WUNRN
Development Alternatives with Women
for a New Era
FEMINIST
RESPONSES IN A FIERCE NEW WORLD STRENGTHENING
POLICY ANALYSIS & ADVOCACY ON GENDER, ECONOMIC & CLIMATE JUSTICE |
In acknowledgement of the urgent need for more effective
and interlinked regional feminist responses from the economic south involving
and in support of women advocates working in areas of gender and development,
DAWN is organising a series of regional consultations and training institutes
on “Strengthening
Policy Analysis and Advocacy on Gender, Economic and Climate
Justice” in
three regions - the Pacific, Africa and Latin America - in 2010 and 2011. This advocacy is part of DAWN’s on-going effort to help
promote awareness on and resolution to the three major challenges
highlighted in the global governance debates (TRIPLE
CRISIS DISCUSSION NOTE): The first challenge is the existence of double
standards in the response to the triple crisis. An unequal playing field in
key policy areas is a major obstacle to coordinated response. The second
challenge is the search for a sustainable model of economic recovery, growth,
and development. The focus on financing climate change mitigation and
adaptation is too narrow given the significant resource flows needed for
developing countries to shift from high carbon, fossil-fuel energy to low
carbon, renewable energy sources; to address the food crisis exacerbated by
extreme and frequent climate events, floods, droughts, storms, loss of arable
land and biodiversity; and to provide social protection for groups most
vulnerable to the impacts of climate change including disease, landlessness,
migration, poverty, and much more. Thus far solutions to all these
challenges have tended to be market- or technology-oriented and driven by
corporate interests, which have created new inequalities between the North
and the South. The third challenge is the inconsistencies between international
trade rules (both WTO and regional trade mechanisms) and international
environmental agreements.While economic south governments and civil society
acknowledge some of these converging crises, as in other regions of the globe
the inter-linkages between them are often ignored. This project brings together actors working in various
spheres of the areas of gender, economic and climate justice in the three
regions of the Pacific, Africa and Latin America, in settings where people
can raise difficult questions and political challenges in an atmosphere of
trust and collective reflection. Specifically, participants include
researchers and analysts from academia and civil society; policy makers from
government, inter-governmental and regional institutions; and young and local
women activists. The training institutes and consultations aim to provide
venues for sharing information on a range of global and regional responses to
the world multiples crises, including new initiatives that challenge
hegemonic thinking and systems in finance, trade and monetary, and
environmental policymaking, as well as for mapping current measures,
mechanisms and programs at national and regional levels; and discuss
possibilities, constraints and contradictions. The women’s rights activists
from local and regional organizations will have their own facilitated input
process. Through the process, DAWN also hopes to encourage young
feminists and women’s rights advocates to increase their engagement in
transforming global economic and climate change governance structures; build
the capacity of participants in policy analysis and advocacy on key gender,
economic and climate justice issues, and their interlinkages; and encourage
solidarity and support to contribute to policy proposals and social
movement activisms toward and during regional and global policy advocacy
targets including the Second
Climate Vulnerability Summit (Kiribati, October 2010), CBD COP
10 (Nagoya, 27-29 October 2010), UNFCCC COP 16 (Mexico, Nov 29-Dec 10,
2010), Rio+20' Earth Summit (New York, May 2012), UNFCCC COP 17 (South
Africa) etc. The GEEJ series began with the Pacific
Consultation and Training Institute that took place in Suva, Fiji from
6-9 September, 2010. This is followed by GEEJ Africa in November and
Latin America in 2011. |