Backlash and gender-focused aid: A quantitative study of gender-based violence in Sub-Saharan Africa

Women’s empowerment and gender equality for all women and girls is one of the United Nations' seventeen Sustainable Development Goals to eradicate poverty and ensure a sustainable future for all. Global development projects targeting women seek to challenge existing discriminatory gender norms, power relationships and values. Based on the backlash hypothesis that suggests changes in existing power relations and gender roles can result in a violent backlash, I use quantitative analysis to identify whether there is a correlation between gender-focused aid and gender-based violence against women in Sub-Saharan African countries. The time-series analysis did not demonstrate a statistically significant positive or negative correlation between gender-focused aid and gender-based violence against women. The inconclusive results show that existing limited data and the lack of comprehensive indicators to measure the violence against women creates challenges in understanding the impact of development efforts on the well-being of women around the world.vvvvvvvvvvvvv