This overview chapter examines how restrictive masculinities shape women’s economic empowerment and gender‑based violence in Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal. Using quantitative and qualitative evidence, it shows that norms linking masculinity to financial provision, authority and control constrain women’s economic agency and are strongly associated with men’s perpetration of intimate partner violence. The chapter also highlights the social costs of these norms for men and identifies opportunities to promote more equitable, non‑violent and care‑inclusive gender roles through integrated policy approaches.
Masculinity and Gender Equality
Insights from Côte d'Ivoire and Senegal
Abstract
Restrictive masculine norms shape who provides, who decides, who cares and, too often, who controls. In doing so, they influence women’s and men’s rights, responsibilities and opportunities across all spheres of life. Although restrictive masculinities exist in all societies, they take specific forms across contexts and have concrete implications for gender equality. This report focuses on two critical policy areas where these norms are particularly consequential: women’s economic empowerment and the prevention of gender-based violence. In Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal, these dynamics unfold against a backdrop of persistent gender gaps. Women spend about five more hours per day than men on unpaid care and domestic work in both countries. Gender gaps in labour force participation remain substantial, at 15 percentage points in Côte d’Ivoire and 28 percentage points in Senegal. Women also continue to face exposure to intimate partner violence. Understanding masculinities is therefore essential to understanding how gender inequality is reproduced, and how it can be transformed.
This chapter provides an overview of the report’s main findings and policy messages, drawing on new evidence from Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal. In line with the African Union’s commitment to promote positive masculinity, the OECD collaborated with both countries’ governments to generate innovative evidence on the links between masculine norms and gender equality outcomes. The findings shows that restrictive masculinities in Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal remain organised around expectations of male provision, authority, control, and distance from care. These expectations constrain women’s economic empowerment, limit their agency in household and community life, and contribute to the persistence of gender-based violence. At the same time, they impose costs on men and boys by tying social recognition to ideals of masculinity that are increasingly difficult to fulfil. Yet the evidence also points to openings for change, particularly where care, non-violence, shared decision making and women’s economic participation are increasingly recognised as compatible with more positive and equitable forms of masculinity.
Masculinities refer to shared ideas about how men and boys are expected to be and behave. These ideas shape social expectations around men’s roles in the household, the economy and public life, influencing how they are expected to provide, lead, exercise authority, undertake care work or express emotions. While masculinities are diverse within and across societies and can change over time, they become restrictive when they limit women’s rights, safety and agency, narrow the range of socially acceptable roles available to men and boys, or reinforce unequal power relations. In this sense, restrictive masculinities are part of a wider system of social expectations that structures gender relations. Examining masculinities therefore helps explain why gender inequality persists, why progress is often uneven, and where change may be possible.
This report builds on the OECD Development Centre’s Man Enough? Measuring Masculine Norms to Promote Women’s Empowerment, which proposed a unique framework for identifying and measuring norms of restrictive masculinities across countries at different levels of development, including OECD and non-OECD countries (OECD, 2021[1]). While this framework does not provide an exhaustive list of restrictive norms, it focuses on those with the most significant implications for girls’ and women’s rights, opportunities and well-being. Applied to Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal in close collaboration with national authorities, this framework helps examine how masculine norms operate in practice across household decision making, divisions of labour, control over resources, caregiving responsibilities and the tolerance of gender-based violence. It also shows how these norms affect both women and men, constraining women’s agency while placing pressure on men to meet expectations of provision, authority and control.
A framework for analysing restrictive masculinities
The OECD Development Centre’s framework on restrictive masculinities is applied to both countries to measure the prevalence of these norms and analyse how they affect gender equality outcomes, with a focus on women’s economic empowerment and gender-based violence (Figure 1.1). In Côte d’Ivoire, the framework is operationalised through a household survey conducted for this study, allowing the report to assess the prevalence and distribution of restrictive masculine norms and construct a Masculinities Index. In Senegal, the same framework guides the qualitative data collection on how these norms are understood, reproduced and contested in context. This shared approach makes it possible to identify common patterns and country-specific dynamics, while recognising that the evidence from the two countries is not directly comparable in statistical terms.
Note: This is not an exhaustive list of all norms of restrictive masculinities. The objective in the creation of this list was to account for those norms which have the most significant and direct impact on the empowerment of women and girls.
Source: OECD (2021[1]), Man Enough? Measuring Masculine Norms to Promote Women’s Empowerment.
The expectation that men should provide remains the central organising norm of masculinities
In both Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal, masculinities remain strongly organised around the expectation that men should be the sole or main financial providers for their families. This expectation is not inherently restrictive: economic provision can be an important source of responsibility, care and social contribution. It becomes restrictive when it defines men’s social value primarily through their ability to provide, placing pressure on men to fulfil this role while constraining women’s opportunities to participate equally in paid work, income generation and household economic decision making. Expectations around men’s role as providers continue to shape perceptions of male responsibility, authority and status. They also structure how women’s and men’s roles are understood across household, economic and public life, with women still more closely associated with unpaid care and domestic work. Being the main provider or breadwinner therefore has a wider significance: it is not simply an economic role, but a norm through which authority and social recognition are organised.
In Côte d’Ivoire, household survey data show that all ten restrictive masculinity norms remain widespread, confirming that restrictive masculinities are not limited to a single attitude or behaviour but affect several dimensions of the economic, political and private spheres. Within this broader pattern, provider expectations and decision-making norms are particularly central: masculinities continue to be organised around men’s perceived responsibility to provide and to exercise authority within the household. The data also show that these norms are not distributed evenly across the population and territories. Support for restrictive masculinities is stronger in rural areas and in the North compared to urban areas and the southern regions of Côte d’Ivoire. Regardless of place of residence and other socioeconomic characteristics, including age, marital status and economic status, higher levels of education are systematically associated with more egalitarian attitudes.
In Senegal, qualitative interviews and locally led participatory workshop discussions with selected stakeholders similarly point to financial provision as a central norm of masculinities, alongside expectations that men should lead, decide and remain relatively distant from unpaid care and domestic work. The Senegal evidence helps unpack how these expectations fit together as a socially recognised normative structure. Ensuring the financial provision for the family gives men legitimacy and authority, while gendered divisions of labour reinforce the idea that care and domestic responsibilities belong primarily to women. Male provider expectations are therefore sustained not only as individual beliefs, but as part of a wider social logic linking economic responsibility, authority and gendered roles. The results for Côte d’Ivoire mirror these dynamics, where experts confirm the centrality of being the main family breadwinner in defining manhood.
Differences in views on specific masculine norms indicate that masculinities are being renegotiated over time and across population groups, albeit in a selective and uneven manner. Across both countries, the evidence suggests that some restrictive norms are less dominant than others, including those related to being a “manly” leader, working in “manly” jobs and controlling assets, including land. These patterns suggest entry points for change, particularly around women’s economic roles and access to resources. In Côte d’Ivoire, women increasingly express disagreement with norms that limit their economic opportunities, including unequal access to assets and unequal pay. In Senegal, qualitative evidence shows that women increasingly claim equal economic rights and opportunities, pursuing careers in previously male dominated sectors and aiming for decision-making roles. At the same time, more deeply embedded expectations around financial provision, household authority and gendered divisions of labour remain difficult to dislodge in both countries.
Finally, young people’s endorsement of dominant masculine norms is changing compared to older age groups in both Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire. In Côte d’Ivoire, survey data show a clear gender divide among younger cohorts: women aged 15 to 24 express the most progressive views, while men in the same age group remain more attached to restrictive masculinity norms, particularly around reproductive dominance, financial power and leadership in the workplace. In Senegal, qualitative findings suggest that younger generations are generally perceived as more open to gender equality and positive masculinities, but also under growing pressure. Young men in particular may face heightened expectations to succeed economically and socially, including through access to stable work, while some young women are becoming more assertive in demanding greater equality. Where young men experience limited opportunities or perceive themselves as losing ground, these tensions may feed frustration, resentment or backlash. This dynamic is not only observed in Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal but also in other countries around the world (see Chapters 2 and 3). Youth focused approaches and targeted policies are therefore essential, but they need to address both the aspirations and agency of girls and young women and the economic and social pressures that restrictive masculinities place on boys and young men in Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal.
Restrictive norms often persist because people think others are more conservative than they are themselves
One of the report’s most policy-relevant findings is that restrictive norms of masculinities are sustained not only by what individuals believe, but also by what they think others believe. In Côte d’Ivoire, respondents systematically overestimate men’s support for restrictive norms and underestimate women’s support for them (Figure 1.2). For instance, while about 76% of the Ivorian population agrees that men make better political leaders, respondents expect 62% of women and 83% of men in their area to agree with this statement. In Senegal, stakeholders similarly describe a context in which individuals often assume that others are less supportive of positive masculinities than they are themselves. This suggests that restrictive norms may persist partly because they are perceived to be more widely shared than they actually are, leading individuals to conform to what they believe to be socially expected. This phenomenon, known as pluralistic ignorance, occurs when individuals privately hold views that differ from the perceived norm, while incorrectly assuming that most others support that norm. The examples of Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal contribute to a growing body of research on pluralistic ignorance and its role in social norms change across different contexts (see Chapters 2 and 3).
These misperceptions matter because they can generate self-censorship and reinforce silence, caution and conformity. Individuals may align their behaviour with what they perceive to be socially acceptable, even when their personal beliefs are more progressive, or may conceal more egalitarian views and practices. Anecdotal evidence from Senegal suggests, for example, that some men who contribute to household chores do so discreetly to avoid social judgement, particularly where such involvement is seen as conflicting with their role as financial provider. In this way, restrictive masculinities can continue to shape behaviour even when personal beliefs are beginning to shift.
This “silent gap” between personal beliefs and perceived social expectations is also important for policy and programming. It can help identify areas where policy reform may be more socially acceptable than commonly assumed, and where resistance may be lower than expected. This is particularly the case for restrictive norms where individuals’ private support is much weaker than perceived social support. In Côte d’Ivoire, for example, reforms related to women’s access to employment, equal pay or shared care responsibilities may receive broader support than decision makers expect. At the same time, norms that remain widely accepted, such as the breadwinner role or men’s authority over women, are likely to require more gradual and context-sensitive approaches. Education, communication, awareness raising and community dialogue are important in this context, not only to shift individual attitudes, but also to reduce the gap between what people personally believe and what they think others believe, making existing support for more equitable norms more visible and easier to express.
Personal beliefs about restrictive masculine norms and perceptions of women’s and men’s support for these norms in Côte d’Ivoire
Note: Data presented in this figure was collected through a sequence of three questions which (1) ask the respondent whether they agree or not with the specific statement; (2) ask the respondent to estimate how many out of 10 men in their area would agree with the statement; (3) ask the respondent to estimate how many out of 10 women in their area would agree with the statement. The population-weighted responses for type (1) questions are labelled as “Personal beliefs” and the responses to type (2) and (3) are labelled as “Perceived support among men” or “Perceived support among women”, referring to respondents’ estimated shares of women and men who would support the different statements. For instance, on average 98% of the population agrees that women should obey their husband/partner and the population expects 85% of women and 96% of men to agree with this. The applied methodology follows a literature-based approach.
Statements marked with an asterisk were initially asked in the opposite way – e.g. instead of “I think women cannot refuse sexual relations with their husband” the question was asked as “I think women can refuse sexual relations with their husband”. To present all data in a harmonised way, the mean values for the social expectations on men and women for these statements were reversed.
Source: OECD (2026[2]), OECD Masculinities Database for Côte d'Ivoire, https://data-explorer.oecd.org/s/4sy.
Restrictive masculinities also place heavy pressure on men and boys
Restrictive masculinities do not only affect women’s rights and opportunities. They also place significant pressure on men by tying social recognition to their ability to provide, lead and remain in control, even in contexts where these expectations may be difficult or impossible to fulfil. In Côte d’Ivoire, more than 90% of men report feeling stressed at the prospect of not being able to provide for their families. This shows that the provider norm is not only socially central, but also personally burdensome.
In Senegal, qualitative evidence points to a similar tension around the breadwinner role, especially among younger men facing economic uncertainty and limited opportunities. Stakeholders described growing difficulty in meeting established expectations of provision and authority, even as those expectations remain socially powerful. This creates a difficult situation in which restrictive norms of masculinities are maintained despite becoming harder to fulfil. In such contexts, frustration, insecurity and pressure to reassert traditional masculine identities can become part of the social landscape.
These pressures are closely linked to broader social and economic change. Men and boys may be expected to fulfil traditional ideals of manhood in contexts where economic opportunities are uncertain, gender gaps in education are narrowing, and women are increasingly entering the labour market, including in traditionally male dominated domains and senior roles. These shifts can expand opportunities for women and girls, but they may also unsettle established ideas of male provision, authority and status. Understanding these pressures is essential for identifying credible pathways towards more equitable masculinities.
Restrictive masculinities shape gender inequality through multiple and interconnected pathways. The evidence from Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal shows that these norms influence both women’s economic empowerment and gender-based violence, although not in the same way. In the economic sphere, restrictive masculinities shape women’s access to paid work, the conditions under which they work, the degree of agency they can exercise, and their control over income, assets and decisions. In relation to violence, they help sustain a social environment in which violence may be tolerated, justified or insufficiently sanctioned, while also increasing the likelihood that men who endorse restrictive norms perpetrate violence. In both areas, restrictive masculinities interact with wider structural inequalities, rather than operating in isolation.
Restrictive masculinities constrain women’s economic participation and agency
Women in Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal continue to face substantial disadvantages in economic empowerment, despite progress in girls’ education and women’s economic participation. These disadvantages are visible not only in access to paid work, but also in job quality, unpaid care and domestic work, decision making power, and ownership or control of productive assets (see Chapter 4). Labour force participation gaps remain large, at around 15 percentage points in Côte d’Ivoire and nearly 30 percentage points in Senegal. Women who do work are also more likely to be concentrated in vulnerable forms of employment, with lower and less stable earnings and more limited access to social protection. These gaps show that women’s economic participation, while essential, does not automatically translate into secure earnings, autonomy or long-term economic security, including access to a pension.
The report shows that restrictive masculinities are a key, yet often overlooked, constraint on women’s economic empowerment. Norms that position men as primary breadwinners, protectors and decision makers, and women as dependants responsible for unpaid care and domestic work, shape both women’s access to economic opportunities and the terms on which they participate in economic life. In Côte d’Ivoire, new OECD survey evidence shows that population’s stronger endorsement of restrictive masculinity norms is associated with poorer economic outcomes for women, even after accounting for differences in education, fertility, geography and household characteristics. These norms are linked to lower probabilities of employment, heavier unpaid care and domestic work burdens, reduced participation in household decision making, and a lower likelihood of women owning or controlling productive assets such as land. This dynamic is visible in unpaid care and domestic work, where women perform most of the work and many people continue to view it as women’s responsibility (Figure 1.3).
Note: Panel A shows the average daily hours that men and women in Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal spend on unpaid care and domestic work (UCDW). Panel B shows the reasons why people believe that men should not do unpaid care and domestic work in Côte d’Ivoire.
Source: OECD (2026[2]), OECD Masculinities Database for Côte d'Ivoire, https://data-explorer.oecd.org/s/4sy; Agence Nationale de la Statistique et de la Démographie (2022[3]), Enquête Nationale sur l'Emploi du Temps au Sénégal.
These patterns are closely linked to the provider and decision-making norms described earlier. Where masculinity is associated with men’s responsibility to provide and exercise authority, women’s economic activity may be treated as secondary, conditional or less legitimate, even when it is essential to household livelihoods. Restrictive masculinities can therefore affect whether women work, but also whether their work translates into income security, control over resources, bargaining power and recognition. In this sense, women’s economic empowerment depends not only on access to work, but also on whether women can exercise agency over the benefits of that work.
The influence of norms also depends on household economic conditions. In Côte d’Ivoire, restrictive masculinities appear to exert their strongest influence in middle- and higher-income households, where women’s paid work may be less economically necessary and households may have more room to conform to traditional gender roles. In poorer households, by contrast, women’s economic engagement appears less sensitive to restrictive norms because income constraints often require the participation of all adult members. This does not mean that provider expectations are weaker among poorer households. Rather, economic necessity may limit the extent to which households can act on the male breadwinner ideal. Even when women work, restrictive norms may continue to shape whether their income is recognised, who controls resources, and who makes decisions.
Qualitative evidence from Senegal points to similar dynamics. Stakeholders describe how expectations around male provision, household authority and women’s responsibility for unpaid care and domestic work continue to shape women’s economic choices and opportunities. Women’s economic participation may be welcomed when it helps meet household needs but often remains conditional on women fulfilling domestic responsibilities and not challenging men’s status as primary providers. This helps explain why women’s increasing presence in the labour market does not necessarily translate into equal decision-making power, control over resources or recognition of their economic contributions.
Overall, the evidence highlights that women’s economic empowerment depends on both structural factors, such as local labour market conditions or supporting policies, and social norms, and especially on how the two interact. Expanding access to education, decent jobs, affordable childcare, land and productive assets remains essential. Yet, these measures are unlikely to be sufficient if restrictive masculinities continue to limit women’s choices, time use and control over resources. Policies aimed at closing gender gaps therefore need to combine economic and labour market reforms with deliberate efforts to transform norms that confine women to unpaid care and domestic roles and associate authority, provision and economic independence primarily with men.
Restrictive masculinities sustain violence and increase the risk of perpetration
Gender based violence remains widespread, recurrent and largely underreported in both Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal, despite progress in legal frameworks and in holistic service provision for survivors, including shelters, legal aid and medical care. Available data show that around 30% of women and 20% of men in Côte d’Ivoire, and 70% of women in Senegal, have experienced intimate partner violence at least once in their lives. Psychological violence is the most common form, often overlapping with physical, sexual and economic abuse. Violence is also rarely isolated. In Côte d’Ivoire, more than two-thirds of intimate partner violence survivors report repeated incidents, often occurring several times per month. These patterns point to entrenched dynamics of abuse within relationships and across social settings.
The report shows that restrictive masculinities play a central role in shaping patterns of violence perpetration, rather than directly predicting who experiences violence. Men who endorse norms emphasising male authority, control over women, breadwinning dominance and sexual entitlement are significantly more likely to perpetrate both intimate and non-intimate partner violence. These associations hold even after accounting for education, income, employment status and other socio-demographic factors. By contrast, women’s general endorsement of restrictive masculinities does not predict their likelihood of experiencing violence. This underscores that exposure to violence is shaped by broader relational, community and structural conditions, rather than by individual attitudes alone.
Restrictive masculinities also matter because they help sustain a social environment in which violence can be tolerated, justified or insufficiently sanctioned. In both countries, a sizeable share of the population justifies men’s use of violence under certain circumstances, and many still consider domestic violence a private matter (Figure 1.4). Shame, stigma, fear of retaliation, social pressure and limited trust in institutions discourage disclosure and reporting, meaning that observed prevalence likely understates the true scale of violence. Childhood exposure to violence further reinforces these dynamics. Individuals, particularly men, who witnessed intimate partner violence during childhood are more likely to justify or perpetrate violence later in life, highlighting how harmful norms can be learned early and transmitted across generations.
Note: This figure shows the share of the population (total, women, men) in Senegal (SEN) and Côte d’Ivoire (CIV) agreeing that a man has the right to beat, slap, kick or physically hurt his wife or partner if she burns the food; argues with him; goes out without telling him or asking for his permission; does not take good care of their children; or refuses to have sexual relations with him.
Source: OECD (2026[2]), OECD Masculinities Database for Côte d'Ivoire, https://data-explorer.oecd.org/s/4sy; Agence Nationale de la Statistique et de la Démographie (2023[4]), Enquête Démographique et de Santé continue 2023.
The finding that restrictive masculinities are closely linked to the perpetration of violence has important implications for policy and programming. Legal reforms, stronger justice systems and survivor-centred services are indispensable, but they are unlikely to end gender-based violence on their own if the normative environments that legitimise male dominance and the use of violence remain unchanged. Promoting positive masculinities therefore emerges as a critical entry point for prevention, alongside stronger institutional accountability, trusted reporting pathways and early interventions targeting children, families and communities. This means reshaping expectations around authority, conflict resolution, economic roles and sexuality, while ensuring that survivors can access protection, justice and support.
Norms and structural inequalities reinforce one another
Across women’s economic empowerment and gender-based violence, the findings point to the same broader conclusion: restrictive masculinities matter, but they matter in interaction with structural inequalities. Norms do not operate in a vacuum. They interact with education, employment opportunities, poverty, rural residence, access to assets, institutional trust, legal protection, childcare provision and survivor-centred services. This helps explain why restrictive masculinities can remain influential even where some attitudes are shifting, and why progress in one area – such as higher female labour force participation – does not automatically translate into progress in another, such as more equal division of care and domestic work.
This interaction between norms and structural inequalities has important implications for policy and programming. Responses focused only on changing attitudes are unlikely to be sufficient. At the same time, structural reforms alone will not guarantee transformation if the social expectations that govern authority, care, control and violence remain unchallenged. Effective action therefore requires integrated approaches that expand women’s access to opportunities, resources, protection and services while also transforming the restrictive norms that shape how power is exercised in households, communities and institutions.
While restrictive masculinities remain deeply embedded in both Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal, the findings of this report also point to the possibility of change. Masculinities are not fixed. They are socially constructed, shaped by institutions and reinforced through everyday interactions. They can thus be reinterpreted and transformed. This makes positive masculinities an important pathway for change. Rather than defining men through authority, control and distance from care, positive masculinities promote more equitable, caring and non-violent ways of being a man. They open space for shared responsibility within households, more equitable and respectful relations between women and men, and forms of masculinity less tied to domination or rigid role expectations.
The evidence presented in this report suggests that such a shift matters for both women’s economic empowerment and gender-based violence prevention. In the economic sphere, more equitable masculinities can support women’s agency by encouraging shared caregiving, more joint decision-making and less restrictive attitudes towards access to resources and participation in economic life. In the area of violence prevention, positive masculinities can replace norms that equated masculinity with authority, control or entitlement, and they can reduce the social acceptability of violence as a means of enforcing gendered expectations. The findings from Côte d’Ivoire are particularly suggestive in this regard: men who hold views in line with positive masculinity are less likely to perpetrate intimate- and non-intimate partner violence. This points to the importance of promoting alternative masculinities not only as a matter of values, but also as a practical strategy for reducing harm.
Positive masculinities also benefit men themselves. As highlighted earlier, restrictive norms place considerable pressure on men by tying social recognition to their ability to provide, lead and remain in control, even in contexts where these expectations may be difficult or impossible to fulfil. This can generate stress, anxiety, frustration and, at times, harmful coping behaviours. Positive masculinities broaden the range of socially acceptable roles and behaviours available to men, including caregiving, emotional expression, shared responsibility and non-violent conflict resolution. By loosening the pressure to conform to rigid expectations, they can contribute to men’s well-being while also supporting more equal gender relations.
A growing number of regional, national and community-based initiatives seek to promote more equitable forms of masculinity and encourage behavioural change.
Advocacy, role models and political momentum
The African Union’s 3rd Men’s Conference on Positive Masculinity (2023) highlighted positive masculinity as part of wider efforts to end violence against women and girls and strengthen women’s empowerment in Africa.
In 2025, UN Women and partners convened a regional workshop in Nairobi on positive masculinities and the fight against GBV, linking the issue to girls’ and young women’s leadership and broader gender transformation.
The MenCare Changemaker Summit (Brazil 2026), led by Equimundo and partners, illustrates growing international momentum around caring masculinities, care policy, men’s well-being and the social value of care.
Community and programme-based approaches
In Senegal, Schools for husbands work with respected male community members to encourage support for women’s rights, reproductive health and greater male involvement in domestic responsibilities.
In Senegal, INFOP clubs for boys, meaning “Together” in Wolof, engage young people, especially out of school youth, on positive masculinities, mental health, social pressure and livelihoods, supporting youth focused GBV prevention and norm change.
In Côte d’Ivoire, the Bla ni Agba project integrates women’s economic empowerment with action on unpaid care, household roles and responsible fatherhood in rural cassava-producing communities.
More broadly, the MenCare approach shows how engaging men and fathers in caregiving can be used as an entry point for reducing women’s unpaid care burden and promoting more equitable gender relations.
These examples suggest that positive masculinities are already being advanced through multiple entry points, including violence prevention, care, health, youth engagement and women’s economic empowerment.
At the same time, pathways towards more positive masculinities are neither linear nor uniform. Some approaches work by directly challenging unequal power relations and restrictive gender roles, for instance through programmes that encourage boys and men to reflect on dominant norms, adopt more equitable behaviours and respond constructively to peer pressure. Others seek change more gradually by reframing existing roles in more equitable ways, for example by emphasising responsible fatherhood, caregiving or non-violence without fully questioning male authority within the household. Such approaches may be more socially acceptable and politically feasible, particularly in contexts where restrictive norms remain widely shared. However, their transformative potential may also be more limited. This highlights the importance of designing interventions that are both context-sensitive and sufficiently ambitious to expand equality rather than simply soften existing hierarchies.
Positive masculinities are therefore more than an abstract concept. They provide a practical framework for linking women’s economic empowerment, violence prevention and men’s own well-being. For Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal, the challenge is not only to identify the harms associated with restrictive masculinities, but also to support credible and contextually grounded alternatives. Framed in this way, positive masculinities provide an important foundation for the policy directions set out in the next section.
The findings of this report point to a clear conclusion: restrictive masculinities cannot be addressed through isolated interventions or awareness-raising efforts alone. Because they are embedded in social expectations, institutional arrangements and material inequalities, effective responses must combine norm-transformative approaches with structural reforms that address inequalities. Policies should therefore aim not only to shift attitudes, but also to change the structural conditions that sustain unequal power relations, limit women’s agency and enable violence.
The recommendations that follow set out an integrated approach to transforming restrictive masculinities. This approach recognises that more equitable and positive masculinities benefit women, men and society as a whole. By reducing the pressures associated with rigid gender roles, expanding women’s economic agency and addressing the underlying causes of violence, policies that engage with masculinities can contribute to more inclusive, equitable and resilient development pathways.
Address restrictive norms and structural inequalities together
Restrictive masculinities are sustained not only by beliefs, but also by economic insecurity, unequal access to resources, weak public services and institutional arrangements that reinforce traditional gender roles. Policy responses should therefore combine efforts to transform norms with reforms that expand access to education, decent work, childcare, social protection and justice. To move beyond a theoretical recognition of restrictive masculinities, gender equality and women’s empowerment interventions should explicitly identify how these norms affect the outcomes they seek to improve, integrate actions to address them into programme design, and measure whether shifts in norms contribute to better results for women, girls, men and boys. This requires including restrictive masculinities in theories of change, results frameworks and monitoring and evaluation systems, alongside indicators on structural barriers and gender equality outcomes. Such an approach is particularly important where structural reforms are necessary but insufficient: for example, where new opportunities do not translate into women’s control over income or decision making, or where stronger legal frameworks do not reduce violence because norms around authority control and silence remain intact.
Engage men and boys as part of the solution
Transforming masculinities requires working directly with men and boys, not only as potential allies, agents of change and role models for more equitable norms, but as individuals affected by restrictive expectations. Policies and programmes should promote culturally sensitive and more equitable, caring and non-violent models of masculinity through schools, youth initiatives, peer dialogue, media campaigns and community-based engagement. Particular attention should be paid to young men, who are navigating new social and economic realities while dominant gender models continue to link masculinity to provision, authority and status. Supporting men and boys to adopt alternative roles and behaviours is essential for both women’s empowerment and violence prevention.
Tailor interventions to context
Restrictive masculinities are not expressed in identical ways across contexts. The report highlights significant differences linked to geography, education, generation and local social dynamics. This means that interventions should be adapted to local realities rather than applied uniformly. In rural areas, for example, where support for restrictive norms may be stronger and service access more limited, community-based engagement and locally trusted actors are especially important. This includes engaging religious and community leaders, who play a central role in shaping social norms and can help frame positive masculinities in ways that are locally acceptable. More broadly, efforts to promote positive masculinities should be framed in ways that are socially credible, context specific and ambitious in their commitment to equality.
Strengthen women’s economic agency, not only participation
Increasing women’s participation in economic activity is not sufficient if underlying constraints on agency, bargaining power and control over resources remain unaddressed. Policies should therefore strengthen women’s economic agency by expanding access to productive assets, decent work, financial services, childcare and safe mobility, while also promoting more equal decision making within households and workplaces. Skills training and capacity building in areas such as entrepreneurship, project management, financial literacy and income generation can support this objective, particularly when women also have access to the tools, finance, information, and mentoring needed to apply these skills. Interventions that encourage shared caregiving and reduce women’s unpaid care and domestic work are especially important if economic participation is to translate into greater autonomy, control over resources and empowerment. These efforts should be embedded within broader gender equality strategies that strengthen women’s agency, voice and autonomy in both public and private life.
Strengthen GBV prevention, accountability and survivor support
Preventing gender-based violence requires both stronger institutions and greater attention to the norms that can normalise or justify violence. Governments should continue to strengthen legal frameworks, reporting mechanisms, survivor-centred integrated services and accountability systems, while complementing these efforts with prevention strategies that address the norms underpinning tolerance of violence, male control and entitlement. Particular attention should be paid to repeated violence and the intergenerational transmission of violence, including through early childhood exposure to violence. Building trust in institutions is also essential to ensure that survivors can seek support and justice without fear of stigma, retaliation or inaction.
Use social expectations as a lever for change
One of the report’s most promising findings is that restrictive masculinities are often sustained by a gap between what people personally believe and what they think others believe. People may comply with norms they privately question, or conceal more egalitarian views and practices, because they assume that others remain more conservative than they are. Understanding this gap can help policymakers identify areas where reform may face less resistance than expected, while also revealing where norms remain more entrenched and require more gradual engagement. Communication campaigns, public dialogue and community-based approaches can help make existing support for more equitable norms more visible and easier to express, thereby shifting perceived social norms as well as individual attitudes.
References
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[3] Agence Nationale de la Statistique et de la Démographie (2022), Enquête Nationale sur l’Emploi du Temps au Sénégal, Ministère de l’Economie, du Plan et de la Coopération, République du Sénégal, https://www.ansd.sn/sites/default/files/2023-04/RAPPORT_ENET_2021.pdf.
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