The COVID-19 pandemic has brought into sharp focus and exacerbated many existing gender disparities. Researchers and activists have warned that the pandemic risks erasing decades of progress towards gender equality around the world.1 Prior to the pandemic, women globally spent about three times as many hours on unpaid care and domestic work as men.2 Stay-at-home orders and school closures have exponentially increased families’ caregiving needs, not to mention the demands (and risks) of caring for the sick and the stress and emotional labor of keeping families safe. Data from 38 countries confirm that while men are also taking on part of the additional care work, women continue to provide the bulk of care during the pandemic.3 Further, the current crisis is expected to hit women’s employment more severely than men’s – particularly for those in the informal economy – in contrast to previous economic downturns.4 Indeed, last year saw more women than men leaving the workforce,5 due in part to caregiving demands and factors which lead families to prioritize men’s paid work over women’s. The pandemic has also shone a light on a “shadow pandemic” of violence against women and children (VAW/C), with many at increased risk while confined at home with their abusers. More than half of all studies on VAW/C in the context of COVID-19 point to an increase in violence as a result of the pandemic.6 Yet, some argue that by making visible these deep-rooted inequalities the pandemic provides an opportunity for countries and communities to mobilize around and invest in policies and programs that prioritize care, equality, and social protection – and not just in times of crisis. Rwanda has been hailed for both its innovative and timely response to COVID-19 and its longstanding efforts to advance gender equality. Yet, little research has examined the gendered impacts of Rwanda’s COVID-19 response, particularly its impact on unpaid work and care, couple relationship dynamics, and whether men and women are coping differently with the stress and uncertainty of the crisis. This study sought to understand how women and men with young children in Rwanda have experienced the COVID-19 pandemic and its response, examining aspects of their lives related to care, connection and coping. It considers if and how men and women have experienced the pandemic differently, including how it has impacted their financial situation and job-seeking, whether men are involved in sharing the additional unpaid care and domestic work, and factors associated with family violence – such as communication, quarreling, anger, and stress. The study looks at men’s and women’s experiences both during and after the first ‘stay-at-home’ period in order to understand the immediate and shorter-term impacts on family dynamics and couple relations compared to life before the pandemic. Uniquely, this study also builds on an existing randomized controlled trial to examine whether families who participated in the Bandebereho intervention in 2015 – which engaged men and couples to promote men’s caregiving, healthier couple relations and violence prevention – have coped with the pandemic differently or been more resilient than other families (see the box on the following page for more on the intervention and RCT). By interviewing these families five years after the intervention ended, we also hope to understand whether the intervention’s previously demonstrated impacts on strengthening couple relations have been sustained during a period of extreme stress. We hope the study findings can inform ongoing and future pandemic or crisis response measures that account for the differing impacts on women and men, as well as provide additional evidence on effective programming that can be scaled up to support families’ well-being and resilience in normal times and in times of crisis
Case Study
Care, Coping, and Connection under Covid-19
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