Advancing Male Engagement in Family Planning and Reproductive Health: An Advocacy Tool

Created by Breakthrough ACTION, this tool offers guidance on how to advocate with various audiences to bring about further investment in, commitment to, and implementation of male engagement to improve family planning and reproductive health (FP/RH) outcomes.

Among the messages such advocates may seek to communicate: Around the world, engaging men and boys as FP users, supportive partners, and/or agents of change has been found to decrease unintended pregnancies, improve maternal health, reduce sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and HIV/AIDS, and meet the needs of youth. Such engagement works by actively promoting gender equality and transforming inequitable or harmful gender norms - ultimately improving FP/RH outcomes for men and women in cooperative ways that protect and encourage women's agency.

However, many relevant FP/RH programmes do not incorporate male engagement into their work because relevant decision-makers may not understand male engagement or its benefits, may be concerned about making changes to longstanding investments in female-centred FP programmes, or may act on personal biases that consider FP to be solely a woman's issue.

In order to support actors working in FP/RH, the tool provides an advocacy implementation plan template that helps users identify priority FP/RH decision-makers, assess their current level of familiarity with or support for male engagement, and tailor a unique advocacy goal and approach based on that decision maker's specific priorities and spheres of influence.

The tool incorporates existing research, frameworks, and other resources to help users build their case for male engagement through the following components:

• Part 1 describes current challenges that prevent ideal male engagement in FP/RH programmes, outlines an overarching vision of how these problems can be addressed through pointed advocacy, and provides indicators for measuring this progress. The section identifies 3 key advocacy audiences (government representatives, donors, and programme implementers) and 3 subgroups within each audience (Collaborators, Skeptics, and Non-Believers) and provides examples of how advocacy to each of these segments differs.
• Part 2 expands upon existing advocacy tools and provides guidance on how to shape male-engagement-specific advocacy efforts. This section proposes an advocacy implementation plan to structure an advocacy approach, set advocacy goals, and select priority advocacy audiences. It  provides additional points to consider when completing the plan and to make advocacy more successful. These include notes on how to integrate life-stage and gender considerations into advocacy and how to plan for resistance while advocating to a priority audience.
• Part 3 comprises appendices, including a list of the male engagement and advocacy resources referenced throughout the tool, definitions of key terms, the advocacy implementation plan template, and 3 sample advocacy implementation plans.

Breakthrough ACTION invites those using the tool to share their experiences via Springboard or to have their experience with the tool documented and shared by the project.