Senior Gender Equality in Academic Knowledge and Research - International Consultant

Background:

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security. 
In the Arab region, UN Women, the Arab Women Organization (AWO), and other partners are implementing an exciting and unique three-year regional programme entitled “Dare to Care” (DTC) with the goal of transforming patriarchal social norms and masculinities, with a regional coverage in six countries (Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Tunisia, Lebanon, and Palestine) and in-country investments in four of them: Egypt, Jordan, and Morocco. 
This ground-breaking regional programme aims to promote social norms change for gender equality and women’s empowerment using the involvement of men and boys in unpaid care and household responsibilities as one key entry point. The programme is funded by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), the German International Development Cooperation (GIZ), and the Basque Agency for Development Cooperation. It works towards the achievement of three following three outcomes:
•    Outcome 1: Societies across the MENA region demonstrate an increased involvement of men and boys in caregiving and household responsibilities and more empowerment of women and girls.
•    Outcome 2: Key institutions effectively transform patriarchal masculinities and social norms, with a focus on advancing caregiving and household responsibilities of men and boys and the economic empowerment of women and girls.
•    Outcome 3:  More men and boys are able to take their share in caregiving and household responsibilities with more enabling laws and policies that promote their caregiving and household responsibilities, and paternity leave.
 

Under the above Outcome 3, UN Women and AWO have formalized a regional partnership that aims to establish a sustainable regional network of at least 18 universities and research institutions from the Arab region. This regional network is to have a clear governance structure and thematic focus on feminist knowledge production around issues related to masculinities, social norms, economics, redistribution of unpaid care and domestic work, decolonial theories and practices, and others.
This academic network is expected to strengthen the women’s/gender studies of universities from the Arab region by promoting regional networking, exchanges, and knowledge production on gender equality that is led and owned by universities and research institutions from the region. 
 

Description of Responsibilities/ Scope of Work:

This consultancy is under the framework of the “Dare to Care” regional programme. The consultant will work in close collaboration with AWO and UN Women, under the direct supervision of UN Women’s “Dare to Care” Regional Programme Manager and in close partnership with AWO Director General and other team members of AWO and UN Women.

All deliverables of the consultant will be reviewed and cleared by both AWO and UN Women before the payments are approved by UN Women’s “Dare to Care” Regional Programme Manager.

Further, the consultant will be required to work in a very collaboratively and consultative way with universities, research institutions, and other relevant stakeholders from the Arab region as needed.

The consultant will provide substantive technical support to carry out the following functions:
•    Undertake a mapping exercise that helps AWO, UN Women, universities, and other relevant stakeholders to understand better the current situation of women’s/gender studies in the academia (universities) from the Arab region and identify key actions to strengthen them.
•    Support the establishment and consolidation of a unique network of universities and research institutions in the Arab region with the goal of promoting feminist knowledge production and cooperation and exchanges between universities/research institutions on feminist teaching and research. 
•    Provide critical advice and support to universities and research institutions from the Arab region to strengthen feminist knowledge production (teaching and research), also based on good practices from university networks from other regions.

Deliverables

The deliverables of this consultancy assignment are described in the below table. The final below deliverables will have to include the inputs provided by both AWO and UN Women before payment is released by UN Women to the consultant. 
 

No. Deliverables Number of Workdays  Completion timeframe 1 Brief inception report of the assignment that includes: 1) a Description of how the consultant will undertake her/his assignment acco