The use of social protection in emergencies has increased rapidly over the past few years. Innovative programming, implementation and financing mechanisms have allowed social protection programmes to evolve and adapt to both prepare for, and respond to, large-scale emergencies.

Over the past two decades, growing attention has also been paid to the role that social protection can play in promoting gender equality and women and girls’ empowerment throughout the course of their lives. At the same time, increased recognition of the gendered impacts of crises has led to more gender-responsive humanitarian interventions.

However, to date, there has been limited use of systematic evidence to inform shock-sensitive social protection policy and programming with a gender lens, and the two sectors have remained siloed, despite the significant overlaps and potential for lesson-learning.

This working paper looks at the core components of gender-responsive social protection programming in non-crisis contexts. 

Published online: 5 April 2019

Corrected online: 29 April 2020
Page 12 – “Evidence suggests that there is particular concern that higher values of transfers targeted to women may contribute to, or exacerbate, abuse or violence in the household (Buller et al., 2018). Evidence shows that smaller transfers tend not to constitute such a threat to existing relations and the status quo (Wasilkowska, 2012).” was changed to “Although there is little evidence that higher values of transfers targeted to women may contribute to, or exacerbate, abuse or violence in the household (Buller et al., 2018), smaller transfers tend not to constitute a threat to existing relations and the status quo (Wasilkowska, 2012)”.