Strategic priority 2

Strengthen leaderful women’s movements

Women-led movements are key to achieving progress, particularly in the face of resistance – working as they do outside of the hierarchies and politics of the status quo, harnessing and benefitting from a diversity of ideas, expertise, and intent.

Why is this a priority?

As we face up to the threat of the anti-rights backlash and consider the importance of ensuring that legal equality forms an integral part of the next phase of the UN’s drive for global sustainable development, we see a huge opportunity to establish diverse, intersectional networks, and networks of networks, spanning civil society organisations whose primary areas of focus (e.g. violence, poverty, climate change, masculinity, and digital harms) cannot be addressed without also taking into account the discrimination, marginalisation, violence and exploitation faced by women and girls.

Vision 2030

A world where women’s and girls’ values, knowledge and experiences inform and shape decisions made in political, economic, legal and social spaces.

Target outcome

Inclusive, diverse, and leaderful feminist networks, and networks of networks, are driving systemic legal and policy reforms for women and girls in 67 countries.

Projected impact

Women and girls from 67 countries have increased opportunities to influence the laws and policies that shape their lives.

“It’s about building and strengthening the movement to create a just world together. A better world.”

Our approach

This is our second overarching priority, impacting on all aspects of our strategy. Over the next five years, it will see us convene and enable partnerships, coalitions, and networks that transform the landscape of gender equality and women’s rights through leaderful, transparent, and mutually empowering relationships. Our focus is on amplifying collective impact by fostering partnerships that honour local expertise, embrace diverse voices, and build sustainable movements for change.

We will achieve this by:

  • Developing partnerships, coalitions, networks, and networks of networks, based on mutual respect and shared ownership, recognising the unique value each partner brings
  • Ensuring inclusive decision-making that centres marginalised voices and intersectional approaches
    Building our joint capacities while avoiding dependency, and enabling independent and sustainable action
  • Providing access to essential resources and leaderful learning opportunities via the new Equal Justice Academy, created in partnership with the Women’s Human Rights Training Institute
  • Leveraging complementary strengths to maximise collective impact on gender equality and justice
  • Maintaining transparent communication and mutual accountability in all partnership endeavours
  • Ensuring that women excluded by regimes and restricted by conflict can still participate

Contributing campaigns

All our campaigns will support this priority, including but not limited to:

Hurra Coalition
Ensuring egalitarian family laws are passed, implemented and secured, with discriminatory family laws and practices reformed and repealed within the MENA region.

Secure Digital Rights, Safety, Privacy, and Freedoms – AUDRi
Ensuring that governments and regional and international bodies adopt intersectional feminist-informed universal digital rights grounded in international human rights law and standards, uphold the rule of law in the digital space, and are held accountable.

Bringing the Maputo Protocol to Life, and strengthening SOAWR
Ensuring that women and girls in Africa fully enjoy their rights as provided for in the Maputo Protocol.

Spotlight on: Spheres of influence and impact

As part of the new Equality and Justice Academy, we aim to map and visualise our spheres of influence, alongside those of the coalitions and networks we support and are members of, as well as our partners. This shared database will not only evidence the strength and breadth of the women’s movement, it will also support the development of a more connected and leaderful global movement, revealing potential strategic alliances and opportunities for collective action.

Have your say

Tell us what you think about our approach to strengthening leaderful women’s movements, and where you think you can make a difference.

Securing rights. Transforming futures.

Explore more resources

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The right to equal citizenship: A decade of global action for gender-equal nationality laws (2014-2025)

An impact report on global action between 2014 and 2025 to end gender discrimination in nationality laws and advance equal citizenship rights.

Exploring legal aid mechanisms for survivors of sexual violence: Lessons from South Asia

The South Asian Movement for Accessing Justice (SAMAJ) presents this regional report on legal aid systems in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, and Sri Lanka.

A guide to using the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa for legal action

This guide provides step-by-step guidance for using the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa at local, national, and regional levels. It explains how to bring women’s rights abuses that violate the Protocol before domestic courts and regional justice mechanisms like the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights; analyzes key cases related to women’s rights decided by the African Commission, and provides general strategies for activists.

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