The development of a new strategic framework (SF) for the Women Human Rights Defenders International Coalition (WHRD-IC) comes almost twenty years after the International Coalition (IC) was founded. During this time, the context in which WHRDs, feminists, trans and non-binary defenders are defending rights has changed significantly, in part because of the work of the Coalition and our collective impact.
The IC itself has also experienced many changes during this period, including recently a period of dormancy, and since 2022, important efforts to revive and rejuvenate the IC with the hiring of a new Executive Coordinator in early 2023. The listening tour with members conducted in 2023 and the Coalition’s governance and membership renewal process in 2024 have surfaced longstanding and important concerns about the unequal power relations and disparity in resources and influence among members of the IC, which need to be addressed moving forward.
This SF then is an effort to build on all that has come before - the history, contributions, people and learning - and to strengthen the political trust among coalition members in pursuit of a shared purpose and the deeper impact that the current context demands of us.
The SF is also rooted in the recognition that for many members of the IC, this work is deeply personal. Many of us are defenders ourselves and have lost loved ones, been threatened, arrested, imprisoned and exiled. Many of us have experienced both the ‘power over’ of transnational feminist movements, and also authentic transnational solidarity in times of threat and danger.
We bring this history, our shared understanding of the current juncture, and all our personal/political experiences into the SF to ask ourselves: who is the WHRD-IC for and what is it seeking to achieve? The Coalition is changing and it seeks a different, feminist and decolonial future, which centres WHRDs, feminists, trans and non-binary defenders in the Global South. This SF charts the path towards that future.
