Difficult Issues

Purpose and Rationale

The epidemic raises difficult issues.

The exercise provides a structured opportunity to explore some of these perplexing or contentious issues in order to be better informed of the implications of these for global and national programmatic frameworks.

Procedure

Give each group a copy of the situations sheet and ask them to identify:

· Who are the key players?
· What are the different issues?
· For whom are they difficult?
· How might they be resolved?

Ask the group to identify any key issues which they would like to share in the plenary.

Materials: Flipcharts, markers, masking tape.
Time: 60-75 minutes

Difficult Issues - Scenarios

Migration

From the time Kenneth set eyes on Paula, he knew she was the woman for him. He pursued her for three months before she agreed to give him an "in". Kenneth moved into Paula's house where she lived with her three children, Jean (12), Harry (10) and Norma (7). Paula had checked Kenneth out with his friends and her own and had learned that he was a "good man".

Paula was a trader who traveled to Trinidad and Curacao twice per month. She used to leave her friend with the children, but this friend was leaving for good. Paula felt lucky that Kenneth had come along at the right time to be with the children; it would be good to have a man in the house.

Paula was always on a hustle when she was trading. In the early days she had trouble with the immigration and customs officers in both countries but she had learned to "fix them up". She had also formed liaisons with persons in hotels in both places and was able to earn enough to purchase more goods.

One day, three years later, Thelma turned up at Paula's home with her six month old baby. Kenneth hadn't given her child support for the past three months. By this time Jean was giving Paula trouble.

Gender Issues and Male Marginalisation

Over the last twenty years Caribbean women have gradually mobilised themselves to the point of changing their role in society and the family. Women are now more consistently outperforming men in the workplace and boys in the school setting. Women are increasingly owning property and choosing to raise children on their own. There exists more camaraderie among women and a number of national women's organisations have been formed to ensure their continuous empowerment.

Men have found it difficult to adjust to this role change. Men find women to be too assertive. Others find it difficult to accept that women have their own resources. Increasingly men have aggressed against their women resulting in domestic abuse and even murder. The increased substance abuse among men along with drop out from school and high unemployment have been the concern from some quarters. Some are suggesting that this has amounted to a phenomenon generally referred to as male marginalisation.

While it is true that there needs to some real strategy geared towards supporting men's adjustment to their new role, women are being made to feel that it is their fault that these changes have happened and that it is their responsibility to fix the situation. While the debate is continuing women are not prepared to give in on the ground already gained.

Exploring the Impact - Chaos Scenario

Purpose and Rationale

This exercise encourages participants to consider the potential scale and extent of the impact of the epidemic upon families, communities, businesses and nations.

Procedure

Give each participant a copy of the sheet headed "The Situation" and ask them to read this in silence. While they do so, cover a large area of wall space with flipchart paper and gather participants around it. Remind participants of the speed with which they have witnessed the spread of the epidemic. Ask them to brainstorm examples of specific impacts on individuals, families, communities and nations, should the epidemic continues to spread unchecked.

Two or three volunteers should help the facilitator to write the responses randomly on the wall. There should be no discussion at this stage, no attempt to show causal linkages or to cluster types of impact. Simply encourage participants to fill the paper on the wall. Use strategic questioning to stimulate new trains of thought in order to elicit responses on all aspects of the epidemic's potential impact. Use humour and allow a degree of disorder.

Once the paper on the wall is filled, ask participants to review (in silence) the final result of their brainstorming. Ask them how people will feel living in the midst of chaos and dislocation. Encourage discussion of their reactions to the apocalyptic vision they have created. Draw attention to the potential impact across all sectors and to the fact that while the exercise itself is hypothetical, the scenarios on the flipchart have become reality in some regions of the world.

Materials: Flipchart paper, masking tape, markers.
Time: 15-30 minutes

The Situation

Not too long ago, the country was considered rich in terms of both its material and human resources. That all changed when it became clear that the HIV epidemic had been spreading throughout the population: so much so, that it is now estimated that more than 20% of the adult population is already infected and that this figure is considerably higher in some places and populations.

Infections tend to be concentrated among the better educated and skilled and the impact is already taking its toll on the national economy. Companies are having to spend a far greater proportion of their earnings on health costs and in specific sectors, skilled labour recruitment and training is becoming very scarce.

In the rural areas things are particularly bad as people who are already ill return from the towns to their homes for care and support. Some households are now completely overwhelmed and a new problem is emerging of integrating children whose parents have died. Funerals are becoming a common sight all over the country. Agricultural production is deteriorating as households have less time (and human resources) to devote to necessary tasks and consequently shift their efforts to crops which are less labour intensive (but also less nutritious and profitable) .

There are concerns for the security and stability of the country. Many members of the armed forces are infected. One consequence of the gradually deteriorating transport and communication systems is the presence in many districts of largely unsupervised and unoccupied groups of military personnel.