Consultant to conduct impact assessment of behaviourally-informed social media campaign to change behaviours of employers of domestic workers in the Gulf Cooperation Council

1. Background and Rationale

Across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), there are estimated to be 5.8 million domestic workers, of whom, 36 per cent are women (ILO. 2021. Making Decent Work a Reality for Domestic Workers).

Since 2011, when the International Labour Conference adopted the Domestic Workers Convention, 2011 (No. 189), although no GCC country or Arab State has ratified it, thanks to the extension of laws and policies to cover domestic workers in the Arab States region, there has been important progress in closing legal gaps, particularly with respect to a right to a weekly rest day. However, migrant domestic workers face substantial challenges in terms of legal coverage and actual protection of their labour rights. Most remain excluded from minimum wage laws and regulations on working time require longer hours of work in comparison to other workers. Across the Arab States, 99.7 per cent of domestic workers are excluded from social protection – the highest proportion of any region globally. Women migrant workers are especially likely to have low wages and long working hours. Because of the privacy concerns around labour inspectors entering private households, reporting and addressing cases of a violence and harassment, lack of occupational, safety and health, and lack of decent accommodation can be challenging. More attention is needed to create adequate regulatory mechanisms, awareness-raising and capacity-building of domestic workers and employers, improving domestic workers’ access to justice, and strengthening the capacity of labour inspectors. Workers’ and employers’ organizations also have a vital role to play in the advancement of decent work for domestic workers.

While it is vital that domestic workers be protected through institutional policies and adequate regulations, it is just as important for these policies to be put into practice by the private households that employ domestic workers. This is often the determining factor in improving the working and living conditions of domestic workers. A central challenge is that people who employ domestic workers are unlike employers in the traditional sense – they are individual households and families who do not typically view themselves as employers or recognize their home as a workplace. They may not consider typical issues of overtime wages, occupational safety and health, or freedom of association or even be aware of the obligations they have under the respective laws. Organizations that represent their interests – or are tasked with educating them regarding their rights and responsibilities – are rare.

The FAIRWAY Programme is an inter-regional initiative which addresses underlying causes of decent work deficits for migrant workers, particularly African migrant workers, in the Arab States. With a focus on key sectors where vulnerable migrant workers are engaged—including domestic work and the construction sector—FAIRWAY seeks to address the interlinked structural, behavioural, and practical barriers to improved labour migration. In particular, the FAIRWAY Programme aims to tackle discriminatory public attitudes towards women and men migrant workers.

ILO and other research with employers of domestic workers in Lebanon, Jordan and Kuwait between 2015-2016 found that in general employers exhibit a low level of knowledge about their rights and responsibilities under the respective laws. Furthermore, they do not actively seek information but instead rely heavily on second-hand information and substitute decision making by recruitment agencies, or their perception of social norms.

Employer engagement strategy – progress to date

The FAIRWAY Programme has carried out a number of initiatives to engage with employers of domestic workers in the Arab States. These included:

• Face-to-face participatory trainings to employers of domestic workers in Lebanon to outreach to employers via companies, universities and embassies (February to November 2017). A similar initiative was also undertaken on a smaller scale in Kuwait
• In November 2019, FAIRWAY ran a regional design-thinking workshop in which participants, ILO partners and collaborators, identified approaches and prototype interventions to reach and influence the behaviour of employers of domestic workers.

Based on these experiences, FAIRWAY developed a draft training toolkit targeted to domestic workers’ organizations, trade unions, civil society organizations, embassies, government authorities and other organizations that engage with employers of domestic workers with them aim of improving the working and living conditions of domestic workers. Unfortunately, COVID-19 disrupted plans to pilot the toolkit through face-to-face training sessions.

A focus on how to encourage behavioural change through digital technology led to the development of a small pilot using videos on Facebook, but the initiative did not have wide penetration (perhaps because it was run during a period when Kuwait was in lockdown, and many would have been distracted by this news).

In Kuwait, FAIRWAY has been collaborating with a civil society organization since 2021 to create an intersectional community space through which to sensitively tackle discriminatory attitudes amongst Kuwaiti citizens towards migrant workers (or particular categories of migrant workers). The goal is not to provoke confrontation, but rather to start a dialogue around labour rights as part of broader discussions about the shared goals of equity and inclusion, safety and community well-being.

2. Objectives of social media campaign

As part of its strategy to engage employers of migrant domestic workers, FAIRWAY will design and implement a behaviourally-informed social media campaign in the GCC, with a focus on Kuwait. The campaign will be based on unpublished research already conducted on attitudes and behaviours of Kuwaitis towards migrant domestic workers including (to be shared with the chosen consultant).

Kuwait context of domestic work

Kuwait has an estimated population of around 4.1 million, of which 69 per cent are foreign nationals. Prior to COVID-19, there were around 732,000 domestic workers comprising a quarter of the total workforce in the country (December 2000, Public Authority of Civil Information). Although approximately 41,000 domestic workers left Kuwait during COVID, Kuwait remains one of the countries in the region with the highest number of domestic workers as a proportion of the labour force (second only to Saudi Arabia).

Under Law 68 of 2015 on Domestic Workers, domestic workers were granted labour protections relating to a weekly day off, maximum normal working hours and annual leave. Although the law contains many important protections, some significant gaps nevertheless remain, principally in relation to provisions on the conditions of employment of domestic workers, as well as in its termination of contract and labour inspection provisions. However, an equally pressing concern is that many employers of domestic workers are unaware of the law’s provisions or choose not to abide by them because of a lack of monitoring and enforcement.

Target audience: The campaign will be targeted to Kuwaiti employers of domestic workers, but also more broadly to other Kuwaiti members of the public and GCC-wide. Three sub-groups are distinguished:

1. Supporters of the better treatment of domestic workers because they are aware of the issues and have the resources (time and money) to be more engaged.

 2. Neutral mind-set group: people who are either unaware of the issue and how it affects them and domestic workers or not having a firm opinion on it yet.

 3. Detractor mind-set group: people who are aware that there are issues with helper employment and recruitment practices but perceive anything that is in the interest of helpers to be to their detriment. They expect hiring of MDWs to be a zero-sum game.

The communication challenge is how to turn as many neutral people into supporters as possible, without turning them into detractors by presenting seemingly judgmental or simplistic messages that focus on supporting domestic workers only.

Target impacts: The campaign aims to change behaviours rather than attitudes and thus a number of target (but realistic) behaviours will be selected, perhaps relating to the priority areas of allowing/facilitating a weekly day off outside the home (Article 9 of Convention 189); making regular and accurate wage payment (Article 12) and complying with rules on normal working hours (Article 10).

Campaign methods: The campaign methods including type of content and social media platforms will be developed based on a contextual understanding of the preferences of Kuwaiti (and more broadly) GCC employers. Thus, it may include:

• Short videos with social media influencers and employers of domestic workers
• Personal stories of employers (including, for example, the support that workers provide to their elderly parents or children)
• Entertaining and informative ‘bite-sized’ videos and infographics (Instagram, TikTok, etc)

The campaign will take place around May 2023 for a period of 4-6 weeks, but all the content will be stored in a website that will be set up and maintained for 3 years (with campaign name, and only ‘lightly branded’ as ILO to put focus instead on the messaging). It will be a vehicle to store the campaign content, but also a place to present useful information for employers such as checklists or information about their legal responsibilities (based on materials such as Country briefs of the regulatory frameworks governing migrant workers in the Arab States (ilo.org)).

The campaign will aim to reach at least 1 million impressions and 2,000 points of engagement (likes, shares, tweets, views) by the end of the campaign (end of June 2023).

Impact evaluation

In order to evaluate the behavioural impact of the campaign, in addition to tracking social media analytics (number of views, shares, likes, etc), FAIRWAY will also commission the design and development of an impact assessment to assess the impact of the campaign on the identified behaviours, including from the perspective of intention and actual change. Given the challenge of measuring actual behavioural, FAIRWAY intends to measure impact of the campaign in two ways:

1. users’ initial takeaways and intentions (After participants have viewed campaign, they will be invited to take part in an ‘exit survey’ about their intentionality relevant to the behavioural indicators for the campaign); and
2. behavioural change 3 months after campaign (measure the effect of the treatment actual behaviour).

3. Activities and methodology

The selected consultant will be required to design and implement the behavioural impact report, including survey instruments, data analysis, survey collection with a control group and develop the final impact assessment report.

The consultant will be required to undertake the following

• Development of impact assessment strategy: Based on instructions from FAIRWAY, a literature review and strong understanding of behavioural insights in the context of campaign for employers of domestic workers, the consultant will develop a short report setting out the key behaviours to be measured and the methodology of the assessment strategy, including sample size, control group, etc.
• Design survey instruments for control and treatment group: design of exit and follow up surveys, as well as providing insights on metrics to assess in the context of social media analytics on the campaign [it is yet to be decided how the control group will be surveyed, but for the treatment group, it will involve surveys with those who viewed the campaign content who are prompted after watching to complete a survey].
• Data analysis and interpretation
• Draft and final reports and presentation of the outcomes of the impact assessment: the final impact assessment will describe the rationale for applying a behavioural approach in the ILO’s activities, the methodology used in the intervention, the analytical process and its results, and the recommendations in terms of informing future communication products in support of the ILO’s employment engagement efforts, both in GCC and elsewhere.

The activities and deliverables are set out in the table mentioned in the attached ToR.

Responsibilities of ILO

• Convene the kick-off meeting and ensure clarity of roles
• Provide materials for desk research and respond to questions
• Provision of timely feedback.

4.  Required competencies and Experience

The ILO is seeking for a qualified consultant with the following required and desirable qualifications:

Required qualifications

The consultant should possess the following requirements:

• Experience in developing and conducting behavioural science interventions.
• Experience in applying behavioural research towards the development of communications products.
• Record of peer-reviewed publications.
• Excellent analytical and written communication skills (English).
• Demonstrated gender sensitivity in research and communications products.

Desirable:

• Record of past collaboration with ILO or UN agencies.
• Demonstrated understanding of the unique context of culture in GCC.
• Strong understanding of the issues faced by domestic workers in the region

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