Non-Governmental Organisations and Culturally-Sensitive Gender Programming: Considerations in Rural Zimbabwe

Introduction

A greater role in development has been presumed since the 1980s, this is when NGOs came into play, they were celebrated by the international donor community as carrying fresh solutions to longstanding development problems. All interventions humanitarian, development or peace building in conflict contexts interact with the given context which can either lead to peace or violence. Issues to do with gender have also increased and hence NGOs’ work in that area has also increased. Gender is quite a sensitive area of study which cannot be separated with cultural values and norms within societies. This section of the paper will give a brief summary of the academic literature which has been documented on how humanitarian, development or peace building interventions have contributed to conflict in culturally conservative communities.

Makonde District has some parts which are amongst rural outposts in Mashonaland West Province most of whom are culturally conservative. Therefore, doing gender programs within these outlying areas is not easy due to the age-old beliefs among both men and women. This paper, therefore, focuses on the meaning of cultural-sensitive programming, prospects, and opportunities for improving gender programming in culturally conservative communities, and examining the cultural sensitivity of programs implemented by NGOs working on gender in Makonde District contributing to the academic literature that already exists. The aim of the article is to examine whether NGOs working on gender in Makonde District are culturally sensitive in their programming. It is guided by three objective the first being to examine the meaning of culturally-sensitive gender programming in Makonde District. The second objective is to analyse how NGOs in Makonde are incorporating the aspects of culturally-sensitive programming and the third is to assess prospects and opportunities for improving programming in culturally conservative communities when dealing with gender programming.

There is a relationship between culture and development and the connection relate to both the ends of development. Culture and development are closely related therefore, culture determines how development can be realized. That is, man is the means and the end to development, (Mbakogu, 2004). The Musasa project, World Vision and Girl child network play the advocacy and lobbying role being mouthpieces of the girl child, women, and the communities as they lobby for policy and law reform in Zimbabwe. These organizations in some instances have been argued to implement programs which are not endogenous, but foreign to the cultures in Zimbabwe. Mpofu (2012) alluded that, NGOs programming is rather a case of sponsored activism since the driving force behind the employees of these organizations who are “activists” are the funds from donors and not the motivation to help the communities. Thus, advocacy and lobbying programs are the most difficult to implement in Zimbabwe due to the lack of consideration of cultural capital in the designing and implementation of the programs.

NGOs developmental programs are premised on verdicts by donor countries on the Zimbabwean cultural communities aimed at dislodging the indigenous cultures, Haider (2014). For example, feminism is a foreign construct which is professed to promote gender equality, disregarding the complementary gender roles in Zimbabwean cultural communities. Basing on the issues of cultural capital by Woocher (2011), the Girl Child Network (GCN) campaigns and lobby for the total elimination of what it perceives to be harmful cultural practices that impede the full development of the girl child. Communities perceive that the claim of the existence of harmful cultural practices in the Zimbabwean cultural communities is absolutely judgemental and rejection of cultural plurality. It can be predicted in the foregoing that the initiative is to change cultural beliefs and substituting them with western culture. This jeopardizes cultural sustainability and sustainable development in Zimbabwe.