CARE’s vision is to seek a world of hope, tolerance and social justice, where poverty has been overcome and people live in dignity and security. CARE recognizes that power relations between girls and boys, men and women are unequal, and that these inequalities should be addressed. As such, CARE must approach its work in a gender sensitive way and commits itself to address discrimination in all its forms.

Sustainable Development demands an equal opportunity for all members of society to take part in social & political change as well as economic progress. However, more often than not, women and girls are widely excluded from decision making processes. Due to prevailing socially ascribed gender roles, women and girls are mainly assigned to the domestic sector and have limited access to education and resources. As a result of continuous discrimination, women lack self esteem and confidence and are therefore highly exposed to male dominance and power. Accordingly, women and girls are highly vulnerable to violence, sexual transmitted diseases as well as to impacts of climate change.

Raising gender awareness and promoting gender equality is one of CARE’s core principals. Existing inequalities due to gender are considered to be the major obstacles of a just and sustainable development. As a means to overcome discrimination, CARE critically reflects socially ascribed gender roles and their impact on society. This is fundamental to discover potentials for change and to include specific needs and rights of women and men. Guided by a highly sophisticated policy and various strategic tools, CARE Österreich assures a gender sensitive programming with a focus on Women Empowerment at all levels.

CARE's Wiki on Gender
CARE has created a Wiki on Gender in order to promote knowledge sharing and learning around gender in CARE. It is intended to be shared among people who want to connect with others, and find or share key resources with regard to women's empowerment and more just gender relations. Follow the link and join us!

CARE International Gender Policy
CARE commits itself to ensure that gender equality is fully incorporated in all its programmatic and organizational practices. As a means to make the collective programming efforts more effective, CARE International has developed a policy that defines specific commitments as well as mechanisms and minimum common standards for all CARE members and Country Offices.

Download  CARE International Gender Policy, pdf  260 K


CARE Österreich’s Conceptual Approach to Gender Equality & Women’s Empowerment
Guided by key international treaties and guidelines, and based on CARE International’s Gender Policy, CARE Österreich has developed a strategy to meet the requirements of gender mainstreaming in all its work. The following conceptual approach briefly outlines CARE Österreich’s priorities and activities as related to Gender Equality & Women’s Empowerment.

Download  CARE Österreich’s Conceptual Approach to Gender, pdf  2 MB


Gender Analysis Guiding Notes
CARE incorporates gender and power analysis as an operational and design feature in all its programmatic work. To assure a high program quality, CARE Österreich has elaborated a set of gender analysis guidelines to facilitate the work of all program staff.

Download  CARE Gender Analysis Guidelines, pdf  310 K


CARE International Strategy for strenghtening a Gender Approach in Emergencies
Gender is identified as a priority issue within emergency response operations. The strategy outlines specific actions to implement and mainstream this priority within CARE's emergency capacity building efforts.

Download  CARE International Gender in Emergencies Strategy Draft 2007, pdf  116 K

Entry Points for Empowerment
An analytical toolbox to help put into practice right-based approaches that empower people to claim and exercise their rights as well as new programmes to address discrimination, exploitation and violence against women.

Download  CARE Analytical Toolbox: Entry Points for Empowerment, pdf  900 K


CARE International Strategic Impact Inquiry on Women’s Empowerment
This report summarizes findings from Phase 2 of CARE International’s Strategic Impact Inquiry on Women’s Empowerment. For the second year in a row, CARE has invested our own resources and reputation to dig deeply a question that many in the development business find difficult to answer: What impact, if any, is our work having on women’s empowerment?

Download The Courage to Change, pdf 650 K


Empowering Women? CARE's Experience in East and Central Africa
The following report is the result of a research undertaken in early 2006 in six countries of East and Central Africa. It reveals challenges as well as core issues that need to be taken into consideration in order to improve program quality and achieve long term and positive impact on people's lives.

Download CARE ECAR - Empowering Women, pdf 3.3 M

“Claiming Rights, Promoting Peace: Empowerment of Women in Conflict affected Areas”
Since 2006 CARE Österreich (CÖ) is running this cross-country program, financed through the Austrian Development Agency (ADA) in Burundi, Uganda and Nepal in order to strenghten the implementation of the UN SCR 1325. The program envisaged Learning Conferences in order to reflect the ongoing program process as well as achieved results and lessons learned in the respective projects in the three countries. According to the commitment to document results, synthesis findings and to pursue an intensive learning agenda, CARE Österreich prepared the following reports of the Learning Conferences in Nepal 2008 and Burundi 2009.

Download  CARE-Report Learning Conference Nepal 2008, pdf  2.3 M
Download  CARE-Report Learning Conference Burundi 2009, pdf  3 M


Peace Building and Post-Conflict Recovery are Women's Business
Together with Isis WICCE, CARE implemented a workshop on Peace Building and Post-Conflict Recovery for Women Leaders and Activists on the Peace, Recovery and Development Plan for Northern Uganda (PRDP) and other Peace Building and Post Conflict Recovery Initiatives in Uganda. As a means of linking grass-roots women's voices to national level policies, the workshop was attended by members of national as well as local CSO's and individual women's rights advocates. The following report provides an insight in the most important outcomes and findings of the workshop.

Download CARE PRDP Workshop Report, pdf 830 K

Due to the firm belief that the integration of women and their specific needs in peace and security processes has an exponential impact on the wellbeing of a whole community and its ability to recover after war, CARE puts a strong focus on the implementation of the UNSCR's 1325 and 1820.

UN Security Council Resolution 1325 - Women, Peace and Security
On October 31, 2000, the UN Security Council unanimously adopted  Resolution 1325, pdf  on Women, Peace and Security. It specifically adresses the disproportional impact of war on women and girls and stresses the importance of equal participation of women as active agents in peace and security processes.

UN Security Council Resolution 1820 - Sexual Violence against Civilians in Conflict
Built on SCR 1325, the UN Security Counsil unanimously adopted  Resolution 1820, pdf  on Sexual Violence against Civilians in Conflict on June 19, 2008. It emphasizes the tremendous impact of sexual violence, particularly on women and girls in conflict situations, and demands its immediate halt through appropriate measures.

Civil Society Recommendations on the Implementation of UN SCR 1325 in Europe
The following list of recommendations was drafted during the civil society conference in September 2009 and focuses on National Action Plans as well as EU Institutions.
Download  Civil Society Recommendations - of UN SCR 1325 in Europe, pdf  220 K