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:

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!

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.

Learn more about previous Forums

Related Content

Défendre les droits des personnes LGBT*QI

Une étudiante, une scénariste, une leader, une avocate. Les quatre femmes auxquelles nous rendons hommage ci-dessous avait toutes leur propre façon de vivre leur activisme, mais elles avaient en commun la promotion et la défense des droits des personnes lesbiennes, gaies, bisexuelles, trans*, queer et intersexes. Nous vous invitons à vous joindre à nous pour commémorer ces défenseuses, leur travail et l'héritage qu’elles nous ont laissé. Faites circuler ces mèmes auprès de vos collègues et amis ainsi que dans vos réseaux et twittez en utilisant les hashtags #WHRDTribute et #16Jours.


S'il vous plaît cliquez sur chaque image ci-dessous pour voir une version plus grande et pour télécharger comme un fichier 

 

Snippet FEA Mariama Sonko (ES)

Tenemos el placer de presentarte a Mariama Sonko, inspiradora ecofeminista, campesina y defensora de los derechos humanos y de las mujeres, que vive actualmente en Niaguis, en el suroeste de Senegal.

Al crecer en una familia y comunidad campesina rural, fue testigo del papel esencial de la mujer en la producción de alimentos y el almacenamiento de semillas desde la infancia, mientras estaba inmersa en el trabajo y ritmos de la tierra.

Mariama ha defendido el conocimiento agrícola local y las prácticas campesinas desde los años 1990. Como madre de 5 hijos, los alimentos que ella misma cultiva son la principal fuente de sustento de su familia.

Actualmente es presidenta de Nous Sommes la Solution y está comprometida con la promoción de las prácticas agroecológicas y la agricultura familiar, con el fomento de la soberanía alimentaria, la biodiversidad y la preservación de las semillas campesinas, y con la exigencia del acceso equitativo a los recursos y a la tierra en África Occidenta para las mujeres.

Fuente: AWID’s Feminist Realities Festival Crear | Résister | Transform - 2º día

Obiageli “Oby” Nwankwo

Avec une carrière juridique de plus de 30 ans à son actif, Oby était connue en Afrique et dans le monde comme une ardente défenseure de la justice de genre et des droits humains.

Elle a fondé le Centre de documentation et de développement des ressources civiles (CIRDDOC), une ONG nigériane qui sponsorise des formations et des activités de mise en réseau qui promeuvent les droits humains, la bonne gouvernance, l’accès à la justice et l’État de droit pour les membres de la société civile, les parlementaires, ainsi que d’autres parties prenantes concernées.

Au Nigeria, les activistes se souviennent d’Oby avec émotion, la qualifiant « d’activiste extraordinaire qui a fait preuve d’énergie et de passion pour lutter pour l’égalité de genre et la justice de genre au Nigéria et en Afrique »

 


 

Obiageli “Oby” Nwankwo, Nigeria

¿Dónde y cuándo tendrá lugar el próximo Foro de AWID?

El 14o Foro internacional de AWID tendrá lugar del 20 al 23 de septiembre de 2021 en Taipéi, Taiwán.

Descubre más

¿Por qué debería considerar responder la encuesta?

Existen numerosas razones acerca de por qué tu respuesta a la encuesta ¿Dónde está el dinero? es importante. Entre otras cosas, tienes la oportunidad de compartir tu experiencia con la movilización de financiamiento para apoyar a tu organización, afirmar tu poder como especialista en cómo se mueve el dinero y a quién le llega, y contribuir a la promoción colectiva y continua ante los donantes para movilizar más y mejor financiamiento. Durante los últimos dos decenios, la investigación de AWID ¿Dónde está el dinero? ha demostrado ser un recurso clave para activistas y donantes. Con muchísimo entusiasmo, te invitamos a sumarte a AWID en su tercera edición para poner de relieve el estado real de la dotación de recursos, impugnar las falsas soluciones y señalar cómo el financiamiento necesita cambiar para que los movimientos prosperen y hagan frente a los complejos desafíos de nuestro tiempo.

Advancing Movements

6 Women Human Rights Defenders (WHRDs) across Western and Southeastern Europe have in their lifetime researched, campaigned, participated in and advanced peace and women’s rights movements be it through political and social activism or through dance. We are grateful for the legacy they have left. Please join AWID in honoring these women, their activism and legacy by sharing the memes below with your colleagues, networks and friends and by using the hashtags #WHRDTribute and #16Days.


Please click on each image below to see a larger version and download as a file

 

Snippet FEA Objectives NSS Advocacy (FR)

LE PLAIDOYER

Yellow circle with illustration of a brown woman with a white t-shirt holding a blue loudspeaker.
Influencer les politiques et promouvoir un accès plus équitable à la terre pour les femmes travaillant dans l'agriculture

Marielle Franco

Marielle was a Brazilian politician, feminist, lesbian and human rights activist.

Marielle was an outspoken critic of police brutality and extrajudicial killings. Her openly feminist, Black and favela-centered politics were a source of hope for marginalized groups in Rio de Janeiro, currently governed by a conservative city government and an evangelical mayor.

On March 14, 2018, after delivering a speech in Rio de Janeiro, Franco and her driver were shot multiple times and killed. Following news of her death crowds took to the streets shouting "Marielle presente!" (Marielle is here!) and demanding justice be done.

Read more about Marielle and the situation in Brazil

 


 

Marielle Franco, Brasil

Nous redistribuons une partie de nos fonds à des partenaires bénéficiaires et nous identifions comme un fonds féministe et/ou de femmes, devrions-nous participer à cette enquête?

Non, nous reconnaissons l’importance cruciale de votre travail, mais nous ne collectons pas les participations de fonds féministes et de femmes à l’heure actuelle. Nous vous encourageons néanmoins à transmettre cette enquête à vos partenaires bénéficiaires et vos réseaux féministes.

2. Frame your research

A framework for your research will guide throughout your research process, and the framing document you develop can also serve as a concept note to advisors and partners, and a funding proposal to potential donors.

Before conducting any research:

Your research framing may evolve over time as you refine your questions and gather new information. However, building an initial research framing will allow you to work from a solid foundation.


Goals

To create a strong foundation for your WITM research, it is important to clarify what you hope to accomplish.

For example, one goal of AWID’s WITM global research was to provide rigorous data to prove what we already knew anecdotally: that women’s rights organizations are discrepantly underfunded. With this data, we felt we would be better positioned to influence funders in their decision-making.

Your goals could be to:

  • Generate hard data on funding realities and trends to prove or disprove existing myths.
  • Gain deeper insight into differences between the perspectives of donors and women’s rights organizations.
  • Influence donors in grant-making.
  • Add crucial input to key funding debates.
  • Explore collaboration between donors and women’s rights organizations on issues that emerge from the research.

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Key questions

Frame your research process with key questions that only your research can answer and limit those questions to a specific time frame (e.g. past five years, past year, etc.).

Consider the following points:

  • What exactly do you want to learn more about and what is the hypothesis you would like to test? Writing this out will assist you in your thought process.
  • Is there existing research on this? If research already exists, it may not make sense to conduct new WITM research unless you feel like the existing research is not extensive or specific enough.  
  • What time frame do you want to cover in your analysis? For example, will your research analyze only the past year, or several previous years, such as the past five years?
  • Are you planning to repeat your survey to collect data in the future?

Choosing a specific timeframe for your research can result in more precise findings than working with an open-ended timeframe. Also, deciding whether you will repeat this research at regular intervals will allow you to set up data collection benchmarks for easy replication and comparison over time.

These were the key questions that guided AWID’s WITM research process:

  • What is the current state of women’s organizations’ financial sustainability across the world?
  • What external and internal trends are impacting donors’ funding decisions to support women’s organizations and movements?

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Type of data

Now that you determined your key questions, you can determine what kind of data will help you answer your key questions. This will allow you to plan the rest of your schedule for your WITM research.

For example, will you conduct a survey that covers an extensive portion of your priority population? Will you analyze the applications that funders are receiving from a certain region? Will you also conduct interviews (recommended)? By determining the types of data you need, you can reach out to external parties who will provide this data early on, and plot out your full schedule accordingly. Some suggested sources of data could be:

  • Surveys you create for women’s rights organizations and donors
  • Application and grantmaking data from donors funding cycles
  • Interviews of prominent activists, organizations, and donors
  • Donor data from membership organizations and networks, such as  the Foundation Center, regional or national donor affinity groups.

Diverse data sets are a great way to create robust and rich analysis.

The data from AWID’s 2011 Global Survey formed the backbone of our analysis in Watering the Leaves, Starving the Roots report. However, we also collected data from interviews and interactions with several actors in the field, ranging from donors to activists and women’s rights organizations.

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Final products

In addition to allowing you to set your schedule, creating an initial plan of what products you will develop will also allow you to work out what resources you need.

For example, will you only produce a long research report or will you also create infographics, brochures and presentations? Depending on your products, you may need to hire a design firm, plan events and so on.

These products will also be the tools you use to achieve your goals, so it is important to keep those goals in mind. For example, is your WITM research exclusively intended as an advocacy tool to influence funders? In that case, your products should allow you to engage with funders at a deep level.

 Some sample products:

  • Long report for dissemination with key funders and organizations.
    Historically, AWID WITM research has centered on a long report, from which AWID distilled other smaller products  - see rest of list.
  • Infographic for viral distribution online
  • Short animation demonstrating key findings
  • Short brochure(s) distilling your findings and messages
  • Articles and blog posts on key findings to draw interest to your larger report
  • Seminars or webinars presenting key findings.

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Conclusion: Framing your research will give you the big picture

Framing your research to cover goals, key questions, types of data, and final products will allow you to create a well-planned schedule, prepare your resources in advance, and plan a realistic budget.

This will make interactions with external partners easier and allow you to be nimble when unexpected setbacks occur.


Previous step

1. Gather your resources

Next step

3. Design your survey

 


Estimated time:

• 1 month

People needed:

• 1 or more Research person(s)

Resources available:

AWID Research Framing: sample 1
AWID Research Framing: sample 2


Previous step

1. Gather your resources

Next step

3. Design your survey


Ready to Go? Worksheet

Download the toolkit in PDF

Snippet FEA FEMINIST COOPERATIVISM (EN)

FEMINIST

COOPERATIVISM

When work and
solidarity go together

Razan Al-Najar

Razan era una médica voluntaria de 21 años en Palestina.

Le dispararon cuando corría hacia un muro fronterizo fortificado, en un intento por llegar hasta una persona herida en el este de la ciudad de Khan Younis, en el sur de Gaza.

En su última publicación en Facebook, Razan dijo: «Estoy volviendo y no retirándome», y añadió: «Denme con sus balas, no tengo miedo».

 


 

Razan Al-Najjar, Palestine

What are the WITM official survey languages?

For now, the survey on KOBO is available in Arabic, English, French, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish. You will have the chance to select your language of choice at the beginning of the survey.

6. Conduct desk research

Desk research can be done throughout your research. It can assist you with framing, help you to choose survey questions and provide insights to your results.

In this section

Giving context

Conducting desk research throughout your research process can assist you with framing, help you to choose survey questions and provide contextual clarity or interesting insights to your survey results, such as comparing similarities and differences between your survey results and information produced by civil society and donors.

Perhaps you notice trends in your survey data and want to understand them.

For example, your survey data may reveal that organization budgets are shrinking, but it cannot tell you why this is happening. Reviewing publications can give you context on potential reasons behind such trends.

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Building on existing knowledge

Desk research also ensures you are building your research on the existing knowledge regarding your topic, confirming the validity and relevance of your findings.

They may be complimentary or contradictory to existing knowledge, but they must speak to existing data on the topic.

To ensure comprehensive research of the entire funding landscape related to your topic, look at a diverse set of funding sectors.

You can consider:

  • Women’s Funds
  • Private and Public Foundations
  • International Non-Governmental Organizations (INGOs)
  • Bilateral and Multilateral Agencies
  • Private Sector Actors
  • Individual Philanthropists
  • Crowdfunders

Include any other relevant sectors to this research.

For example, you may decide that it is also important to research local non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

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Potential sources for desk research (non-exhaustive)

1. Donors’ websites and annual reports

These are direct sources of information about what funders are actually doing and generally contain information on policies and budgets. Researching this before interviewing donors can result in more focused questions and a stronger interview.

2. Online sources of information

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Previous step

5. Conduct interviews

Next step

7. Synthesize your research findings


Estimated time:

• 1-2 months

People needed:

• 1 or more research person(s)


Previous step

5. Conduct interviews

Next step

7. Synthesize your research findings


Ready to Go? Worksheet

Download the toolkit in PDF

Snippet FEA In numbers (ES)

EN CIFRAS