Reclaiming Our Lives: HIV and AIDS, Women’s Land and Property Rights and Livelihoods in Southern and Eastern Africa

Summary

This collection of narratives from Southern and East Africa aims to raise awareness not only about the heavy impact of HIV and AIDS on women’s property rights and livelihoods in the region but also about the active steps being taken by many grassroots organisations to respond to the crisis. Too often, the personal stoies of both hardship and resilience in the face of adversity are lost in the statistics and dry overviews of national policies and epidemiological trends.

The pandemic is biting deeply into the social fabric of many communities, but it is also galvanising ordinary women and men to respond with compassion and conviction and to organise support groups and innovative ways of defending and promoting the rights of HIV-affected women and children. From this perspective, HIV and AIDS can be seen as an opportunity to expose the immense human cost of discriminatory laws and practices, and point to the social, policy and legislative changes that are necessary if the pandemic is to be comabted effectively.