Tag Archives: empowerment

A means to an end, or an end in itself? Rights, access, and comprehensive sexuality education

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Guest post by Heather Barclay, International Planned Parenthood Federation

Comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) has been the focus of much discussion and political debate over the years. It has been lauded as the way for young people to be empowered and realize their rights, as well as a means through which to create demand for family planning and sexual health services. But as with many highly politicized debates, the truth lies somewhere in the middle.

A hallmark of CSE is its rights-based approach to education about sexuality, gender, sexual and reproductive health, and sexual behavior. It equips young people with life skills and empowers them to make autonomous, informed decisions about their bodies and futures. That means teaching young people comprehensively both about the biology of sex and about the personal, emotional, societal, and cultural forces that shape the way in which they choose to conduct their lives, including their sexual and reproductive lives. In particular, CSE imparts information, promotes responsibility, and equips youth to question why they act in certain ways, so that they can make informed and considered decisions that allow them to have healthy and empowered lives.

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Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health Key to Achieving Sustainable Development

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By Suzanne Petroni, Senior Director for Gender, Population, and Development at the International Center for Research on Women (ICRW)

Last month, the global community celebrated the 20th anniversary of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD). The ICPD, which took place in Cairo in 1994, led to an historic agreement by 179 governments to place women—and importantly, their reproductive health—at the center of the sustainable development agenda. Five years later, while at the State Department, I served as the U.S. government’s “officer in charge” for the five-year review of the ICPD, where we exulted when the global community agreed to advance the ICPD agenda through promoting access to safe abortion, comprehensive sexuality education, and youth-friendly reproductive health services, among other critical areas.

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The Road to Implementation: A User’s Guide for Applying a Rights-Based Approach to Family Planning Programs

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Guest post by Mariela Rodriguez, Research Associate, Futures Group

Human rights. Contraceptive choice. Access. Information. Empowerment. What do all of these things mean? How do they relate to family planning (FP)? Since the 2012 London Summit on Family Planning and the movement it initiated, FP2020, the topic of human rights and empowerment in FP has risen on the international development agenda. We know that the Summit “underscored the importance of access to contraceptives as both a right and a transformational health and development priority.”[i] But what does this mean in practice? How can FP programs turn rhetoric about rights into a reality?

The recently published Voluntary Family Planning Programs that Respect, Protect and Fulfill Human Rights: a Conceptual Framework Users’ Guide is intended for use in conjunction with the Voluntary Family Planning Programs that Respect, Protect, and Fulfill Human Rights: A Conceptual Framework, published in 2013 by Futures Group and EngenderHealth with funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.[ii] The User’s Guide is intended for use by a wide audience spanning policymakers, program managers, health providers, rights advocates, civil society organizations, donors, technical assistance agencies, implementing organizations, and researchers. The document contains three modules to orient stakeholders to the framework and to guide the processes for using it to assess, plan or strengthen, monitor, and evaluate FP programs through a human rights lens.

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Strengthening the Links Between Human Rights and Family Planning: An Update from Addis

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Guest Post by Shannon Harris

There is greater interest and investment in family planning (FP) programs now than in the last 20 years. With this increased attention and funding, programs are also benefiting from an increased commitment to ensuring that vulnerable and hard-to-reach populations are being better served and that women are receiving high-quality services and expanded contraceptive choice. As FP reemerges as a global priority, there is more attention to the human rights that underlie providing contraceptive services to all individuals. The recently published Family Planning 2020 (FP2020) first annual progress report highlights the new Conceptual Framework for Voluntary, Rights-Based Family Planning, a tool designed to ensure that public health programs oriented toward increasing voluntary FP access and use respect, protect, and fulfill human rights in the way they are designed, implemented, and evaluated.

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Walking Together: Strengthening Health Facility and Community Links to Improve Access and Choice

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Guest post by Molly Tumusiime, Program Associate (Community Engagement), EngenderHealth/Uganda

The Right to Health asserts that people are entitled to access reproductive health services, including family planning (FP), that are acceptable to them and of the highest possible quality. However, there are many barriers to individuals’ realizing this right at many levels. While policy change and provider training can support increased FP access and use and better ensure contraceptive choice, interventions at the policy and service delivery levels alone are insufficient. Community-level barriers also impede service utilization and should be addressed in participatory and cooperative ways.

In 2010, EngenderHealth began piloting site walk-throughs (SWTs) in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Ghana, Tanzania, and Uganda. This promising approach—rooted in the core human rights principles of participation, empowerment, and accountability—catalyzes community participation in health and strengthens the accountability of service providers to communities. In addition, SWTs foster linkages and collaborative partnerships between health providers and community members in addressing barriers to informed choice and service access and in improving the quality and acceptability of services.

Photos by E. Brazier/EngenderHealth

Photos by E. Brazier/EngenderHealth

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