Dynamics of Social Norm Change

1. Values Deliberations and Norm AdoptionMaasai Woman Examines Declaration of Equal Rights for Women and Children, Issued by Justice Elders (standing in background) of Ol Pusi Moru, Kenya, 5/2012

2. Dynamics of Social Norm Change • How are some norms harder to change than others? • Who is the reference network? • Who is the core group? • What are more effective ways to do values deliberations and organized diffusion? • What is coordinated abandonment?

3. Strength of Interdependence and Speed of Shift • Social convention of Driving on Left vs. Driving on Right • An extreme example • Almost everyone must know that almost everyone is changing • And they must know the exact point in time the change takes place • Contrast: a new social norm of individuals’ conservation of municipal water supply • One will reduce if one sees that enough other people are reducing • It’s enough that one sees every day in the weather report that city water consumption steadily goes down

4. How Strong is a Social Norm? Two Dimensions of Interdependence • Bad Consequences of Doing New Behavior on One’s Own: Strong to Weak • Early marriage – daughter marries poorly or not at all, risk of dishonor • Community sanitation – wasted effort, ridicule • Washing hands with soap – teasing • How Many Must be Organized to Adopt an Effective New Norm: Many to Few • Almost everyone – community sanitation • Most people – condom usage • Enough unmarried girls – going to school together that their honor is secure • Family, friends, neighbors – exclusive breastfeeding

5. Who is the Reference Network?It differs, even for the same practice • Urban-coastal China footbinding and FGM/C in Senegal • Overlapping marriage horizons • Old and newly created networks • Contagion of abandonment • Deir al Barsha, Egypt • Religious and geographical isolate • Eased pioneer abandonment, but prevented easy contagion

6. Who is the Reference Network? • USAID Guinea urban study, descriptive survey, FGC reference network • Lower income: ethnically homogeneous neighborhood; for more important decisions respondent is oriented to rural community of origin and its notables; less exposed to communications media • Higher income: mixed neighborhoods away from extended family, for important decisions are more oriented to friends, coworkers, media figures, house of worship; much more exposed to media messages

7. For a Social Norm, Treat the Reference Network, not the Population at Risk • Individual Problem • Which individuals are at risk from high blood pressure? • Concentrate effort on those individuals • Social Problem • Which individuals and which of their beliefs cause the pattern of behavior? • Example: Social norm of child marriage • Population at risk: adolescent girls • Population whose beliefs (expectations, evaluations) cause existence of the social norm: parents, grandparents, bridegroom’s families, caste, village • Adolescent girls could be highly motivated agents of change, • But, they are not enough for change, program must also engage all those who cause the social norm

8. Enough People have to See that Enough People are Changing

9. Dynamics of Norm Adoption • Core Group • Values Deliberations • Organized Diffusion • Enough People Ready to Change • Coordinated Abandonment

10. Who is the Core Group?It can take different forms • Differs by Circumstances, By Program History, by Chance Opportunity • Prefer More Influential, More Innovative Individuals, with ties to all Sectors of the Reference Network • Chosen by village leaders – but largely self-selected (Tostan) • All of the school teachers; later, male and female elders, multiple other groups (Fulda Mosocho, Kenya) • Town council – not acting in its police capacity (Deir al Barsha, Egypt) • The elders’ council – not acting in its police capacity (a Maasai group, Kenya) • Core groups with people from all sectors, including village, clan, religious leaders, educators (KMG, Ethiopia) • Founders of each marriage society (China) • Self-selected cadre (Otpor!) • College student clubs (U.S. civil rights)

11. Dynamics of Norm Adoption • Core Group • Values Deliberations • Organized Diffusion • Enough People Ready to Change • Coordinated Abandonment

12. Values Deliberations(Transformative Human Rights Education) • Study of more effective and less effective FGM/C programs in five countries (Mackie 2009, UNICEF 2010) • Programs that apparently were more effective had two central features • Community deliberations about local values and national or international human rights • Coordinated abandonment of FGM/C and other harmful practices

13. Values DeliberationsStarting in Core Group, and it Takes Time • These deliberations take place in small core groups for 1 to 3 years, and diffuse from the core group through the population • The deliberations are about values, human rights, moral norms, social norms, factual beliefs, and community practices • Multiple positive changes result • (Not unique – found in other program areas, & in other regions)

14. Values DeliberationsThey can take different forms • Religious and human values of justice and peace (CEOSS, Egypt) • Values-centered education, equal rights of women and men (Fulda Mosocho, Kenya) • Gender equality, human rights (KMG, Ethiopia) • International human rights (Tostan, Senegal) • Rights in Kenyan constitution (Ol Pusi Moru Maasai, Kenya) • Rights in Indian constitution (IHRE, India) • Etc.

15. UNDP Community Capacity Enhancement – Community Conversations; on HIV/AIDSM. Gueye, D. Daouf, T. Chaava • Community Conversations = Core Group, Values Deliberations • “Multilevel resonance of CCs” = Organized Diffusion • CC resonates in one community and changes it • CC resonates from one community to the next, transferring change • CCE-CC not explicit about Coordinated Abandonment

16. Four Ethiopian CCE-Community Conversation Programs on Harmful Practices • CCE-CC was launched in Ethiopia in 2002 for HIV/AIDS; some programs also took up harmful social practices • Four of these programs were measured by UNICEF-organized quantitative and qualitative surveys • Two were effective: • Rohi Weddu: Afari nomads in scattered bands • KMG: Abandonment of FGM/C, marriage by abduction, and other harmful practices throughout province of 700,000, in about 5 years

17. KMG, Ethiopia • Core groups – values deliberations – organized diffusion – public celebration marking norms shift • Deliberations, diffusions, and public commitments saturate the population, upward, from local communities to Subdistricts, from Subdistricts to Districts, from Districts to Zonal “Whole Body, Healthy Life” Celebrations repeated annually • decisively shifting normative and empirical expectations throughout the communities • 85% of population participated in a core-group-inspired discussion on harmful practices

18. KMG Ethiopia: First Annual Whole Body Celebration, Zonal Level, 2004, ca. 80,000 (10% of total population)photo: kmgselfhelp.org

19. Effective Abandonment Requires Community Discussion, Decision, Commitment • Community – of reciprocal expectation • Not any community, e.g., not the country, the “population at risk,” government territorial unit, trade association • Genuine Community Discussion of pros and cons • Not central officials declaring top decisions to local officials, not one-sided campaign in subgroup, no foreordained conclusions • Genuine Community Decision • Not a top-down command, not merely a law from the capital • Greater part of community must be disposed to change • Genuine Community Commitment • Coordinated abandonment, mutual pledge • Monitoring mechanism

20. Less Effective Community Dialogue (due to limited program resources)Note: surveyed by UNICEF • Project A, Regional Govt • Involves 70 individuals in all community sectors from each of 17 Subdistricts, for 18 months • Small human rights element • Abandonment made at Subdistrict level • Subdistrict decision (including criminalization) conveyed downward to local communities (no local discussion, decision, commitment) • Project W, Zonal Govt • Trains for two days six community dialogue facilitators from each Subdistrict on health and harmful practices • No human rights element • Facilitators from Subdistrict sent to organize 1-2 day dialogues in several villages at a time • Abandonment decision (including criminalization) conveyed downward from Subdistrict to village

21. Institute for Human Rights Education (HRE), Middle-School, Indiareported by Monisha Bajaj, Columbia Teachers College • 18 states, 3500 schools, originated in Tamil Nadu • Class 6, HR as enunciated in Indian Constitution • Class 7, Children’s Rights and Experiences • Class 8, Right to Equal Treatment and Nondiscrimination • School style, not informal education style

22. A Credible Program with Remarkable Changes in Attitudes • Urged working youth to return to school • Convinced a family not to commit female infanticide • Tried to halt child marriage of classmates • Reported and threatened to report instances of child labor and child marriage • Diffused values deliberations to parents, siblings, neighbors, friends, and self-help groups • Boys washed own dishes • Boys refused extra food, advocated equal treatment of sisters • More student interaction across caste and religious lines • Played more with children of other castes • Confronted teachers late for class • Threatened to report staff abuses • Complained about substandard food • But, behavior change was unstable, because it…

23. Does Not Involve All Sectors of Community • “Given these impediments to intervention and without sufficient support from teachers or other adults who could provide strategies or back-up as higher status community members, students sometimes had a difficult time sustaining the activist impulse that their studies in human rights had inculcated in them.” • Turkey, Women for Women’s Human Rights • Empowering individual results • Resistance from nonparticipants

24. Dynamics of Norm Adoption • Core Group • Values Deliberations • Organized Diffusion • Enough People Ready to Change • Coordinated Abandonment

25. Coordinated AbandonmentIt can take different forms • “Public declaration” is only one implementation of the concept • Create new relationships among the like-minded • Urban China: join marriage society • India: non-dowry matrimonial websites • Egypt, Deir al Barsha: sign community commitment in private, personal commitment either kept private or made public • Sudan, Saleema: for mass-media, an animated portrayal of accelerating attitude change, gathering together in central assembly, all looking up to a full-colored flag (up to a higher ideal of completeness) • Local tradition of signing on a flag, etc. • Bogota water consumption • Publish total city water consumption daily as part of weather reports