Locating Men in Sexual and Reproductive Health, Rights, and Justice: Past, Present, Futures

TL;DR

This paper explores how to better include men in sexual and reproductive health and rights by combining gender and power theories.

Contribution

The paper introduces a novel analytic framework by combining hegemonic masculinities and Reproductive Justice theories.

Findings

Current SRHR programs lack the tools to address gender and power dynamics effectively.

Combining hegemonic masculinities and Reproductive Justice can improve research and policy approaches.

This framework can help produce evidence to address injustices in sexual and reproductive freedoms.

Abstract

Since the International Conference on Population and Development in 1994, global policies, and agenda‐setting milestones have emphasized that universal sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) are unattainable without the meaningful engagement and inclusion of men. Despite this, the field of SRHR continues to struggle with how and in what ways men can and should be included in research, programs, and policies. In this commentary, we argue that the programmatic focus of SRHR limits the capacity to produce the data and evidence needed to inform gender transformational change. For men to be meaningfully engaged with by SRHR, researchers need an analytic lens that can capture the manifestations and outcomes of gender and power. We consider the conceptual complementarities between two theoretical frameworks: hegemonic masculinities and Reproductive Justice. We contend that bringing together these conceptual approaches to men and SRHR offers an analytic framework to iterate and innovate approaches to research. Such changes will allow for a greater interrogation of gender and power and the production of data and evidence necessary to grapple with the ongoing injustices that curtail people's sexual and reproductive freedoms.

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