Guidance

Shared Advisory Capability Statement on Safeguarding Against Sexual Exploitation Abuse and Sexual Harassment (SEAH) August 2022

Published 28 September 2022

Summary

The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) is committed to tackling sexual exploitation and abuse and sexual harassment (SEAH) in the aid sector as reflected in key policy documents, including the 2018 Safeguarding Summit commitments and UK Strategy: Safeguarding Against SEAH within the Aid Sector. All Official Development Assistance (ODA) must be delivered in a way that does no harm. Sexual exploitation and abuse and sexual harassment undermine the integrity of the aid sector and pose grave risks to some of the most vulnerable people in the world who we aim to help.

A key FCDO asset in delivering ODA is concentrated in its 13 professional advisory cadres^{[footnote 1]}, employed across FCDO and other ODA spending government departments, in country and at HQ levels. Advisers lead policy, programming and research, and manage stakeholder engagement through diplomacy and international partnerships. They work with institutions and individuals at national, international, regional and local levels.

Whilst Heads of Profession (HoPs) oversee the specific technical competencies for each cadre, all advisers are aid sector experts, able to identify, generate and utilise the best evidence, knowledge and ideas to improve the impact of UK Aid. Advisers have technical competencies specific to their own cadre areas. They also have capabilities in common that include (though not limited to):

• international development expertise to maximise the impact of UK investment and policy
• using evidence to inform policy and programming, translating evidence into action
• political economy and social analysis to understand the opportunities and challenges of delivering ODA priorities in the contexts they work in to maximise desired impact and avoid harm
• designing, appraising, managing, monitoring and evaluating policy, programmes and research
• influencing and stakeholder engagement skills that enable advisers to understand and strategise around diplomatic and political work and broker partnerships with governments, civil society, the private sector, multilaterals, research organisations and professional bodies in the UK and globally
• minimising the risk that policies, programmes and research that FCDO supports cause harm, including SEAH to vulnerable individuals and groups

This capability statement specifically addresses SEAH, setting out what advisers should know and be able to do to ensure that preventing and responding to SEAH is designed into policy and programming at the outset; and that the risk of SEAH in the aid sector is well managed. The Capability Statement has been developed through consultation with advisers, HoPs and the FCDO Safeguarding Unit.

Shared advisory capability framework on tackling SEAH

Background

The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) plays a key role on safeguarding against SEAH both in its own operations and influencing across the aid sector. To continue to drive up standards, FCDO personnel need to help implement the 4 strategic shifts reflected in the Donor Commitments from the 2018 Global Safeguarding Summit:

• ensure support for survivors, victims and whistle-blowers; enhance accountability and transparency; strengthen reporting; and tackle impunity
• incentivise cultural change through strong leadership, organisational accountability and better human resource processes
• adopt global standards and ensure they are met or exceeded
• strengthen organisational capacity and capability across the international aid sector to meet these standards

SEAH Capability Framework

This Shared Advisory Capability Statement (SACS) sets out the framework for meeting the shared advisory competencies to tackle SEAH in support of the UK Strategy: Safeguarding Against SEAH within the Aid Sector. The Strategy recognises the specific and elevated risk of SEAH through the delivery of aid, the need to support survivors and the need to protect the integrity of ODA. Many advisers also work on non-ODA programmes and the SACS is also applicable to that work.

SEAH safeguarding is integrated into advisers’ work through shared technical competencies, rather than a separate safeguarding cadre or assigning SEAH responsibility to any one cadre. The aim of the SACS is to improve the confidence and competency of all advisers to address SEAH. To that end, there is support available for advisers to upskill on the SEAH competencies described in this document.

Purpose

The SACS aims to support advisers’ competence and confidence in applying SEAH safeguarding principles and practice. It was developed in collaboration with advisers and Heads of Profession across 13 cadres and others in FCDO.

Capability Needs

Capability to understand and tackle SEAH was prioritised using 3 main considerations:

• groups at higher risk of SEAH (e.g. people discriminated against on the basis of disability, race, ethnicity, sex, sexuality, age (children, youth, elderly) and settlement status)
• contexts where SEAH risk is higher (particularly fragile and conflict affected states and disaster/emergency response zones where security and humanitarian presence is high)
• sectors that the aid sector works in where SEAH risks are thought to be highest (health, education, humanitarian, infrastructure, conflict, and livelihoods).

SEAH Competencies

Competency: Preventing and responding to SEAH
An adviser can identify and understand the international standards on tackling SEAH, in particular the IASC Minimum Operating Standards to Prevent Sexual Exploitation and Abuse, the IASC Six Principles relating to sexual exploitation and abuse, the Core Humanitarian Standard (especially the SEAH content, the DAC Recommendation on Ending Sexual Exploitation, Abuse and Harassment and the UK Strategy on tackling SEAH in the aid sector. An adviser can contextualise these standards within the ambit of international and human rights instruments that provide definitions and parameters of SEAH (e.g. CEDAW, CRC, the Lanzarote Convention and articulate international human rights principles (non-discrimination, universality and inalienability), meaning that violence and other discrimination based on sex or gender is prohibited, irrespective of the local, legal or cultural context.	Enables an adviser to: Understand what SEAH is, how it happens, and what social mores and behaviours enable SEAH to be perpetrated. Be informed about the minimum standards on SEAH expected by the FCDO. Analyse SEAH in the context of international legal instruments and utilise them in applying policy decisions and operational practice.
An adviser can undertake social and political economy analysis to understand how the local and national context may impact (positively / negatively) on SEAH risks, safety, prevention and response.	Enables an adviser to: Understand how formal and informal institutions are shaped by social exclusion, gender inequality and social norms to support or undermine efforts to prevent and respond to SEAH. Understand and map how power relations underpin the risk of SEAH, identifying entry points for awareness raising and advocacy. Understand national / state institutions and how the social and policy environment may impact their SEAH policies, processes, and risk management[footnote 2] . Identify the most vulnerable / disadvantaged and socially excluded groups in a given context and entry points for action to mitigate SEAH risks. Apply analysis to influence / inform planning, policy and programme design / decisions, including context specific survivor-centred response strategies. Apply evidence to monitoring and evaluation of policies and programmes, including how to integrate SEAH into results frameworks.
An adviser can assess and monitor SEAH risk in policy and programme development.	Enable an adviser to: Provide advice to prevent, manage and mitigate SEAH risks throughout the programme cycle. Advise on and / or lead beneficiary/stakeholder engagement in SEAH risk management. Support the Senior Responsible Owner / Programme Responsible Owner to assure accountability processes[footnote 3] in managing SEAH concerns are upheld.
An adviser can analyse sector specific SEAH risks in their technical area utilising conceptual frameworks for that sector and understand how those risks may intersect with other sectors in a multi-sectoral programme.	Enable an adviser to: Bring best practice on risk management of SEAH from a sectoral perspective. Identify sectoral evidence and use that to inform analysis and practice in policy and programme design and development. Understand and advise on specific institutional structures, how they operate and how to engage to prevent and manage SEAH, including how to manage survivor-centred responses within sectoral contexts. Engage with key sectoral and multi-sectoral stakeholders to influence policy and programme frameworks within sector-specific and multi-sectoral (programme) contexts.

It is important to recognise that the different cadres have their own specific comparative advantages and skills gaps to consider when addressing SEAH, e.g. social development strengths include gender equality and social analysis; humanitarian strengths include understanding of international / humanitarian laws and humanitarian protection systems; infrastructure advisers analyse the impact of infrastructure services on livelihood options; private sector advisers and economists have a specific focus on women’s economic empowerment in value chains. How SEAH risks arise and can be prevented and responded to, extend into each cadre’s specific technical competency framework.

1. Climate and environment, Conflict, Economics, Education, Evaluation, Governance, Health, Humanitarian, Infrastructure, Livelihoods, Private Sector Development, Social Development and Statistics ↩

2. These could include, for example, Ministries of Education and Health, Ministries for Youth, Employment and Gender or equivalents. ↩

3. For example, in situations where an allegation of SEAH is made, senior managers at the organisation where it occurred are held responsible for the response (to the allegation) and attention drawn to the zero-tolerance approach to inaction expected from FCDO. ↩