Barbershop for Gender Equality
On February 14 the Permanent Delegation of Iceland to UNESCO, UNESCO Social and Human Sciences Sector & the UNESCO Gender Division hosted a Barbershop workshop for gender equality with the theme „Act like a man, Act like a woman.“ The Barbershop concept looks at innovative ways for men to mobilize and motivate other men to address discriminatory stereotypes of masculinity. It identifies ways for men to talk about gender equality in comfortable and safe environment and addresses how male leaders can drive this dialogue forward.
Following a video message by Prime Minister of Iceland, Katrín Jakobsdóttir, and an Address by H.E. Begona Lasagabaster, Director of UNESCO’s Division for Gender Equality, GRÓ GEST academic coordinator and project manager Dr Thomas Brorsen Smidt presented the GEST programme to Permanent Delegates and Ambassadors of UNESCO‘s Executive Board and other participants. In his talk, Dr Smidt also addressed masculinity issues among men in the gender equality sector and emphasized the need for moving beyond „engaging men“ and instead focus on embracing accountability. This was echoed in the address by Dr Gary Barker of Equimundo: Center for Masculinities and Social Justice, who also spoke at the event.
Also contributing to the workshop were GEST alumna of 2022, Ankita Bhat, Manager for Gender Equality and Social Inclusion at MicroSave Consulting in India, and GEST fellow of 2023, Nomore junior Mutsengi, program assistant at SAfAIDS, Zimbabwe, who functioned as discussion facilitators. Following the opening addresses, participants of the workshop were first divided into all-male and all-female groups to discuss gender issues from a more personal standpoint, among other things discussing how gender issues had affected their lives. After initial discussion rounds, participants were shuffled into mixed gender groups, where they listened to and learned new perspectives of how gender affects the lives of women and men differently.
The workshop ended with a briefing by discussion facilitators, who were able to report many new angles of approaches to gender issues discovered by participants during discussion.
The Barbershop event was open to Permanent Delegates and Ambassadors of UNESCO‘s Executive Board, but male Ambassadors who want to make positive contributions to gender equality by learning to address the impacts of gender norms were particularly encouraged to attend.
The Barbershop series started with a high-level conference in New York in January 2015 under the leadership of UN Women and with the participation of several high-level UN officials. It has since been implemented across the world to sensitize men in different industries to become allies for gender equality. Barbershops have been held at the international organizations in Geneva, including ILO, WTO and the UN, at NATO Headquarters in Brussels, at the OSCE in Vienna, at the Council of Baltic Sea States during the Icelandic Presidency in Reykjavik, in Copenhagen, organized by the Nordic Council of Ministers, at the Parliament of Iceland, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Iceland, The Council of European Parliamentary Assembly, at the OECD, in Malawi, both at a local and at a high level, and at the World Bank. The theme of these events has differed but all of them introduced the participants to new ways to address gender equality.