Funding Women Leaders and Movements at the Frontlines, part 2

Yesterday we told you the story of legendary Dame Carol Kidu, who was the only woman in the Papua New Guinean parliament for most of her time in office, tried to introduce a law banning marital rape. She bided her time until the last session of parliament in 2002 and bundled it in with a series of amendments to a Child Sex Exploitation and Rape Bill. So, the law banning marital rape finally did pass, and it was months later before all her all-male parliamentary colleagues found out they’d been asleep at the wheel.

Today we hear from Yifat Susskind, Executive Director of the international feminist fund MADRE (founded in 1983). She explains how women’s movements are essential for democracy in a Los Angeles Times op-ed:

“Women are behind the most successful uprisings of 2019. In over a dozen countries on five continents, people have risen up to confront economic inequity and even the most repressive governments. These mobilizations are answering the question of how to tackle ascendant right-wing authoritarianism—and women have been at the heart of it all. In part, that’s because women know well the consequences of living under these draconian governments. Right-wing forces promote a toxic brand of masculinity that defines manhood through violence and aggression, promising men a slice of patriarchal power in exchange for backing authoritarian rule. They relegate women to silence and submission and force LGBTIQ people into hiding. They have targeted female human rights activists who defy patriarchal norms with harassment, criminalization, and even murder.”

One of the reasons women-led, feminist organizing is an effective strategy to confront authoritarian power is that women’s movements are nonviolent, inclusive movements, which means more people can join them and more do.

Nonviolent movements are twice as effective at achieving their goals as violent uprisings, succeeding more than 50 percent of the time, according to a 2008 study of more than 320 uprisings from 1900 to 2006.

When women are at the forefront, leading the mass mobilizations, they are more likely to be peaceful, another study found.
More than 60 percent of nonviolent movements featured women’s groups that formally called for peace. Of movements that turned violent, women’s groups were a minority of organizing groups, comprising only 35 percent.
Feminist movements are a strong antidote to authoritarianism because they have the infrastructure, built over a half-century, needed to sustain peaceful grassroots organizing, Susskind notes also, from her perspective as a women’s fund leader.

Muadi Mukenge, Senior Director with MADRE, was formerly director of the sub-Saharan Africa program at the Global Fund for Women. In a report from 2010, she discussed the Global Fund for Women’s partnership with the women’s movement in Congo:

“As the country emerges from a ten-year war that claimed over five million lives and violated the dignity of up to half a million women and girls through organized rapes, one has to ask how best to support community efforts at rebuilding. I am Congolese. I direct the Sub-Saharan African program at the Global Fund for Women. I am often asked what can be done to help the Congo, especially women … Since 2004, the Global Fund for Women’s support to women’s groups in the Congo has quadrupled, and we’ve seen that grantmaking to women’s groups, despite the closed political space and weak infrastructure, can make a difference in the lives of women and their communities in the aftermath of conflict … The Global Fund for Women’s support has helped women’s groups to promote peace, justice, women’s leadership, and respect for human rights. Over five years, the Global Fund for Women supported 70 groups (in the Congo) with almost $1 million in grants.”

In a world of increasing military aggression and might, women’s representation in peace-keeping measures is critical to achieving peace. A consensus is emerging that women’s participation in peace negotiations contributes to the success of lasting peace. For example, women’s participation increases the probability of a peace agreement lasting at least two years by 20 percent and a peace agreement lasting 15 years by 35 percent.

Tomorrow we learn about: Funding Women Leaders and Movements at the Frontlines, part 3