Pakistan

Evaluating the Effectiveness of Sexual and Reproductive Health Services during Humanitarian Crises: A Systematic Review

Citation:

Singh, Neha S., James Smith, Sarindi Aryasinghe, Rajat Khosla, Lale Say, and Karl Blanchet. 2018.  “Evaluating the Effectiveness of Sexual and Reproductive Health Services during Humanitarian Crises: A Systematic Review.” PLoS One 13 (7): 1-19.

Authors: Neha S. Singh, James Smith, Sarindi Aryasinghe, Rajat Khosla, Lale Say, Karl Blanchet

Abstract:

Background: An estimated 32 million women and girls of reproductive age living in emergency situations, all of whom require sexual and reproductive health (SRH) information and services. This systematic review assessed the effect of SRH interventions, including the Minimum Initial Service Package (MISP) on a range of health outcomes from the onset of emergencies.
 
Methods and Findings: We searched EMBASE, Global Health, MEDLINE and PsychINFO databases from January 1, 1980 to April 10, 2017. This review was registered with the PROSPERO database with identifier number CRD42017082102. We found 29 studies meet the inclusion criteria. We found high quality evidence to support the effectiveness of specific SRH interventions, such as home visits and peer-led educational and counselling, training of lower-level health care providers, community health workers (CHWs) to promote SRH services, a three-tiered network of health workers providing reproductive and maternal health services, integration of HIV and SRH services, and men’s discussion groups for reducing intimate partner violence. We found moderate quality evidence to support transport-based referral systems, community-based SRH education, CHW delivery of injectable contraceptives, wider literacy programmes, and birth preparedness interventions. No studies reported interventions related to fistulae, and only one study focused on abortion services.
 
Conclusions: Despite increased attention to SRH in humanitarian crises, the sector has made little progress in advancing the evidence base for the effectiveness of SRH interventions, including the MISP, in crisis settings. A greater quantity and quality of more timely research is needed to ascertain the effectiveness of delivering SRH interventions in a variety of humanitarian crises.

 

Topics: Armed Conflict, Domestic Violence, Education, Environment, Environmental Disasters, Gender, Women, Girls, Health, HIV/AIDS, Reproductive Health, Humanitarian Assistance Regions: Americas, Caribbean countries, Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia Countries: Haiti, Pakistan, Philippines

Year: 2018

Women's Mobility via Bus Rapid Transit: Experiential Patterns and Challenges in Lahore

Citation:

Malik, Bilal Zia, Zia Ur Rehman, Ammad Hassan Khan, and Waseem Akram. 2020. "Women's Mobility via Bus Rapid Transit: Experiential Patterns and Challenges in Lahore." Journal of Transport & Health 17: 1-18.

Authors: Bilal Zia Malik, Zia Ur Rehman, Ammad Hassan Khan, Waseem Akram

Abstract:

Background: Women in developing countries experience greater restrictions in mass urban mobility. UN’s Sustainability Development Goals for 2030 recommend safe, affordable, accessible, and sustainable public transportation, particularly for the vulnerable groups. Pakistan experiences rapid urbanization trends and considerably low ranking worldwide for gender equality. In addition, socio-cultural norms, higher dependency on public transport, lack of genderresponsive mass transportation, and harassment experiences limit women to explore potential growth opportunities.

Objectives: Since limited evidence exists on the subject, this study aims to investigate typical mobility attributes of women users of Pakistan’s first bus rapid transit (BRT) in Lahore, explore the challenges they face, and recommend measures for improved urban mobility.

Methods: Primary data include face-to-face interview-based questionnaire surveys along the BRT corridor to assess various quantitative and qualitative travel characteristics. Descriptive and cross-comparison statistical techniques were applied to obtain reliable results. Responses related to harassment were documented and evaluated. Graphical trends and pictorial evidences were also presented.

Results: Major segments of the study sample belonged to lower-income, relatively younger and middle age, students, employees and users with no or limited work. More prevalent modes to and from BRT stations were paratransit, including rickshaws and chingchis (motorbikes converted into rickshaws), followed by walking. Majority accessed BRT within 5 km, covered less than 15 km along 27 km BRT corridor, and traveled during daylight. Major challenges were harassment at stations and in buses (younger users being more affected), limited facilities for the elderly, lack of seating/waiting facilities near entrances/exits of BRT stations, limited dedicated space in buses and ticketing booths during rush hours.

Conclusion: The study highlights important typical mobility trends and difficulties of women while using Lahore BRT. Addressing women’s mass urban mobility issues could improve their educational and economic prospects. Findings could be useful for transportation agencies and practitioners to incorporate gender-sensitive measures in future BRT systems, particularly in developing countries. 

Keywords: women's mobility, bus rapid transit, gender equality, developing country

Topics: Economies, Education, Gender, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Infrastructure, Transportation, Urban Planning, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Regions: Asia, South Asia Countries: Pakistan

Year: 2020

Armed Conflict and Women's Agency: The Case of Swat, Pakistan

Citation:

Wagha, Rehana. 2014. “Armed Conflict and Women's Agency: The Case of Swat, Pakistan.” Asian Journal of Women's Studies 20 (3): 121-31.

Author: Rehana Wagha

Abstract:

ENGLISH ABSTRACT:

Women are generally portrayed as the helpless victims of armed conflicts. However, the consequences of such portrayal or essentialist representations prove very adverse for women’s identity and agency. Rather than fully acknowledging women’s courage and strength in civil conflicts and war situations, their role and voices are hidden and muffled. As a result, they are neither counted nor given any role in critical decision-making for the future. This study is aimed at retrieving women’s agency in the context of Islamic militancy in the Swat region of Pakistan.

URDU ABSTRACT:

Keywords: agency, patriarchy, Islamic militancy, identity, female consciousness, feminism

Topics: Armed Conflict, Civil Wars, Gender, Women, Terrorism, Violence Regions: Asia, South Asia Countries: Pakistan

Year: 2014

Faith, Gender, and Activism in the Punjab Conflict: The Wheat Fields Still Whisper

Citation:

Kaur, Mallika. 2020. Faith, Gender, and Activism in the Punjab Conflict: The Wheat Fields Still Whisper. San Mateo: Springer International Publishing.

Author: Mallika Kaur

Annotation:

Summary:
“Punjab was the arena of one of the first major armed conflicts of post-colonial India. During its deadliest decade, as many as 250,000 people were killed. This book makes an urgent intervention in the history of the conflict, which to date has been characterized by a fixation on sensational violence—or ignored altogether. Mallika Kaur unearths the stories of three people who found themselves at the center of Punjab’s human rights movement: Baljit Kaur, who armed herself with a video camera to record essential evidence of the conflict; Justice Ajit Singh Bains, who became a beloved “people’s judge”; and Inderjit Singh Jaijee, who returned to Punjab to document abuses even as other elites were fleeing. Together, they are credited with saving countless lives. Braiding oral histories, personal snapshots, and primary documents recovered from at-risk archives, Kaur shows that when entire conflicts are marginalized, we miss essential stories: stories of faith, feminist action, and the power of citizen-activists.” (Summary from Palgrave Macmillan)
 

Topics: Coloniality/Post-Coloniality, Conflict, Feminisms, Gender, Rights, Human Rights Regions: Asia, South Asia Countries: India, Pakistan

Year: 2020

Women, Peace, and Security in Pakistan

Citation:

Faraz, Zeenia. 2017. Women, Peace, and Security in Pakistan. United States Institute of Peace. 

Author: Zeenia Faraz

Annotation:

Summary:
Conflict and crisis have adversely affected the social and economic circumstances of women and girls in Pakistan. A gender lens is needed in responses to crises. 

Ensuring women’s participation at all levels in decisions related to peace and security in the country is essential.

The women, peace, and security (WPS) framework is useful for enhancing women’s participation in peace processes and applying a gender lens to postconflict reconstruction.

Implementation of the WPS agenda in Pakistan requires concrete measures at social and political levels that would challenge existing gender stereotypes and pave the way for greater participation among women in peacebuilding and peace processes.

Topics: Conflict, Gender, Women, Girls, Post-Conflict, Post-Conflict Reconstruction, Peacebuilding, Political Participation, Peace Processes, UN Security Council Resolutions on WPS Regions: Asia, South Asia Countries: Pakistan

Year: 2017

Gender, Conflict, Peace, and UNSC Resolution 1325

Citation:

Shekhawat, Seema, ed. 2018. Gender, Conflict, Peace, and UNSC Resolution 1325. Lanham: Lexington Books.

Author: Seema Shekhawat

Annotation:

Summary:
"There is an increasing amount of literature on various aspects of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325. While appreciating this scholarship, this volume highlights some of the omissions and concerns to make a quality addition to the ongoing discourse on the intersection of gender with peace and security with a focus on 1325. It aims at a reality-check of the impressive to-dos list as the seventeen years since the Resolution passed provide an occasion to pause and ponder over the gap between the aspirations and the reality, the ideal and the practice, the promises and the action, the euphoria and the despair. The volume compiles carefully selected essays woven around Resolution 1325 to tease out the intricacies within both the Resolution and its implementation. Through a cocktail of well-known and some lesser-known case studies, the volume addresses complicated realities with the intention of impacting policy-making and the academic fields of gender, peace, and security. The volume emphasizes the significance of transforming formal peace making processes, and making them gender inclusive and gender sensitive by critically examining some omissions in the challenges that the Resolution implementation confronts. The major question the volume seeks to address is this: where are women positioned in the formal peace-making seventeen years after the adoption of Resolution 1325?" (Shekhawat 2018)
 
Table of Contents:
Introduction: Gender, Peace, and UNSC Resolution 1325
Seema Shekhawat
 
1. Redefining Women’s Roles in Internationl and Regional Law: The Case of Pre- and Post-War Peacebuilding in Liberia
Veronica Fynn Bruey
 
2. The Contribution of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women to the Implementation of Security Council Resolution 1325
Antal Berkes
 
3. Faith Matters in Women, Peace, and Security Practices
Elisabeth Porter
 
4. Creating or Improving a National Action Plan Based on UN Security Council Resolution 1325
Jan Marie Fritz
 
5. Widowhood Issues for Implementation of UNSCR 1325 and Subsequent Resolutions on Women, Peace, and Security
Margaret Owen
 
6. The Commodification of Intervention: The Example of the Women, Peace, and Security Agenda
Corey Barr
 
7. Beyond Borders and Binaries: A Feminist Look at Preventing Violence and Achieving Peace in an Era of Mass Migration
Aurora E. Bewicke
 
8. The Disconnection between Theory and Practice: Achieving Item 8b of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325
Onyinyechukwu Onyido
 
9. Gender and Feminism in the Israeli Peace Movement: Beyond UNSCR 1325
Amanda Bennett
 
10. Conflict Ghosts: The Significance of UN Resolution 1325 for the Syrian Women in Years of Conflict
Emanuela C. Del Re
 
11. The UNSC Resolution 1325 and Cypriot Women’s Activism: Achievements and Challenges
Maria Hadjipavlou and Olga Demetriou
 
12. Victims, Nationalists, and Supporters: UNSCR 1325 and the Roles of Ethnic Women’s Organizations in Peacebuilding in Burma/Myanmar
Mollie Pepper
 
13. Gender and the Building Up of Many “Peaces”: A Decolonial Perspective from Colombia
Priscyll Anctil Avoine, Yuly Andrea Mejia Jerez, and Rachel Tillman
 
14. “It’s All About Patriarchy”: UNSCR 1325, Cultural Constrains, and Women in Kashmir
Seema Shekhawat

Topics: Armed Conflict, Conflict Prevention, Displacement & Migration, Feminisms, Gender, Peace and Security, Peacebuilding, Peacekeeping, Peace Processes, Religion, UN Security Council Resolutions on WPS, UNSCR 1325 Regions: Africa, MENA, West Africa, Americas, South America, Asia, Middle East, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Europe, Southern Europe Countries: Colombia, Cyprus, India, Israel, Liberia, Myanmar, Pakistan, Syria

Year: 2018

Pakistani Policewomen: Questioning the Role of Gender in Circumscribing Police Corruption

Citation:

Ahmad, Sadaf. 2019. “Pakistani Policewomen: Questioning the Role of Gender in Circumscribing Police Corruption.” Policing and Society. doi: 10.1080/10439463.2019.1611820.

Author: Sadaf Ahmad

Abstract:

The popular belief that women are more honest and morally superior than men, shared by many feminist theorists, development practitioners and policy makers across the globe, subsequently informs another belief, that increasing the number of women in a corrupt organisation will therefore reduce the levels of corruption in said organisation. This year-long ethnographic research on Pakistani policewomen, based on participant observation and interviews with policewomen across different ranks and in different police branches in nine Pakistani cities, critically interrogates this narrative. More specifically, it claims that while a gendered reason – policewomen's positionality as women within the world of policing – plays a critical role in circumscribing the degree to which and the kinds of corrupt activities they engage in, gender is not a very useful category to use when thinking about reducing police corruption levels in Pakistan given the socio-political and institutional structures in which the Pakistani police are enmeshed. This culturally grounded study thus makes an empirically rooted contribution to exploring the relationship between policewomen, gender, and corruption, which is currently underdeveloped in the global literature on policewomen and completely absent in the literature on policewomen in Pakistan.

Keywords: Pakistan, Gender, policewomen, corruption

Topics: Corruption, Gender, Women, Livelihoods Regions: Asia, South Asia Countries: Pakistan

Year: 2019

Promoting Gender Sensitivity: Disaster Risk Reduction in Pakistan

Citation:

Zeeshan, Afsheen, Muhammad Bashir Khan, and Shahzad Hussain. 2019. “Promoting Gender Sensitivity: Disaster Risk Reduction in Pakistan.” Pakistan Journal of Women’s Studies: Alam-e-Niswan 26 (2): 31-44.

Authors: Afsheen Zeeshan, Muhammad Bashir Khan, Shahzad Hussain

Abstract:

Gender sensitization is a theory that a maximum number of policy analysts discover easy to implement, but very few perform well. The same can be said about disaster risk reduction. When these two concerns are put together to mainstream gender into disaster risk reduction (DRR), concerned organizations and experts find gaps in planning and implementation of policies. This is not because the job is integrally challenging; rather, there is not adequate practical guidance and pragmatic information. This paper aims to increase awareness about gender issues in disaster risk reduction, to improve government capability to address gender problems in DRR and to encourage Pakistan’s government to incorporate gender perception into DRR legislatures, strategies and plans for sustainable development. The importance of the Beijing Agenda for global action on gender sensitive DRR and the Manila Declaration for Global Action on gender in climate change and DRR have been highlighted, with the help of information from other developing countries, to develop a road map for Pakistan. Capacity development and gender-aware knowledge products are the two main areas with the help of which concerns regarding gender sensitivity can be addressed in disaster preparedness, recovery and rehabilitation.

Keywords: gender sensitization, disaster, capacity-development, Risk reduction

Topics: Environment, Climate Change, Environmental Disasters, Gender, Women, Gender Mainstreaming Regions: Asia, South Asia Countries: Pakistan

Year: 2019

Gendered Immobility: Influence of Social Roles and Local Context on Mobility Decisions in Pakistan

Citation:

Adeel, Muhammad and Anthony G.O. Yeh. 2018. “Gendered Immobility: Influence of Social Roles and Local Context on Mobility Decisions in Pakistan." Transportation Planning and Technology: 41 (6): 660-78.

Authors: Muhammad Adeel, Anthony G.O. Yeh

Abstract:

This paper examines the instances of one-day immobility in Pakistan and reports its socio-demographic determinants using the nationally representative dataset of the 2007 Pakistan Time Use Survey. Of 37,830 time diary respondents, nearly 30% did not report travel during the diary day. Homemakers and those out of the workforce were more likely to be immobile than employed or student respondents. Immobility rates were very high among women (55%) as compared to men (4%). Among women, those between 20 and 34 years of age, married, with children, having better education, dependent on other household members and those living in higher income households were more likely to be immobile. The excessive gender nature of immobility seems to be triggered by a gender-based sociocultural environment, which restricts female mobility due to family honor concerns. Other than this, those living in the provinces of Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa or in urban areas were more likely to be immobile than those living in Punjab and Sindh provinces or in rural areas. The significant geographic effect at broader spatial scale is caused by the demographic structure as well as due to differences in the social and cultural context of these areas. Finally, questions regarding the measurement of immobility and the potential implications of increased female immobility are discussed.

Keywords: mobility, travel behavior, gender, Time use, immobility, Pakistan

Annotation:

Topics: Gender, Women Regions: Asia, South Asia Countries: Pakistan

Year: 2018

Intersections of Gender, Mobility and Violence in Urban Pakistan

Citation:

Anwar, Nausheen H., Sarwat Viqar, and Daanish Mustafa. 2018. “Intersections of Gender, Mobility and Violence in Urban Pakistan.” In Social Theories of Urban Violence in the Global South: Towards Safe and Inclusive Cities, edited by Jennifer Erin Salahub, Markus Gottsbacher, and John de Boer, 15-31. Routledge Studies in Cities and Development. Abingdon; New York: Routledge.

Authors: Nausheen H Anwar, Sarwat Viqar, Daanish Mustafa

Annotation:

Summary:
This chapter explores the intersections of gender, mobility, and violence by analysing gender as a key mediator of mobility in two urban areas of Pakistan: Karachi and the twin cities of Rawalpindi-Islamabad. Karachi is the commercial hub of the country, Islamabad is the federal capital, and Rawalpindi is the headquarters of the all-powerful Pakistani military. Much journalistic, and some academic, attention has been paid to the various kinds of violence in Karachi: terrorist activity, ethnic violence, and extrajudicial killings by law-enforcement agencies. As women and men move through public spaces-streets, neighbourhoods, and the larger city-they indicate different aspects of mobility. The chapter suggests that certain mobilities, mostly masculine, impact the immobility of other genders; and that these gendered mobilities are inextricably bound with social norms, class, ethnicity, and violence. The larger context of dominant masculinity inhibits women's mobility, as do its claims about the appropriate and "natural" behaviours of men and women in public and private spaces. (Summary from Taylor & Francis Group)

Topics: Class, Ethnicity, Gender, Gender Analysis, Masculinity/ies, Intersectionality, Violence Regions: Asia, South Asia Countries: Pakistan

Year: 2018

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