As March wraps up, our advocacy is running in full force! Some of our members headed to the 67th UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW67) and began the process of strategizing for the High Level Political Forum in July and SDG Summit 2023 in September. Some members also began re-engaging with their regional WMG constituencies and civil society engagement mechanisms in preparation for and at the Regional Forums on Sustainable Development (RFSDs). At the same time, we recognize that many members, especially from the Global South, could not attend CSW and RFSDs due to denial of visa, lack of access to funding and resources, and due to war and conflict. Women’s Major Group stands in solidarity with all the feminists, in all their diversity, who were missing in these conversations. Here’s a short summary of WMG’s events at and around CSW67.
Antigender hate towards WHRDs in the Digital Ecosystem
NGO CSW Parallel Event co-organized by Women’s Major Group, AWID & Resurj on 7 March
“Designing a technology with a sense of justice in mind matters. Apolitical tech is nonexistent and not possible.” – Eva Cruells (Donestech)
Women and Girls Human Rights Defenders (WHRDs) are crucial to the achievement of Agenda 2030 to ensure economic, environmental, gender and social justice. Despite being leaders of social movements, WHRDs are stigmatized, ostracized, excluded, and face hostility and attacks in many forms by State and non-State actors, particularly when fighting against private interest. In the past two decades, with the internet increasingly becoming a site for mobilization, advocacy and resistance, new venues for attacks and targeted harassment of WHRDs have been created, as an extension of the violence they faced in the physical world. This has been exacerbated by the increasing, yet decentralized, mobilization of anti-gender groups and their effective utilization of digital spaces. The parallel event highlighted some of the emerging challenges faced by WHRDs, with resistance strategies to attacks by anti-rights and anti-gender groups in the digital space. It explored possible ways in which feminist movements can support the safety and security of the WHRDs in the digital space, and how political will, commitments and resources can be mobilized towards this end. The panelists included feminist experts such as Melissa Upreti (UN Working Group on Discrimination against Women and Girls), Sivananthi Thanenthiran (ARROW), Almudena Rodriguez (L’Associació de Drets Sexuals i Reproductius), Yvonne Wamari (Outright International), Nalini Singh (Fiji Women’s Rights Movement), Eva Cruells (Donestech), and was moderated by Sachini Perera (RESURJ). UN Women Regional Director for Americas and the Caribbean, Maria Noel Vaela, also joined the meeting with a video message.
Our Ghosts are as Loud as our Work
Parallel Event co-organized by Women’s Major Group and AWID on 8 March at AWID Portal Container
“Authoritarian states recognise the power art holds, & systemically persecute, censor & it to silence political dissent.” – A Co-creator
Women and Girls Human Rights Defenders (WHRDs) face threats and attacks from state and non-state actors in the form of unlawful surveillance, censorship, gender-based violence, disinformation, internet shutdowns, and doxing. WHRDs’ experiences are exacerbated by historical, unequal patriarchal power relations. Building on from the parallel event co-organized by WMG, AWID and RESURJ discussing the emerging challenges faced by WHRDs and resistance strategies to mobilize political will, commitments and resources, feminist activists of AWID and the Women’s Major Group, as well as other feminists attending the CSW67 in person and virtually, came together to curate an immersive social and political art experience of co-creating a wearable symbol of resistance with activists at CSW by engaging physically, intellectually, emotionally, and politically, to build an evolving symbol that calls upon governments to protect, uphold and and defend our human rights, and spotlighting the threat and impact of anti-rights and anti-gender groups in the digital ecosystem on Women and Girls Human Rights Defenders around the world. We are grateful to Espectra Negra for providing sounds of resistance for the co-creation process, Sexual Rights Initiative for their support and help.
The People’s Chair Exhibition
Hybrid Workshop co-organized by Women’s Major Group and SRI on 9 March at AWID Portal Container
“If you had a seat at the People’s Council what would you say?”
While CSW is a space to hold states to account, over the last many years it has increasingly been eroded by state and non-state right-wing and anti-rights actors, corporate capture, and the overarching crisis of multilateralism. To host conversations that build transnational solidarity and interrupt the exclusive space of the UN proceedings in New York, an audio-visual exhibition was held in collaboration between #EmptyChairs and the Women’s Major Group featuring an empty chair bearing the demands from activists for a just world order.
Bilateral meetings with member states and UN institutions in preparation to 2023 HLPF and the SDG Summit
CSW was also an important step in the preparation of the WMG towards the 2023 HLPF and the SDG Summit, its main mandate policy spaces. Using the opportunity of many of its OPs and members being in NY, WMG utilized the opportunity to meet with our members and strategize at The People’s Forum, as well as separately with OPs. WMG held meetings with Member States and UN institutions to talk about WMG’s key messages and preparations towards the HLPF and the SDG Summit, and the political declaration which will be the outcome document of the 2023 SDG Summit. These meetings helped WMG to strategize better towards its fierce feminist advocacy in its mandate spaces later in the year.
