign in South Africa

Why the Campaign? More than four out of five men worldwide will be fathers at some point in their lives. Nearly all the world’s men have some connection to children as brothers, uncles, teachers, coaches or simply as friends. A growing and overwhelming body of evidence from the Global North and Global South confirms that engaged fatherhood is good for children, good for women and good for men themselves. Yet engaging men as caring, involved fathers and caregivers has seldom been the focus of our global efforts to engage men in gender equality.

Why the campaign? We often hear of the intergenerational transfer of violence, where perpetrators of violence are likely to have witnessed violence as a child. It is less often that we hear of the intergenerational transfer of caring behaviors. An image from the Fatherhood Project in SA 2005

The campaign consists of A set of ten messages that convey important aspects of fatherhood, men and care to address globally Formative research and guidance for local country adaptation of the campaign Images that convey the themes A website with resource materials A prospectus that gives deeper background to the messages, and encourages action from individuals, families, communities, institutions and governments

The ten themes 1. Be Involved from the Start 2. Share the Care Work, and Get Good at It 3. Show it, Be Proud 4. Get Involved in Your Child’s Health 5. Play. Laugh. 6. Provide an Education. At Home and at School. 7. Be Brave. Show Affection. 8. Raise Without Violence. 9. Teach Equality and Respect. 10. Support and Respect the Child’s Mother

The global campaign adapted for South Africa

The prospectus and the images Play. Laugh Employers, policymakers, schools and NGOs should encourage men’s play with children. Early childhood development programs should specifically seek to engage men in play and care of young children. We need to show and emphasize more spaces and ways in which men should play with children – as well as be involved other aspects of care work.

Get Involved in Your Child’s Health Men, too, as fathers, uncles, brothers, grandfathers, need to be reached with messages about how to protect their children’s health. Men need to be encouraged to get tested for HIV and to be part of preventing the transmission of HIV from mothers to children.

Get Involved in Your Child’s Health Men can get tested to know their HIV status. Men can also support the prevention of transmission of HIV from the mother to the child by sharing a greater load of household work, in order for the mother to focus on breast-feeding the child. Men can also share in the care of the child by feeding with a bottle, in cases of formula feeding. Young children need clean water and men can fetch and boil water for use with the child.

Share the Care Work, and Get Good at It Engaging men in care work has not yet been made part of the global gender equality agenda. Studies show that couples are happier and say their sex lives are better when they share the care work in more equal ways. Boys need to be taught how to do domestic chores, and men need to be encouraged to take on a fair share. Men also need to know that doing the care work is good for them.

Implementation in SA 1. My Dad Can… A national community radio driven process. Men who care are nominated by their families, and acknowledged and profiled on radio and other media. 2. Engaging with Policy makers The Department of Social Development has committed, among other steps, to review policies that prevent engaged fatherhood, such as paternity leave. 3. Developing a fatherhood module for One Man Can A practical guide to working with communities and men to increase the caring behaviors of men. This is implemented within the existing network of MenEngage and Sonke partnerships in SA

My Special Dad