Yolanda Santana
AWID Forum: Co-creating Feminist Futures
In September 2016, the 13th AWID international Forum brought together in Brazil over 1800 feminists and women’s rights advocates in a spirit of resistance and resilience.
This section highlights the gains, learnings and resources that came out of our rich conversations. We invite you to explore, share and comment!
What has happened since 2016?
One of the key takeaways from the 2016 Forum was the need to broaden and deepen our cross-movement work to address rising fascisms, fundamentalisms, corporate greed and climate change.
With this in mind, we have been working with multiple allies to grow these seeds of resistance:
- Our Seed Initiatives, has helped 20 ideas that emerged at the Forum to grow into concrete actions
- The video “Defending people and planet” and guide “Weaving resistance through action” put courageous WHRDs in the spotlight and present concrete strategies they use to confront corporate power.
- With our animations about the State of Our Feminist Movements and Climate and Environmental Justice, movements now have creative tools to support their advocacy work.
- The compiling artistic expressions of our #MovementsMatter series continues to inspire stronger and more creative organizing around the world.
- Movements can also benefit from new methodologies on Visioning Feminist Futures (Coming up soon!)
And through our next strategic plan and Forum process, we are committed to keep developing ideas and deepen the learnings ignited at the 2016 Forum.
What happens now?
The world is a much different place than it was a year ago, and it will continue to change.
The next AWID Forum will take place in the Asia Pacific region (exact location and dates to be announced in 2018).
We look forward to you joining us!
The next AWID Forum will take place in the Asia Pacific region (exact location and dates to be announced in 2018).
We look forward to you joining us!
About the AWID Forum
AWID Forums started in 1983, in Washington DC. Since then, the event has grown to become many things to many peoples: an iterative process of sharpening our analyses, vision and actions; a watershed moment that reinvigorates participants’ feminisms and energizes their organizing; and a political home for women human rights defenders to find sanctuary and solidarity.
Related Content
Snippet - WCFM Preferred languages: - EN
Preferred languages:
Boil them down to communications language preferences
We Are the Ones We Have been Waiting For!
We’re beginning a new year--2023. COVID-19 continues to infect and re-infect many, many people around the world. We are witnessing the resurgence of right-wing and fascist governments, even in places we may not have expected like Sweden. War, armed conflict, and dramatic increase in militarization, militarism, and military spending are enabling the unbridled capital accumulation by the few, with participation of seemingly “strange” alliances locking arms, both visibly and invisibly, where economic and political elites of the Global North and Global South are benefitting beyond our wildest imagination. In the meanwhile, our people and the natural environment pay enormous costs and suffer all the expected and unexpected consequences.
As all of you and all of us at AWID know, feminists in multiple movements around the world are resisting and organizing against multiple faces of tyranny, creating alternative structures, implementing grassroots strategies, and building transnational alliances. We are generating joy, inspiring one another, singing, and dancing within and against the prevailing culture of killing and cynicism that seems to have engulfed so much of the world.
We--Staff and Board--of AWID are prepared and inspired more than ever before to face challenges by strengthening our relationships with our members and organizational partners, meeting and getting to know those who we are yet to meet and do what we do best: support the global feminist movements. Although we were sad facing the departures of our beloved former Co-Eds Cindy and Hakima, our wonderful new Co-EDS Faye and Inna along with committed and creative staff have embraced the moment that encapsulates both opportunities and threats.
For sure, all of us at AWID and all our movement folks know: As the Caribbean US poet and activist June Jordan wrote to the South African women activists during the height of the apartheid regime, “We are the ones we have been waiting for”!
Snippet Forum Quoate Nicky Mcintyre (FR)
Tous nos processus de changement reposent sur les relations que nous établissons dans des espaces comme les forums de l'AWID, où l'on danse ensemble, où l'on fait ressortir son humour, sa vraie personnalité, où l'on raconte des histoires. C'est ce qui fait la différence.
- Nicky Mcintyre, États-Unis
Film club - The Turtle's rage
The Turtle’s Rage (2012) German | Arabic with English subtitles
THE TURTLE'S RAGE tells the story of a mysterious man, whose life has been molded by flight, expulsion, life in exile and the failed return to Palestine. The film is composed of a daughter's search for answers from her father.
Live Conversation with Pary El-Qalqili, filmmaker of “The Turtle’s Rage”
Carmela Elisarraraz Mendez
Snippet WCFM Title Menu (EN)
Abby Lippman
Abby was a pioneering feminist, human-rights activist and former McGill University epidemiologist.
Abby was renowned for championing social causes and for her insightful critiques of reproductive technologies and other medical topics. Specifically, she campaigned against what she called the "geneticization" of reproductive technologies, against hormone replacement therapy and for better, longer research before the approval of discoveries such as the vaccines against the human papillomavirus.
On the news of her passing, friends and colleagues described her fondly as an “ardent advocate” for women’s health.
Who can fund my women’s rights organizing?
Our funder database is currently under revision. We know feminists still need and deserve more and better resources!
Please join our mailing list to stay informe about this update.
You can also become a member and find and create connections with feminists around the world.
Featured
Beyond Investing in Women and Girls
What measures to protect public health and contain risks of Covid19 outbreak will be in place?
We are monitoring this and other risks carefully, and will publish comprehensive health and safety information when the registration opens, so you could make an informed decision. In addition, the hybrid format is designed to provide a meaningful engagement experience to the participants who will prefer not to travel or are not able to travel.
Nos droits en danger - OURs 2021 résumé
Nos droits en danger : il est temps d’agir
Un réseau complexe et mouvant d’acteur·rice·s antidroits exerce aujourd’hui une influence croissante dans les espaces internationaux et nationaux, ainsi qu’au niveau des politiques locales. Les antidroits pénètrent les espaces multilatéraux de collaboration entre pays, dans le but de les transformer et les saboter de l’intérieur. C’est en s’appropriant le langage des droits et de la justice pour travestir leurs véritables intentions qu’ils et elles parviennent à acquérir une certaine légitimité.
Ce rapport est le deuxième d’une série sur les droits humains, produite par l’Observatoire sur l’universalité des droits (OUR). Outre une analyse des principales parties antidroits, de leurs discours, stratégies et impacts, ce rapport inclut des nouvelles féministes pleines d’inspiration et des exercices de renforcement des connaissances qui nous permettront d’assurer notre résistance collective.
Les conséquences sur nos droits sont déjà importantes, mais il est encore possible de réagir. Nous pouvons toutes et tous participer à la résistance face aux programmes antidroits et récupérer nos droits.
Rejoignez l’appel à l’action collective dès aujourd’hui!
Fannyann Viola Eddy
WITM - Refreshed INFOGRAPHIC 1 EN
Ever wondered what budgets for feminist organizations look like?
In 2023, feminist and women's rights organizations had a median annual budget of USD 22,000. Behind that median lies disparity and inequality: while a few groups access large-scale resources, the vast majority survive on shoestring budgets.
A closer look at actual budgets reveals major income diversity and inequality.
Marielle Franco
Marielle fue una política brasileña feminista lesbiana y activista por los derechos humanos.
Criticó abiertamente la brutalidad policial y las ejecuciones extrajudiciales. Su política declaradamente feminista, negra, centrada en las favelas, fue una fuente de esperanza para los grupos marginados de Río de Janeiro, gobernados actualmente por un gobierno municipal conservador y un intendente evangélico.
El 14 de marzo de 2018, después de dar un discurso en Río de Janeiro, Franco y su chofer fueron asesinados a balazos. A partir de la noticia de su muerte, multitudes se volcaron a las calles al grito de «¡Marielle presente!», en demanda de justicia.
En esta nota se puede leer más sobre Marielle y la situación en Brasil
Une stratégie, un marché et de nouvelles voix : les femmes autochtones et les forums de l'AWID
Le Forum a été un espace clé pour le Mouvement des femmes autochtones (Indigenous Women’s Movement, IWM) dans son rapport au féminisme. Aux Forums de l’AWID, elles ont appliqué la même stratégie que celle utilisée pour les Nations Unies. Au cours de ce processus, les deux mouvements ont été transformés : de nouvelles voix et questions ont émergé au sein de l’IWM, et les féministes ont commencé à changer leurs discours et leurs pratiques autour des droits fonciers et de la spiritualité, elles ont mieux compris les droits collectifs et ont inclus l’IWM dans leurs événements et leurs programmes. Mónica Alemán et María Manuela Sequeira, de l’IWM, nous ont raconté cette histoire.
Dans leur propre voix : regardez l'interview de María Manuela Sequeira & Mónica Alemán
Diferentes personas de mi organización planean asistir al Foro. ¿Hay algún descuento para grupos en el Foro?
AWID no ofrece descuentos para grupos, pero sí ofrece descuentos en la inscripción a sus afiliadxs. (Haz clic aquí para obtener más información sobre cómo sumarte a la membresía)
ours chapter 6
Chapter 6
Anti-Rights Trends in Regional Human Rights Systems
In the African Commission and the Inter-American System, anti-rights actors push essentialist notions of culture and gender to hamper progress on rights and undermine accountability. As we see, anti-rights actors are exerting influence in regional human rights systems, as well as international spaces.
Dolorosa Mubvumbi
Snippet - COP30 Intro - ES
Súmate al movimiento feminista abocado a recuperar la acción por el clima del control corporativo
Con 1773 cabilderos de los combustibles fósiles presentes en la COP29 del año pasado, nos dirigimos, junto con otres feministas a Belém (Brasil) del 10 al 21 de noviembre de 2025. Allí continuaremos denunciando las soluciones falsas, llamando la atención sobre la captura corporativa, y exigiendo que los Estados cumplan sus compromisos bajo las Responsabilidades Comunes pero Diferenciadas y las Capacidades Respectivas (en inglés) para impulsar las alternativas económicas feministas.
USD 2,7 billones para gasto militar. USD 300.000 millones para la justicia climática. Estamos aquí para dar vuelta el relato.
Razan Al-Najar
Razan était une infirmière palestinienne bénévole âgée de 21 ans.
Elle a été tuée par balle à l'est de la ville de Khan Younis, au sud de Gaza, alors qu'elle courait vers une clôture de la frontière fortifiée dans le but de porter secours à une victime.
Dans son tout dernier post sur Facebook, Razan avait déclaré : « J’y retourne et ne reculerai pas », ajoutant: « Frappez-moi de vos balles. Je n'ai pas peur ».
