Resourcing Feminist Movements

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Around the world, feminist, women’s rights, and allied movements are confronting power and reimagining a politics of liberation. The contributions that fuel this work come in many forms, from financial and political resources to daily acts of resistance and survival.
AWID’s Resourcing Feminist Movements (RFM) Initiative shines a light on the current funding ecosystem, which range from self-generated models of resourcing to more formal funding streams.
Through our research and analysis, we examine how funding practices can better serve our movements. We critically explore the contradictions in “funding” social transformation, especially in the face of increasing political repression, anti-rights agendas, and rising corporate power. Above all, we build collective strategies that support thriving, robust, and resilient movements.
Our Actions
Recognizing the richness of our movements and responding to the current moment, we:
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Create and amplify alternatives: We amplify funding practices that center activists’ own priorities and engage a diverse range of funders and activists in crafting new, dynamic models for resourcing feminist movements, particularly in the context of closing civil society space.
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Build knowledge: We explore, exchange, and strengthen knowledge about how movements are attracting, organizing, and using the resources they need to accomplish meaningful change.
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Advocate: We work in partnerships, such as the Count Me In! Consortium, to influence funding agendas and open space for feminist movements to be in direct dialogue to shift power and money.
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الصياغات النسوية للرسائل النصّية ذات المحتوى الجنسي: الدُّعابة الجنسانيّة في فضاء الثورة النسوية الرقمية
في الثاني من أيلول/ سبتمير 2021، التمّ شمل مجموعة رائعة من الناشطات النسويات والمناديات بالعدالة الاجتماعية ضمن فعاليات مهرجان (AWID Crear | Résister | Transform). لم يقتصر هدف اجتماعهنّ على مشاركة استراتيجيات المقاومة وعمليات الابتكار الخلّاقة المشتركة التي ترمي إلى تغيير العالم. لقد اجتمعت الناشطات ليتبادلن الغزَل الإباحي على «تويتر». قادت نانا سيكياما النشاط.
نانا من مؤسسي «مغامرات من مضاجع النساء الإفريقيات» وهي كاتبة «حيوات النساء الافريقيات الجنسيّة». لقد جمعت عملها مع عمل المنبر النسائيّ الكويري المنادي بالوحدة الإفريقية (AfroFemHub) للبحث في جواب السؤال التالي: ما هي الصياغات النسوية للرسائل النصّية ذات المحتوى الجنسي؟
أعتقد أن هذا سؤال مهمّ للغاية، لأنه يبحث في القضية الأكبر المتعلّقة بالمقاربة النسوية لكيفية تنقّل المرء في عالم الإنترنت. في ظل الرأسمالية، يمكن للخطاب المُنتَج حول الجسد والجنس، أن يكون مجرّدًا من الإنسانية ومُشوّهًا. كما أن مساحات المتعة الجنسية في الفضاء الافتراضي لها طابع آدائي مبتذل. لذا، فإن البحث عن طرق تُمكّننا من استكشاف رغباتنا باستحسان، يمكن أن تولّد مقاومة للسائد من نماذج العرض والاستهلاك. تباعًا، تُستعاد هذه المساحات كمواقع للتشابك الحَقّ، ويتبيّن أنّ الرسائل النصّية ذات المحتوى الجنسي لا بد وأن تكون نسويّة.
بالإضافة إلى ذلك، فإن السماح للخطاب النسوي بتجسيد وجهه المرِح في فضاء الإنترنت، يساعد على مقارعة السردية الذائعة ومفادها أن التشابك في الفلك النسوي غير مرح وقاسٍ في طابعه العام. ولكن كما نعلم، فإن المتعة والمرح هي من صلب سياستنا وجزء متأصّل مما يعنيه أن يكون المرء نسويًا.
باستخدام وسم #SextLikeAFeminist، تقدَّم الناشطون والأكاديميون من حول العالم بـ»تويتات» تحمل نهمًا نسويًا كبيرًا. أورد لكم في هذا النص التويتات العشرة المفضّلة لدي.
يتبيّن من هذه التويتات الفكاهة المقرونة بالإثارة والاهتياج الجنسيّ، التي تتّسم بها المقاربة النسوية لكتابة الرسائل ذات المضامين الجنسية، دون أن تُسقط عن نفسها الالتزام بالمساواة والعدالة.
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She is on her way:
Alternatives, feminisms and another world
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2019: Feminist Realities in a changing world
AWID began preparing this annual report just as the global pandemic began to unravel how we gather, organize and live our lives. It is impossible to review what we have done without COVID-19 tinting our assessment.
Download the full 2019 Annual review

Co-Creating Feminist Realities is no longer just an AWID Forum theme - it is a rallying cry in response to a pandemic that has laid bare the failures of social, political and economic systems.
It is an urgently needed affirmation that there are other, more just ways of organizing our lives. During 2019 hundreds of groups shared their experiences and proposals for feminist realities with us, ranging from radical networks of community support in Latin America facilitating self-managed abortion, to practices of community-centered economies in Indonesia and community-centered food systems in India and the US, to a re-imagination and new practice of harm-free rites of passage in Sierra Leone. These are the experiences that will chart a path forward for a “new normal”.
Yet long histories of oppression and violence can make it difficult to imagine the possible. A key part of our work in 2019 was to spark these explorations through a toolkit AWID launched to support groups interested in unearthing the stories and aspirations that are the building blocks of feminist propositions.
While we focus on our proposals for a different world, we recognize the challenging context around us.
Through the Observatory on the Universality of Rights, Feminists for a Binding Treaty, Count Me In! and other alliances, AWID has continued to push back against unfettered corporate power and fascist and fundamentalist agendas that undermine women’s rights and gender justice. With dim prospects for transformative change through multilateral processes and limited responsiveness from most states, we are redoubling our efforts to ensure that feminist movements, in all their diversity, are resourced in ways that match the critical roles they play - supporting their communities, demanding rights and responding to crises. In 2019 we introduced feminist principles and approaches to ground-breaking funds like the Spotlight Initiative and the Equality Fund, and succeeded in leveraging resources through feminist reality seed grant funding from feminist funders.
As we look ahead, it is clear that the context is calling for a transformation of our organizing strategies:
- we are learning to navigate global advocacy confined to online channels,
- we grapple with the uncertainty of when and how we can convene in person, and
- we use the tools at our disposal to tighten connections across local to global spheres.
AWID is embarking on a new membership model that lowers barriers to access and emphasizes opportunities for engagement and cross-member connection. We will continue to experiment with different online tools and processes for building community. Cross-movement engagement will stay at the center of our work. AWID’s actions in solidarity with oppressed movements and identities, even and especially where these are marginalized in feminist movements, are important to drive change and support broad and inclusive movements for all.
Crisis is not new to feminist and social movements.
We are resilient, we adapt, and we show up for each other. And we have to keep doing better. Thank you to all who are part of the journey with us.
Download the full 2019 Annual review
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Priscilla Hon
Priscilla has nearly two decades of experience working in the non-profit sector with social justice organizations that worked on women and youth rights, conservation, peacebuilding and development. Her interests are in setting up progressive processes and systems that will help an organization live to their values and principles and thrive, and finding ways to support organizations and fundraisers to locate and secure the resourcing they need to do good work. . Priscilla joined AWID in 2018 as Resource Mobilization Manager and in July 2023, took on the role of Director of Operations and Funding Partnerships.
Priscilla holds an MSc in International Politics from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), a growing pile of books she is still trying to find time to read, and sits on the Board of Hodan Somali Community, a London-based charity.
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Maria Olivo
Maria is a graphic designer and visual communicator. Maria has worked with NGOs and Human Rights like Profamilia and OXFAM. As a woman of the Global South, she feels especially called to use her skills to work with organizations that help protect the wellbeing, as well the rights of millions of girls and women in Latin America.
Fidan Dogan
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