“It’s a 50/50 Thing You Know”: Exploring the Multileveled Intersections of Gender and Power Within the Relationships of Young South African Men and Women

ABSTRACT

Efforts to advance sexual health globally require greater understandings of youth intimate relationship dynamics. Among 38 South African youth (21 women/17 men aged 21–30 from Durban and Soweto) we conducted qualitative cognitive interviews to explore how gender and power intersect to shape intimate relationship dynamics (October 2019-March 2021). Participants discussed perceptions and relevance of each of 13 items comprising the Sexual Relationship Power (SRP) scale, a widely used measure of gender equity, and the influence of SRP on youth sexual health. Data analysis was guided by constructivist grounded theory. The findings were organized using the socio-ecological model, revealing how gender and power intersected at multiple levels to influence youth intimate relationships. Key influencing factors included individual-level gender attitudes, male partner expectations, and women’s resistance to dominance; intimate relationship-level power dynamics, consent, and intimacy; family-level household configurations and parental monitoring of daughters; and societal-level traditional gender norms. At all levels, women discussed resisting power inequities through communication and rejection of inequitable relationships. While men also displayed resistance to inequitable power structures, most upheld traditional gender norms through institutional affiliation (e.g. church) and deep-rooted socialized beliefs and attitudes. Efforts to improve youth sexual health require multileveled approaches that address inequitable power dynamics.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to express their gratitude to the young people who participated in this research and shared their stories with us. Also, thank you to the members of the Perinatal HIV Research Unit (PHRU) Adolescent Community Advisory Committee (ACAB), members of Simon Fraser University’s Global HIV Interdisciplinary Leadership Lab (GHIRL), and the WITSIE research group at the University of the Witwatersrand for providing feedback on the results of this study. Thank you to the staff at the Maternal Adolescent and Child Health Research Unit (MRU) in Durban and the PHRU in Soweto for supporting the data collection and logistics of this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/00224499.2022.2129561.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the International Development Research Centre, Ottawa, Canada Doctoral Research Award, and with support from the University of British Columbia Public Scholars Initiative. KC is supported by a CIHR Vanier Canadian Scholarship. The work reported herein for JJD was made possible through funding by the South African Medical Research Council through its Division of Research Capacity Development under the SAMRC Postdoctoral Programme from funding received from the South African National Treasury as well as the CIPHER GROWING THE LEADERS OF TOMORROW grant from the International AIDS Society. The authors received no funding to produce this manuscript as it is part of the first author’s dissertation research. The views expressed herein do not necessarily represent those of IDRC or its Board of Governors.