A reader based on the February, 1998 Inter-Regional Consultation in Kigali, Rwanda. This publication brings together case studies, testimonies and analytical studies drawn from countries in situations of conflict and reconstruction from across Africa, South and Central America, the Balkans, the Middle East and the Asia-Pacific Region.

Speaking at a high level conference with finance ministers in Brussels on Oct 17, UNIFEM's Executive Director, Noeleen Heyzer, called on all governments to review their national budgets by 2015 to see how the budgets impact women and girls differently from men and boys.

On Thursday October 11th Ms. Omaima Al Mardi, Director of the Gender Centre went to work as usual, to find out that the office has been occupied by security agents who ordered her to close the Centre and leave immediately.

The issue of male presence, in physical and ideological terms, within what should be women-only spaces is not just a matter of ideological contestation and concern within the Women’s Movement globally; it is also a serious expression of the backlash against women’s attempts to become autonomous of men in their personal/political relationships and interactions.

What seems to be evident from historical accounts on marriage and the human family is that these institutions evolved from various property relationships. The word "family," in fact, is derived from fammulus, which referred to the total number of slaves owned by a man. Today, even with women’s inevitable rise out of property/slave status, her transformation from property into person continues to challenge the foundations of intimate heterosexual relationships, especially within marriage.