Field of work
Gender specific educational work
In this area of work Dissens focuses on boys in open work, supervised forms of living and social groupwork. Dissens also carries out political adult and youth work and provides training and consulting to social institutions and projects.
Dissens is involved in a program called Lernende Regionen (Learning Regions), set up by the German government department for education and research (BMBF) and the ESF:
- Educational Network Berlin (Bildungsnetz-Berlin) for gender equality in education and employment:
- Supporting boys in care and education.
- Improving the chances of boys and girls in education.
In cooperation with the youth welfare department and various independent organisations, Dissens has taken responsibility for providing a sports and leisure program at a neighbourhood sports field in Marzahn, Berlin. This project, called "Unser Platz" (Our Site), will offer sports and leisure activities for children, young people and adults. This project is supported financially by Aktion Mensch, Fortuna Wohnungsunternehmen e.G., FELIX Wohnungsgenossenschaft e.G., MädchenStärken - a Nike project, and Deutsche Kinder- und Jugendstiftung, Kurt-Richter-Stiftung and C&A.
Gender research
From 2001 to 2003 Dissens was involved in the EU research project (5.FP) "Work Changes Gender" as a coordinator. The three year project was concerned, in a european comparison, with the actual changes in working conditions for men, its correlation to changes in how men see themselves, and the possibilities for increasing gender equality.
The research results were published in:
Ralf Puchert, Marc Gärtner Stephan Höyng (eds.): Work Changes Gender: Men and Equality in the Transition of Labour Forms, Publisher: Barbara Budrich. Leverkusen-Opladen, 2005.
Violence against men
In September 2003, in co-operation with two partners, Dissens began work on a national research project about violence against men, a pilot project which aimed to provide a broad study on a national level. This project was funded by the German Federal Ministry for Family, Elders, Women and Youth.
This project was concerned with a rarely studied issue and delivered fresh insights and approaches. Statistics about men's experience of violence in domestic and external settings were collated for the first time. Due to the small size of the sample surveys it is impossible to draw generalized conclusions, but the study provided first insights into the extent to which men are effected by violence.
Human rights violations
The EU project Co-ordination Action on Human Rights Violations (CAHRV) was launched in 2004.
CAHRV is the result of a cooperation between research institution, political networks and individual researchers. It deals with human rights violations in the context of inter-personal relationships. The main aims of this project are:
- to promote an exchange between and integration of parallel research strands,
- to foster new interdisciplinary and transnational research projects,
- to support implementation in politics and science through dissemination of research results.
Gender Mainstreaming
In cooperation with genderWerk, Dissens offers gender mainstreaming, gender training and consulting in a variety of areas.
Team members of Dissens work closely with gender experts from different fields, such as town planning, environment and ecology, conflict management and mediation, business consulting, body work , youth and adult education. The specific expertise of Dissens members, together with outside expert knowhow form a rich base for the services offered by Dissens in the field of Gender Mainstreaming:
- Gender Training
- Introduction, implementation and evaluation of Gender Mainstreaming
- Gender consulting
- Support during the process and moderation
- Conflict resolution and mediation
- Integrated body work
An article on this subject from our point of view can be found in German in:
Stephan Höyng, Klaus Schwerma: Gender Mainstreaming - Möglichkeiten und Grenzen aus der Perspektive von Männern , In: Barbara Nohr, Silke Veth: Gender Mainstreaming. Kritische Reflexion einer neuen Strategie. Berlin, 2002.
Gender work
In cooperation with genderWerk, Dissens offers gender mainstreaming, gender trainings and consulting in a variety of areas.