Management Response

: Kenya
: 2014 - 2018 , Kenya (CO)
: CVE Project Evaluation
:
: Kenya
:

UN-Women Kenya commissioned an independent, external, end of project evaluation of the Government of Japan funded project “Women's Active Participation in Preventing and Response to Violent Extremism and Terrorism in Kenya" April 2017 - March 2018. This was an evaluation for one year project and as per the donor requirement. The project has ended in April 2018 with no further funding. This means some of the recommendations from the evaluation has been used to inform current UN Women Programming, but the majority of the recommendations will be considered in subsequent similar projects as they are PCVE project specific recommendations.

: Approved
Recommendation: RECOMMENDATION 1 UN Women should strengthen its theory of change and engage the broader debate on gender equality into its P/CVE intervention in order to prevent the risk of enforcing women’s stereotypical roles as mothers and custodians of their children and society and so better placed to prevent and counter VE. When women alongside men are empowered on their human rights and engaged in broad discussions about social issues (such as co-existence), their agency can contribute to P/CVE.
Management Response: This is a key lesson learned, not only by UN Women Kenya, but by women, peace and security stakeholders globally who are concerned with interventions to empower women to lead and participate in PCVE interventions. Over the past few years the focus has been on "tapping into the potential that women have as transformative agents of peace", which has led to an over emphasis on existing roles that women already play, which in largely patriarchal societies are stereotypical roles associated and limited to motherhood. This emphasis has been identified as a threat to the reversal of hard won gains by gender equality advocates and practitioners. While the PCVE project has ended, UN Women will endeavor to strengthen the theory of change in future projects to include breaking down the gender specific barriers that prohibit women from playing roles in PCVE efforts beyond stereotypical gendered roles and advocating for the meaningful participation and inclusion of women in decision-making processes regarding conflict prevention and resolution.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership, Promoting inclusiveness/Leaving no one behind
Organizational Priorities: Normative Support, Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Relevance
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Include a comprehensive theory of change in subsequent CVE projects, to ensure that prohibitive stereotypical roles allocated to women in matters of peace and security are challenged and expanded towards alternatives that empower women to actively lead and participate in PCVE efforts. Team Leader PSH Unit 2019/03 Completed UN Women KCO developed a TOC for the Unit and this will be part of proposals submitted to donors for resource mobilisation.
Recommendation: RECOMMENDATION 2 Given the popularity of P/CVE programming activities in Kenya, UN Women should enhance its role in ensuring that the right beneficiaries are targeted by its interventions as opposed to random selection. For example, definitions for ‘vulnerable’ and ‘at risk’ groups should be made clear and well justified
Management Response: UN Women's implementing partners referenced the identification of the "most vulnerable" or "most at risk" beneficiaries as problematic, given the safety and security issues associated with identifying oneself as in any way engaged in violent extremism. The roll out of multiple PCVE interventions over the last three years has also led to the creation of a "PCVE" industry. UN Women acknowledges their role in contributing to the definition and understanding of PCVE terms, specifically those concerning gender, women, peace and security, as well as identifying criteria for those who classify as "most vulnerable" or "at risk", and documenting and disseminating lessons learned, challenges encountered and facilitating the identification of strategies to overcome these challenges among women, peace and security stakeholders in Kenya, the East African region and beyond.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: Promoting inclusiveness/Leaving no one behind, National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities, Normative Support
UNEG Criteria: Effectiveness
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
UN Women will employ participatory beneficiary identification approaches in ensuring that the right beneficiaries are targeted by its interventions. This will be considered in the next CVE project Team Leader PSH Unit 2019/03 Completed UN Women has incorporated this is the planning of all projects
Recommendation: RECOMMENDATION 3 Given the importance of the implemented activities to communities affected by the scourge of VE, enough time should be allocated for capacity building to enable more in depth knowledge sharing about VE and on gender equality. This means going deeper and merging women’s human right issues as stipulated for example in CEDAW and the Beijing Platform for Action with women and P/CVE issues as stipulated in UNSCR 1325, 2242, 2250 and the National Action Plan for the implementation of UNSCR 1325. Enough time allocation will also serve to cater for unforeseen factors such as prolonged election campaigns and ensure that activities are eventually not rushed to beat deadlines.
Management Response: Given the nature of UN Women's donor cycle, and our obligation to adhere to agreed upon timelines and timeframes UN Women may not always be in a position to allocate longer project implementation time frames. However, UN Women can encourage implementing partners to schedule longer training periods when building the skills/capacity of stakeholders on gender, peace and security and PCVE to ensure that training activities are comprehensive. Every UN Women project contains a section that details risks, assumptions and mitigation strategies. UN Women also requires Implementing partners to articulate the same in their project proposals. However, some instances cannot be avoided (i.e. prolonged electoral cycles) and in these instances UN Women works closely with partners to ensure that activities are rolled out as best as possible despite unforeseen events/dynamics.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Partially Accepted
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership, Capacity development, Promoting inclusiveness/Leaving no one behind
Organizational Priorities: Normative Support, Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Effectiveness
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Ensure that Risks, Assumptions and Mitigation Strategies are Articulated Clearly and Comprehensively by Both UN Women and Implementing Partners. Team Leader PSH Unit 2019/03 Completed Risk identification has been done for the unit during the development of the SN 2019-2022. The risks are monitored and reported on in RMS on quarterly basis.
Recommendation: RECOMMENDATION 4 VE is still a major security threat that demands subtle approaches both in research and project implementation. Engaging in P/CVE should therefore be carried out in a manner that ensures the safety of all those involved, particularly those based deep in the communities. Women need to be protected not only from physical violence but also emotional and verbal attacks emanating from their choices. Presenting women as the ones with the most information about the society and “their” radicalized children could put their lives at risk.
Management Response: UN Women undertakes risk assessments and develops contingency plans and security measures to ensure that the “do no harm” principle is applied to all activities and outputs. UN Women also encourages staff, partners and beneficiaries to consider and apply safety and security measures given the sensitive nature of the subject matter of violent extremism and terrorism. However, beyond this UN Women cannot guarantee the physical and emotional safety of beneficiaries beyond UN Women’s engagement with them. A key lesson learned in the Kenyan context, and globally is avoiding strategies that promote the role of women as informants, and the notion that women (as wives, mothers, sisters, daughters) have access to information regarding the engagement of their family members with violent extremism that can be shared with security agents. UN Women will continue to advocate for the meaningful participation and inclusion of women in decision-making processes regarding conflict prevention and resolution. It is key to highlight that women's engagement in PCVE will not only strengthen the quality of conflict prevention and resolution strategies, but also create peaceful societies where development can prosper.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Partially Accepted
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: Promoting inclusiveness/Leaving no one behind, Capacity development, National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities, Normative Support, Partnership
UNEG Criteria: Effectiveness
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
For future projects, UN Women will ensure that all partners include in their proposals/work plans safety and security measures that they will take as they roll out their activities given the sensitive nature of PCVE interventions, and ensure that these are articulated in the risks, assumptions and mitigation strategies section of their proposals/workplans. UN Women will also emphasize IPs to apply principle of “Do No Harm” as part of their proposal/work-plan development. Team Leader PSH Unit 2019/03 Completed No proposal received from CVE partners in 2019 due to limited funding.
Recommendation: RECOMMENDATION 5 The inclusion of a gender pillar in the NSCVE is a great success in the struggle for gender equality in P/CVE. To ensure gender is mainstreamed UN Women can support the implementation of the NSCVE by promoting coordination, cooperation and sharing of experiences between national and county levels structures (NSCVE and CAPs respectively) so that gains made in the NSCVE trickles down to the counties and for both governance structures speak the same language. UN Women can also support efforts by NCTC to advocate for the allocation of resources for implementation of the various CAPS in order to institutionalize it as well as capacity building for stakeholders.
Management Response: UN Women will provide technical support to NCTC for the formulation of a gender pillar in the revised and refreshed NSCVE and will also continue to facilitate platforms where various different stakeholders including duty bearers and rights holders can come together to explore avenues for coordination and collaboration, and to share experiences to inform policy making as far as gender responsive PCVE strategies are concerned.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership, Capacity development, Promoting inclusiveness/Leaving no one behind
Organizational Priorities: Normative Support, Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Effectiveness
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Provide support to NCTC in the formulation of a gender pillar to be included in the revised and refreshed NSCVE and support the participation and inclusion of women in county CVE forums. Team Leader PSH 2019/02 Completed
Recommendation: RECOMMENDATION 6 Relationship between security agents and members of the community (including women) should be improved by careful cultivation of trust and dialogue between the two entities on issues of concern such as heavy-handed security measures. This could take the form of intercultural training to build empathy, storytelling to share of experiences from both sides or simulation exercises. For example, security agents can share challenges in implementing their work as well as their success stories (See annex on success stories), while members of the community can narrate their experiences with security structures. UN Women can support these platforms and even engage mass media to air unique sessions as well as capacity building for security structures on issues emerging from the platforms.
Management Response: UN Women will continue to endeavor to create safe spaces where community members and state security agents can come together to rebuild the weak relationship that is characterized by fear and mistrust between the two stakeholders.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: Promoting inclusiveness/Leaving no one behind, Capacity development, National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities, Normative Support
UNEG Criteria: Effectiveness
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Facilitate in collaboration with NCTC the creation of safe spaces (a platform that is established for women and girls to share their experiences, learn from each other and develop strategies to work together on a given subject without fear of facing conflict, criticism, or potentially threatening actions, ideas or conversations within that space) for community members, including women and youth to dialogue with state security agents, and tackle the root causes of fear, suspicion and mistrust that exist between the two stakeholders. Team Leader PSH Unit 2019/03 Completed No funding available for this at the moment
Recommendation: RECOMMENDATION 7 Resources allocated for an intervention should be based on needs assessment to avoid shortages. Logistics should also be organized such that the needs of the beneficiaries is taken into account and is driven by contextual considerations. A needs assessment analysis can be helpful for this purpose.
Management Response: UN Women has standardized and comprehensive templates for implementing partners for project proposals, work plans, and budgets. Each of these templates is intended to guide the IP to articulate their expected impact, accompanying outputs and activities and financial costing attached to each output/activity. UN Women reviews each submission from the IP thoroughly from a programmatic and operational perspective before approval of each proposal, workplan and budget. Any changes to the agreed upon documents must be approved by UN Women in advance. UN Women can encourage IP's to capture as much information as is necessary in the templates to avoid "shortages" during the implementation of the project.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Rejected
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: Evidence, Data and statistics
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Efficiency
Key Actions
Key Action not added.
Recommendation: IPs knowledge and experience of the local context should be mandated as a way of preventing subcontracting and the challenges that come with it.
Management Response: UN Women sought to work with women's and human rights based organizations that are implementing projects in the field of peace and security, and P/CVE. UN Women selected IPs that have a strong understanding of the local context and key issues in the areas where UN Women implements interventions. Based on the IP competitive process and the subsequent capacity assessments, UN Women believes that the selected IPs had the knowledge and experience of the local context and have also delivered project results at the end of the project.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Rejected
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: Oversight/governance
Organizational Priorities: Partnership
UNEG Criteria: Efficiency
Key Actions
Key Action not added.
Recommendation: RECOMMENDATION 9 UN Women can use the existing contacts/networks emerging from the intervention to its advantage and build synergies for its future interventions. This will facilitate continuity of past knowledge among beneficiaries and IPs and increase chances of UN Women ‘being recognized as an authority on the women, peace and security agenda’ in different communities.
Management Response: UN Women seeks to build on and expand key results achieved from one project cycle to the next. With reference to UN Women's existing contacts/emerging networks the agency will tap into its existing networks and contacts moving forward to consolidate and build on gains from past project cycles moving forward.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: Capacity development, Promoting inclusiveness/Leaving no one behind
Organizational Priorities: Partnership
UNEG Criteria: Efficiency
Key Actions
Key Action not added.
Recommendation: RECOMMENDATION 10 Barriers to gender equality should be deeply interrogated in the various capacity building components of the intervention coupled with allocation of more time and resources. Both men and women’s agencies on gender equality should be built, such as against prevalent cultural norms that promote discrimination of women and how it is linked to the broader ideological component of VE. UN Women can support learning circles of small influential groups/ centers of power in communities such as mass media, open-minded religious leaders, teachers, women among others on the rights of women and VE ideology with the aim of curbing hate campaign against women and cultivating tolerance.
Management Response: A key lesson learned for UN Women and a best practice for transformative and sustainable impact for UN Women's Interventions is the need to Identify and break down barriers to gender equality in the field of peace and security, and specifically PCVE. UN Women will incorporate this lesson learned and best practice into future PCVE interventions for transformative and sustainable outcomes.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: Promoting inclusiveness/Leaving no one behind
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Gender equality
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
In calls for proposals include a key outcome area regarding breaking down of barriers to gender equality in specific contexts where UN Women will implement interventions. Team Leader PSH Unit 2019/02 Completed
Recommendation: RECOMMENDATION 11 UN Women can play a role in ensuring that facilitators on issues of gender equality issues have good credentials so as not to replicate stereotypes based on their own religious or cultural convictions.
Management Response: UN Women can recommend consultants that IP's can use to facilitate activities, and specifically training sessions, as well as build the capacity of peace and security practitioners on gender to ensure that they do not reverse the gains of gender equality advocates in their work on broader peace and security Interventions.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: Capacity development
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities, Partnership
UNEG Criteria: Gender equality
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Incorporate capacity building of peace and security stakeholders (CSO staff members, researchers, academicians and other practitioners) on gender in peace and security in future capacity building programming. Team Leader PSH Unit 2019/03 Completed This is part of ongoing UN Women initiatives of PSH under the implementation of KNAP 1325
Recommendation: RECOMMENDATION 12 Given the strategic position of mass media in society, capacity building and engagement of media practitioners was commendable including the method employed of targeting grassroots journalists, separate sessions for editors and reporters and case by case analysis. UN Women can further promote critical journalism on gender equality issues and gender sensitive reporting of VE issues. More female journalists should be engaged on a long-term basis in form of a ‘working group’ in order to promote sustainability.
Management Response: UN Women will continue to engage media practitioners (reporters and editors), and specifically female media practitioners on gender responsive media reporting on matters of peace and security and specifically PCVE, given that they are identified as key responsible parties in the KNAP on UNSCR 1325 and the current NSCVE.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Peace and security (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: Capacity development, Advocacy
Organizational Priorities: Partnership, Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Gender equality
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
incorporate and build and expand on capacity building of media personnel and institutions on gender responsive reporting on peace, security and violent extremism in future programming. Team Leader PSH Unit 2019/06 Completed There is no project with media at the moment but will be included in future programming