Brigitte Bagnol & Ernesto Chamo

The reasons for adult men and young women to get involved in an intergenerational sexual relationship in exchange for compensation include both cultural and economic aspects. Poverty is often considered the main driving force for adolescent girls to engage in sexual relations with adult men. The introduction of consumer society through television, videos and magazines has increased young women's needs and aspirations, without educating them on how to define their priorities and find ways to satisfy these new desires independently from men and their sexuality.

Thus, many girls choose older men, not because they are attracted to them out of love or affection, but rather out of simple economic interest: older men have a profession and greater economic stability. As one young woman puts it: "It is better to be with a man who is loaded and you don't like, than to stay with a young guy you do like, but gives you nothing – even if there is no sexual pleasure in it". Although many interviewees of both sexes and different age groups say that the money obtained helps the schoolgirls to pay for their education (fees, notebooks and uniforms), part of the money is used for ‘luxuries', especially clothes.

Other reasons for girls to get sexually involved with older men include going out at night to bars and dance spots; riding around in cars; being able to eat on the street without having to go back home; and having money for presents to give boyfriends their own age whom they love. The young women acquire a special status by living in a different world from the majority of their girlfriends. Some ignore their parents' advice and at times come to live completely outside the control of their family.

Furthermore, girls may get led by partners their own age, by brothers or other family members, to get involved in sexual activity with older men in exchange for money. In these cases, those who promote this activity benefit directly. Exchanging sex for money is not new or specific to adult men and adolescent females: adult women also said that when they need money, they get involved sexually with men or depend on their stable partners for their sustenance.

What is driving adult men?

Identifying young women's poverty as the main factor for intergenerational sex leaves aside adult men's motives. Study results indicate that ‘more sexual satisfaction' is one reason for adult men to get involved with younger partners, as highlighted by common expressions such as ‘An old donkey eats young grass'; or: ‘A young woman who hasn't been used much, gets men more excited'.

Men's ‘lack of responsibility' is also seen as a determinant: If men got involved with older women or women with children, they would have to bear greater expenses – or as some women said: "They only want to get their kicks and leave the woman pregnant"; "They just want to leave things in a mess, there's no other reason"; and "They don't want to reflect on the fact that these are someone's daughters and that they ought to be studying".

Linked to this sexual culture is the fact that men have greater access to paid work and material wealth. Thus, they control the money and the resultant power without in return being obliged to provide support payments for their children, which favours irresponsible sexual behaviours. Interviewees of all sexes consider that for the men, the involvement with girls is a ‘demonstration of economic power': a man who can get young women is considered a rich man. A man's social status depends on the woman he goes around with, or as an adult woman in Quelimane explained: "When there's a social occasion, you're not going to take your wife, who has lost her figure and has to look after the babies. You'll take the teenager who is attractive-looking". Furthermore, adult men tend to prefer sexual relations with young females because it is more socially accepted than involvement with sex workers.

Challenging traditional masculinity

The existing gender inequity and associated vulnerability of both adolescent and adult women raises a number of issues:

• How to develop strategies to protect young women from the multiple risks?
• How to change adult men's self-identity and their perception that they are victims of girls "who are provocative toward them?"
• How to change the situation in which women are forced to put up with an abusive relationship, and cannot stand up against their husbands' irresponsible behaviour out of fear of being left alone with the responsibility for the children, without a home or financial resources?
• How to help young women to protect themselves from adult men, to believe that they can build their own future, independent from sexual relations with men – in a situation of generalised poverty, when their mothers have no alternatives; when they see their fathers, uncles, teachers and men in positions of leadership involved with their female schoolmates; and when society slams the door on their dreams?

In Mozambique, there is growing recognition that programmes aiming to improve men's and women's sexual and reproductive health have had little impact, essentially because they have failed to properly involve men, i.e., transforming their attitudes and behaviour in relation to their sexuality. In the past, gender analyses of sexual and reproductive health problems, including HIV/AIDS, highlighted the importance of women as the main protagonists of transforming their own subaltern status. Hence, most interventions – however inadequate and with limited results – have focused on educating and empowering women to negotiate their sexual and reproductive lives.

However, few interventions have addressed the existing notions of masculinity, despite the acknowledgement that it is men who have greater decision-making power in relation to family-planning matters or negotiation of condom use. Therefore, future efforts should have a stronger gender-based perspective on sexual and reproductive health, and focus more on changing the existing models of masculinity that place both men and their female partners at risk of contracting HIV/STIs. Nevertheless, a certain resistance still exists to dividing up the scarce resources aimed at informing and empowering women, for working with both men and women. The key issue is how to involve men, both as individuals and as a group, in strengthening gender equality and empowerment of women, with greater sensitivity and with a different notion of their masculinity.