This document is a strategic toolkit designed to strengthen the capacity of practitioners interested to navigate Kenya’s rapidly shifting gender discourse and facilitate the design of effective counter-narratives that challenge existing dominant narratives which are harmful to marginalised groups.
This guide builds on RNW Media’s and Meza Yetu’s exploratory research on anti-gender narratives in Kenya, which analyses digital coordination patterns, rhetorical framings, emotional triggers, and amplification ecosystems across platforms such as Telegram, X, WhatsApp, TikTok, and Google Search. The findings confirm that anti-gender narratives operate as a form of power infrastructure: they are timed, strategically recalibrated, emotionally saturated, and shaped by both local actors and transnational ideological imports. To read the research report that led to this work, please visit https://www.rnw.media/index.php/resources/anti-gender-narratives-in-kenyas-digital-media-spaces/
The toolkit provides a structured design framework for crafting counter-narratives that are grounded in evidence, culturally fluent, and emotionally aware. Recognising the complexity of the digital landscape, it guides users in developing interventions that are ethically responsible, structurally anticipatory, and sensitive to platform dynamics, audience segmentation, and narrative fatigue. The design framework, template and included case studies presented have been designed to guide advocates to build long-term narrative infrastructure that protects the dignity of feminist and queer movements in Kenya.
*While developed for the Kenyan context, the principles within this toolkit can also be applied to other narrative shift work; however, context must be heavily applied to ensure they remain relevant and effective.