Gender Equity, Reconciliation and Partnership Curriculum Development Workshop

South Sudan,

Literature Review

Introduction,

Feb 10, 2022 — This Literature Review is part of the data analysis relating to the gender mainstreaming project commissioned by ALARM to provide a baseline situation as a basis for tracking and measuring the changes that would ensue from the interventions in the planned period of its implementation and also inform the development of a curriculum on gender mainstreaming. The literature will form part of the secondary data collected from different countries to help the technical team in coming up with Gender Equity Curriculum that ALARM and other actors will use in East, Central and part of North Africa to mainstream gender issues and guides its programming. 

From South Sudan perspectives, the Literature Review will be based on among other secondary materials, the legal frameworks available and institutional policies governing and mainstreaming gender issues, articles and baseline studies done by different actors to support gender mainstreaming as well as sharing intersectional and relationship concepts on gender variables and practices in South Sudan.

Legal Frameworks and Institutional Policies relating to Gender Issues in South Sudan

According to a baseline research carried out by Japan International Cooperation Agency on the Country Gender Profile, South Sudan is a signatory to the Geneva Conventions, the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, and the Convention on the Rights of the Child. 

The report stated that, after advocacy by a wide range of stakeholders including the CSOs, South Sudan ratified the CEDAW in 2014 and the National Assembly was handling the final procedures. However, it has yet to ratify the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

Again, South Sudan is part of the African Union (AU) and is obliged to observe international and regional agreements, but it is the only country of the AU that has not ratified the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights (1986) prohibiting discrimination against women and articulating the protection of women’s rights, and its supplementary protocol, the Protocol on the Rights on Women in Africa (the Maputo Protocol). The Maputo Protocol inclusively recognizes women’s rights such as the right to peace and the right to protection in situations of armed conflict. It also addresses violence against women, FGM, and the situation of women in polygamous marriages.

Some think that the articles dealing with marriage and reproductive health go against the traditions of South Sudan. South Sudan only signed the Maputo Protocol in 2013 and the National Assembly approved its ratification in 2014. The African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child has been ratified and the Charter on the People’s and Women’s Rights is in the process of ratification. The African Charter on the Establishment of an African Court of Human and People’s Rights and the African Youth Charter have not been ratified. South Sudan’s involvement in the international and regional legal framework is still in the making as shown above.

Gender Related National Policies 

Following the CPA and the Interim Constitution, the Transitional Constitution of 2011 articulates equal rights for men and women. The Transitional Constitution stipulates the free and full consent of men and women intending to marry, women’s full and equal dignity with men, equal pay for equal work, the right to participate equally with men in public life, and women’s representation in the legislative and executive organs by at least 25%.164. The South Sudan Development Plan (SSDP) 2011–2013 (extended till 2016) has been developed to implement the South Sudan vision 2040. The importance of gender equality, one of the nine cross cutting issues of the SSDP, is well recognized. The SSDP supports women’s political participation, pushing the 25% affirmative action stipulated in the Transitional Constitution to 35%. It also recognizes the need to combat harmful customs and traditions negatively affecting the protection of women’s rights. 

With the assistance of the international community, legal reforms and policy development have made significant progress. Nonetheless, there remain legal gaps. For example, family law is absent and there is no law to govern marriage, divorce and inheritance although the Constitution articulates that marriage should be based on consent. Laws to ban harmful customs of inheritance and marriage, and laws on gender based violence are lacking. Some laws still have discriminatory provisions. The criterion for South Sudan citizenship set by the Nationality Act 2011 requires that one must belong to one of the tribes of South Sudan. This means that a child born to a South Sudanese woman married to a non-South Sudanese man cannot be a South Sudanese national.

Nevertheless, stronger institutional capacity to implement gender sensitive policies and programmes is also required. While national ministries set policies, state ministries implement them. However, to a large extent, implementation depends on the decisions of state governments that may set their own laws and policies, and decide on the allocation of budgets. 

The fact that the central ministries were added to the administrative structure after independence while state governments have been functioning since before independence is not helpful to strengthening the relationship between the central and the state governments. Continuing impunity to perpetrators of sexual violence also shows the weaknesses in the implementation of policies to protect human rights, especially that of women and children.

 The availability of social services is limited to the urban and surrounding areas. An insufficient number of female police officers, the inadequate training of the police force, and the fact that many of the recruits into the police were former SPLA and other soldiers with little training in human rights are among the factors impeding the implementation of human rights policies.

Gender Inequities in South Sudan

According to the Eve Organisation for Women Empowerment Gender Analysis in 2020, they said that, as a result of decades of violence, and the dramatic return to conflict in 2013 and 2016, the traditional social structures and values within South Sudan were challenged. This had a number of consequences on gender roles and relations in the country. For instance, while men were increasingly involved and killed in battle fields, women and girls were left to handle burdening parenting roles and responsibilities with little support system and increasingly became vulnerable to violence, sexual abuse, rape, abduction, killings and exploitation. They are further left to deal with the trauma of the various forms of violence they have experienced. 

Due to limited opportunities, girls get exploited and involved in all sorts of negative practices such as prostitution, dropping out of school, early and forced marriages and unwanted pregnancies making their lives more complicated. The boys on the other hand got deprived of the rights to education and the pursuit of decent living. Many of them either end up as child soldiers or disgruntled gang groups while others get engaged in cattle raiding aggravating intercommunal violence. Other obstacles to gender equality include discriminatory and negative cultural practices that relegate women to the lowest echelons of society. Meanwhile political elites impress upon the youth the notion that they are not yet ready for leadership. 

In this context, said EVE, the issues facing women in South Sudan at large continue to be reflected in the state as the women continue to fight to see the minimum 35% representation of women is met? Conflict and practice of negative cultural norms in the region also continue to see women and girls bare majority of the impact. With the COVID-19 pandemic and seasonal floods, up to 60,000 civilians have been displaced this year. Women and girls vulnerability is increased as they experience sexual and gender based violence, destruction of livelihoods, abduction of hundreds of women and children and are also a majority of civilian casualties.

The transitional constitution (as amended in 2016) and other legal gender frameworks including UNSCR 1325 and 2250 firmly established new rights for women and youth, however most of these have failed to translate into opportunities and increased participation of women and youth in public life. There, this project and the literature review  is meant to address these disparities through structural and behavioural changes that can stir both men and women, boys and girls towards shaping and owning the future of South Sudan with values such as gender equality, reconciliation and Partnership.

Cultural, Sexual and Gender Based Violence 

According to the Initial Assessment and Mapping called ‘Reducing Inequality and Gender-Based Violence in South Sudan’ Case Studies for Wau, Juba, and Renk, South Sudan Women Network (SSWEN) stated that the decades of conflict in South Sudan supported a culture of violence that still pervades the society. A key characteristic of this is violence perpetrated against women and girls. The outbreak of the third civil war in 2016, signified the growing insecurity and violations of women’s rights, characterised by widespread abductions, sexual slavery, domestic violence, rape, sexual assault and early and forced marriages. Despite the establishment of a transitional government, under the 2018 Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of Conflict in South Sudan (R-ARCSS), incidences of violence against women have not abated. 

The widespread character of SGBV against women and girls in South Sudan is well documented and has long been identified as a key feature of the armed conflict. However, those responsible are rarely held accountable and survivors of SGBV including refugees who fled the conflict have not had access to legal redress for the violations suffered. Despite significant international attention on the problem and efforts to document and record SGBV it has not yet been possible to translate this into real prospects of justice and redress for survivors. 

In December 2019, UNICEF reported that 65% of women and girls in South Sudan have experienced physical and/or sexual violence in their lifetime and some 51% have suffered intimate partner violence. 33% of women have experienced sexual violence from a non-partner, primarily during attacks or raids. The majority of girls and women experience sexual violence for the first time under the age of 18.1 In 2020, conflict related crimes perpetrated on women primarily consisted on abduction (41%) and killing (28%), for the most part during localized violence, with 18% of victims being subjected to conflict-related sexual violence, including rape and sexual slavery. 

In October 2020, UNICEF reported that early and forced marriages are very common in South Sudan with 52% of all girls married before 18 years of age. Only 7% of girls finish primary school, and fewer than 2% go to high school. COVID-19 and the necessity for social isolation also increased the vulnerability of women and girls to hunger, food insecurity, domestic violence, and early child and forced marriage. About 1.4 million children are expected to suffer from acute malnutrition this year, the highest figure since 2013 which is forcing them into child marriage. Between January and March of 2021, UNICEF reported that 50% of the women reached had suffered from intimate partner violence.

Still on Sexual and Gender Based Violence, a study by the NGO Consortium of:  Agency for Co-operation and Research in Development (ACORD); Dan Church Aid (DCA); and the Centre for Conflict Resolution (CCR) found out that the vast majority of respondents pointed to the fact that the use of (often extreme levels) of violence is indeed completely normal in the household; in management of disputes; and as a means of ensuring compliance. 

The ‘normalcy’ of this is repeatedly re-asserted through various assertions including: this has been there long; this is the way it is here; this is normal; it is our culture. These attitudes render the use of violence as deeply reflexive. Indeed, in many cases (e.g.: domestic violence) it is not even recognised as a problem, with countless respondents explaining that ‘we just accept it like that’. This profound normalisation of violence is taken to equate with an acceptance of it. However, this nevertheless does not change the fact that violence is deeply destructive and utterly unsustainable, so this so-called normalisation of violence embodies a profound contradiction. 

 There are many factors in the South Sudan context that continue to perpetuate this normalization. For example, the high prevalence of small arms, especially in the hands of male youth, exacerbates these trends. While the Programme refers to the problem of ‘disengaged youth’ the fact is that youth involved in cattle-keeping are extremely engaged – albeit in highly violent and socially disruptive behavior. There is indeed another portion of the male youth who have had some education but can now find no productive alternatives. Respondents point out that both of these youth populations tend to proactively undermine traditional authority. 

 The erosion of moral authority, which is traditionally, the basis of both community governance structures, as well as household level systems, is all too apparent. Moral authority is being usurped by armed youth who lead by threat and the use of force. Masculine aggressively has moved to the fore. It has eroded the capacity of individuals to empathise with others and squelched the space for softer sentiments such as compassion and cooperation. Once one is no longer able to imagine the feelings and experiences of another, they are far more able to perpetrate violence against that one. These factors contribute to the normalization of the use of violence. The resultant context of perpetual violence fosters social fragmentation in which one’s sense of community reduces. Those excluded from one’s inner group are often perceived as a threat; and these perceptions are exacerbated by social practices. For example, the Taposa refer to the Buya as ‘the enemy who is constantly among us’. Their daily language thus constantly reminds everyone that the Buya are their enemies, thus making the idea of peaceful co-existence ever-more difficult to imagine. 

 Even more fundamental is the lack of understanding/acceptance of the notion of human equity. In contrast to the core principle of universal human rights which states that human beings are equal due to the simple fact that we are all human, there is a clear hierarchy of value among individuals. This is most evident in terms of gender, with males, as the primary power brokers within the society, widely considering themselves as inherently superior to females. This attitude surely extends to the so-called ‘enemy’, which when seen as less than human, can more easily be seen as having no rights to live.       

Conclusion

With the above literature, it can be concluded that almost all mechanisms are in place to enhance gender mainstreaming from the legal frameworks catering for women participation in decision-making, promotion of the rule of law and protection of human rights to economic empowerment. What needs to be done is to continue the engagement and advocacy against situations that threaten the sustainability of these gains so far made going forward. 

This can only be achieved by putting in place strong law enforcement mechanisms, independent judicial bodies, vibrant civil society as well as good governments in our respective countries. Development of Gender Curriculum like the one ALARM is now undertaking are some of the mechanisms that will be very useful in raising awareness and building the capacity of gender actors and other stakeholders to enhance Gender Equity.