Change lessons from the campaign to prevent FGM

I listened to an interesting article today talking about the British government’s decision to spend £35m to help counter Female Genital Mutilation.  They were interviewing Lynne Featherstone, Minister for International Development and a woman called Nimco Ali who suffered this. They were talking about a campaign that is attempting to change the culture in Africa, where some 30 million girls are at risk, and thus help the 20,000 UK girls in the same position.  Accepting this is a huge injustice to all young girls, it was the language they used that interested me.  Nimco said “If they are never spoken to, just talked about and talked at”   referring to the African girls and women, however the same is true of any group you are trying to influence.  If you don’t listen to them, why should they listen to you?!?

Lyn Featherstone talked about the importance of shifting behaviour which as to start with the realisation of that this is not a good thing for them or their daughters.  So first comes information, then awareness, then listening, then change.  She made the point that the laws that are already in place will make little difference until these steps are taken.  The other key part of the strategy was getting this change championed by women.  You have to have allies / champions within the group you wish to change in order to make progress.

The other element is getting this practice reframed from a cultural thing to one of violence against women, from being the norm to being unacceptable.  I thought one very good example was Chinese foot-binding which at one time was considered a thing of beauty, which became seen as a form of torture.

There are lessons here which are closer to our homes and work places.

Resources:

1. http://www.thegirlgeneration.org/
2. http://www.dofeve.org/

This entry was posted on Friday, October 10th, 2014 at 11:25 and is filed under Business Change, Hints, Tips & Techniques, Values & Philosophy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.