Protection of the Family
The Issue
Over the past few years, a troubling new trend at the international human rights level is being observed, where discourses on ‘protecting the family’ are being employed to defend violations committed against family members, to bolster and justify impunity, and to restrict equal rights within and to family life.
The campaign to "Protect the Family" is driven by ultra-conservative efforts to impose "traditional" and patriarchal interpretations of the family, and to move rights out of the hands of family members and into the institution of ‘the family’.
“Protection of the Family” efforts stem from:
- rising traditionalism,
- rising cultural, social and religious conservatism and
- sentiment hostile to women’s human rights, sexual rights, child rights and the rights of persons with non-normative gender identities and sexual orientations.
Since 2014, a group of states have been operating as a bloc in human rights spaces under the name “Group of Friends of the Family”, and resolutions on “Protection of the Family” have been successfully passed every year since 2014.
This agenda has spread beyond the Human Rights Council. We have seen regressive language on “the family” being introduced at the Commission on the Status of Women, and attempts made to introduce it in negotiations on the Sustainable Development Goals.
Our Approach
AWID works with partners and allies to jointly resist “Protection of the Family” and other regressive agendas, and to uphold the universality of human rights.
In response to the increased influence of regressive actors in human rights spaces, AWID joined allies to form the Observatory on the Universality of Rights (OURs). OURs is a collaborative project that monitors, analyzes, and shares information on anti-rights initiatives like “Protection of the Family”.
Rights at Risk, the first OURs report, charts a map of the actors making up the global anti-rights lobby, identifies their key discourses and strategies, and the effect they are having on our human rights.
The report outlines “Protection of the Family” as an agenda that has fostered collaboration across a broad range of regressive actors at the UN. It describes it as: “a strategic framework that houses “multiple patriarchal and anti-rights positions, where the framework, in turn, aims to justify and institutionalize these positions.”

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Quel est l’objet de l’enquête WITM?
Le principal objectif de l’enquête WITM est de faire la lumière sur la situation financière de divers mouvements féministes, de défense des droits des femmes, pour la justice de genre, de défense des personnes LBTQI+ et des mouvements alliés dans le monde entier. Sur cette base, nous souhaitons démontrer l’importance d’orienter davantage de fonds, de meilleure qualité, et de transférer le pouvoir vers les mouvements féministes.
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Obiageli “Oby” Nwankwo
With a legal career spanning more than 30 years, Oby was known across Africa and around the world as a champion for gender justice and human rights.
She founded and served as Executive Director of the Civil Resource Development and Documentation Centre (CIRDDOC), a Nigerian NGO which sponsors trainings and network-building activities for members of civil society, parliamentarians and other key stakeholders to promote human rights, good governance and access to justice and rule of law.
Oby is remembered fondly by activists in Nigeria as an “extraordinary activist who displayed energy and passion towards the fight for gender equality and gender justice in Nigeria and across Africa.”
Snippet FEA Agroecology And Food (EN)
AGROECOLOGY AND FOOD SOVEREIGNTY AS RESISTANCE |
Today, large-scale industrial food production uses single-crop plantations, genetically modified organisms and other pesticides that destroy the land and knowledge of local communities. |
Agroecology is a resistance to corporate-driven agriculture. It prioritizes smaller scale agriculture, multiple crops and diversified food production, and the centering of local knowledge and practices. Agroecology goes hand-in-hand with demands for food sovereignty, or the “right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems”(Via Campesina, Declaration of Nyéléni).
The role of women, indigenous and rural communities and people of color from the Global South is absolutely essential when it comes to food systems. Feminist agroecologists are working to dismantle oppressive gender roles and systems of patriarchy embedded within food production. As shown by the heroines of NSS, they are generating a liberatory agroecology by strengthening community resilience, empowering women peasants and farmers, and preserving local traditions, territories, and knowledge of food-producing communities.
Zarema Sadulayeva
We re-grant money to grantee partners and identify as a feminist and/or women’s fund, should we take the survey?
No, we very much appreciate your work but are not asking for responses from women’s and feminist funds at this time. We do encourage you to share the survey with your grantee partners and feminist networks.
Defending LGBTQI Rights
Student, Writer, Leader, Advocate. Each of the four women honored below had their own way of activism but what they had in common is that they all promoted and defended Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Queer and Intersex rights. Join us in remembering and honoring these Women Human Rights Defenders, their work and legacy by sharing the memes below and tweeting by using the hashtags #WHRDTribute and #16Days.
Please click on each image below to see a larger version and download as a file




Laura Lee
Laura fue una abogada y líder activista que luchó valientemente por la descriminalización del trabajo sexual en Irlanda.
Es recordada como «una combatiente por la libertad de lxs trabajadorxs sexuales, una feminista, una madre para su hija y una amiga necesaria para mucha gente».
Laura promovió el reconocimiento de las personas de la industria del sexo como trabajadorxs merecedorxs de derechos. Presentó demandas por la descriminalización, e inició una revisión judicial en la Corte Suprema de Belfast respecto de las provisiones que criminalizan la compra de servicios sexuales. Declaró que su intención era llevar el caso a la Corte Europea de Derechos Humanos.
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Ana Fabricia Cordóba Cabrera
¿Puedo acceder a la encuesta y responderla desde el teléfono?
Sí, es posible acceder a la encuesta mediante un teléfono inteligente.
Los derechos de las personas trans* requieren una mayor protección
Estas mujeres trans* fueron asesinadas por su activismo y por su identidad de género. Son escasas las leyes que reconocen los derechos de las personas trans* e, incluso donde están vigentes, es muy poco lo que se ha hecho para salvaguardar sus derechos. Únete a AWID para honrar a estas defensoras de derechos humanos, su trabajo y su legado, compartiendo los memes aquí incluidos con tus colegas, amistades y redes; y tuiteando las etiquetas #WHRDTribute y #16Días.
Por favor, haz click en cada imagen de abajo para ver una versión más grande y para descargar como un archivo.




Deborah Holmes
Jusqu’à son décès, à la suite d’une lutte brève mais agressive contre le cancer, Deborah était la directrice de la communication et de la mobilisation au Women’s funding network (le réseau de financement des femmes), WFN.
Entre 2008 et 2017, elle avait également travaillé auprès du Fonds mondial pour les femmes. Deborah était extrêmement appréciée et respectée par le conseil d'administration, l’équipe et les partenaires du Fonds mondial pour les femmes.
Kavita Ramdas, ex-PDG a déclaré, à juste titre, que Deborah était « la combinaison unique d’un être mêlant chaleur, générosité, intelligence et style, avec un engagement passionné pour faire fusionner la beauté et la justice. Elle avait compris le pouvoir des histoires. Le pouvoir de la voix des femmes. Le pouvoir de l'expérience vécue. Le pouvoir de renaître de ses cendres et de dire aux autres que c'était possible. Et nous continuons à nous relever. »
Musimbi Kanyoro, l'actuelle PDG du Fonds mondial pour les femmes, a ajouté: « Nous avons perdu une sœur et sa vie illumine des valeurs qui nous unissent et nous inspirent tou-te-s. Alors que nous sommes tou-te-s réuni-e-s pour pleurer le décès de Deborah, souvenons-nous et célébrons sa vie remarquable, audacieuse et passionnée. »