Feminist Strategy Archives

W20 Calls for Gender Equality In COVID Crisis

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, Mar. 23 /CSRwire/ – Women 20 (W20), the Women’s Engagement Group, welcomes the extraordinary G20 Summit and strongly agrees that a coordinated response to the COVID-19 pandemic – and its human and economic implications – is urgently needed. We appreciate the effort of G20 Leaders to reduce the COVID-19 pandemic, to propose policies to protect people and safeguard the global economy, and their recognition that collaboration among G20 countries is needed. We, W20, are willing to contribute.

W20 Saudi Arabia has released a statement urging G20 leaders to act on gender equality efforts in addressing COVID-19 crisis. (Image Credit: W20 Saudi Arabia)

We urge that policies and public health efforts address the gendered impacts of disease outbreaks. Experts find that pandemics make existing gender inequalities for women and girls worse, and can impact their treatment and care. Women and girls face a variety of risk factors that must urgently be addressed. Given their predominant roles as caregivers within families and as front-line health-care workers, women are more likely to be exposed to the virus. Women also make up a disproportionate percentage of workers in sectors and roles that are impacted harder in economic downturns and offer less social protection.

Rihanna’s Foundation Donates $5 Million to Fight COVID-19

Editor’s Note: The following announcement is from the Clara Lionel Foundation, founded by singer/songwriter Rihanna.

When we first began this year, never could we have imagined how COVID-19 would so dramatically alter our lives. It doesn’t matter who you are or where you’re from, this pandemic will affect us all. And for the world’s most vulnerable, the worst may be yet to come.

The Clara Lionel Foundation, started by Rihanna in 2012 and named after her grandparents, Clara and Lionel Braithwaite, is giving $5 million to an array of global organizations to address the COVID-19 crisis. (Image Credit: CLF)

Over the past five years CLF has been one of the first organizations to respond to some of the world’s most devastating natural disasters, and we’ve seen firsthand the profound and unintended consequences of not being prepared.

Twitter Donates $1 Million for COVID Journalism, IWMF Receives $500 K

Editor’s Note: The following is from Vijaya Gadde, Legal, Policy and Trust & Safety Lead at Twitter.

(March 24, 2020) All around the world, we’ve seen our service connecting people with the authoritative health information they need to protect themselves and their loved ones. That work can only be successful if people have access to the news and information they need.

Right now, every journalist is a COVID-19 journalist. From the stories of healthcare workers on the frontlines, to analysis of the real human and economic cost of the pandemic, reporters around the world are still writing, still exposing themselves to harm, still giving us the facts. Journalism is core to our service and we have a deep and enduring responsibility to protect that work. This week we’re contributing to two critical organizations that are working tirelessly to uphold the fundamental values of a free press during this pandemic.

How Canada is Pushing for Better Mental Health Care for Women

Editor’s Note: This edition of our Feminist Giving IRL (in real life) series features Dr. Vicky Stergiopoulos, Clinician Scientist and Physician-in-Chief at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), Canada’s largest mental health hospital and a global research leader. She is the clinical lead of CAMH womenmind, a new effort from CAMH to close the gender gap in mental health. She is also a Professor and Vice Chair Clinical and Innovation in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto.

1. What do you wish you had known when you started out in your profession?

Philanthropy Women Responds to COVID by Going FREE

Right now, what we need more than ever is feminist leadership to get us through the COVID crisis. As a result, Philanthropy Women is glad to be able to offer free registration for the next three months.

That’s why we’re excited to share some BIG NEWS here at Philanthropy Women. Due to the COVID-19 crisis, a generous donor has provided extra support so that we can make registration for Premium Access to Philanthropy Women FREE for the next three months. (Editor’s Note: This special offer is now over.)

At Philanthropy Women, we will be working extra hard to be a resource for the feminist giving community on best practices to get us through the COVID crisis. We will work to generate ideas and share news that will help us make system-wide changes that will address this crisis and prevent future crises of this proportion in the future.

#SheTransformsTech Launches with Cross Sector Collaboration

On International Women’s Day, World Pulse announced the launch of their new digital impact campaign, #SheTransformsTech. In partnership with the Vodafone Americas Foundation, EQUALS, and a network of other sponsors from the philanthropy and technology worlds, this campaign crowdsources ways women can–and do–shape the future of tech.

“Our goal is to support organizations that are empowering women and girls on a global level,” says June Sugiyama, Director of Vodafone Americas Foundation, a charitable arm of one of the world’s leading telecoms and technology service providers. The Foundation fosters social change in global and local communities, with a focus on empowering women and girls. “This World Pulse initiative is a great example of how we can rally voices on this important issue.”

Vote for the G.O.A.T! Join in the Fun and Build Women’s Leadership

Plan International USA is working to build women’s leadership by inviting young people ages 13-22 to “Vote for the GOAT (Greatest of All Time).” While this acronym usually applies to football stars and other sports legends, Plan is using the acronym in a much for fun, purposeful, and world-changing way. Specifically, Plan’s GOAT competition refers to the greatest female, femme or nonbinary person advancing gender equality across the categories of visibility or representation, women’s health, equal opportunity, and gender-based violence.

Plan International USA—an independent development and humanitarian organization advancing children’s rights and equality for girls—established the “Vote for the G.O.A.T” competition to heighten awareness about those working on behalf of gender equity, and to benefit needy women and families in the developing world.

Greengrants: Participatory Grantmaking as Path to Greener Future

When corporations divert rivers, when governments displace communities, and when the constant human desire for “more” disrupts the safety of our environment, women and children are often the first to suffer. Access to clean water, a full belly, and a safe place to sleep at night are rights humans should have at birth.

What can we do when these natural rights are violated?

Recently retired CEO Terry Odendahl and GGF activist Eva Rehse in London at the pre-COP21 climate march. (**Image Credit:** Global Greengrants Fund)

Global Greengrants Fund, also known as Greengrants, seeks to answer this question by taking action. By committing to a program based on participatory grantmaking, Greengrants connects under-served and under-funded communities with the resources and mentorship they need to fight for justice.

COVID-19: The Gendered Impacts and How to Respond

Well folks, we’re off the charts, quite literally. Vulnerable people are dying at an alarming rate. Markets are dropping and jumping and dropping again as more people test positive for COVID-19. Health care workers are risking their lives by going to work, and many of us are spending more time social distancing than humanity may have ever tried before. It’s all quite surreal. And we’re not even talking about the gendered impacts yet.

Some leaders in philanthropy are responding to the health crisis with concern and plans to help.

gendered impacts — The Kaiser Family Foundation is providing a database of funders for COVID-19. (Image Credit: Kaiser Family Foundation)

The Kaiser Family Foundation has put together a Donor Funding for COVID-19 Response list, and there you can find organizations funding the research and the medical response to the unprecedented outbreak. Most of the funding listed here is going to China, and all of this funding is brand new, starting in January 2020.

WPI Cancels Plugged In Conference, Plans to Move Online

Editor’s Note: The following message is from Andrea Pactor, Associate Director, Women’s Philanthropy Institute, Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, regarding the 2020 Women Give conference.

Dear Friends,

Thank you for your patience as we wrestled with whether or not to move forward with Philanthropy Plugged In in light of the rapidly spreading COVID-19 situation. Yesterday, the Indiana University President made the decision to cancel the symposium easier. At Indiana University, as at several universities and businesses across the country, all travel outside the state is suspended through April 5 and we are discouraged from scheduling events with more than 100 attendees. Sad as we are not to see you in Chicago, we know, as one speaker mentioned, that this is the right thing to do.

Category: Feminist Strategy