About the Center for Women’s Global Leadership (CWGL)

With feminist values, CWGL strengthens and bridges voices for human rights toward social justice and self-determination. Working at the intersection of gender, human rights, and economic policy, the Center utilizes an intersectional, rights-based approach to strengthen the collective impact to transform civil society. To this end, CWGL operates within a participatory strategy to:

• Convene those closest to the issue to explore and exchange holistic ideas and solutions;
• Research with an action-oriented lens, guided by partners and constituencies around the world who are committed to realizing rights for themselves and others;
• Advocate with, and for, those traditionally excluded from decision-making guided by evidence stemming from collective research.

CWGL’s role has strategically evolved over its 25-year history in order to respond and remain relevant to the times, in particular the expressed needs of its regional partners and the global feminist community. CWGL’s early and pioneering work embedded women’s rights firmly within the international human rights frame, and developed ongoing initiatives toward multi-cultural leadership for advocacy around women’s rights globally. With the global financial crisis in 2009, CWGL integrated a strong focus on economic rights and justice from a feminist perspective into its ongoing modalities of convening, training, and research. This brought, for the first time, a gendered understanding of macroeconomic policy and economic and social rights to the attention of civil society organizations, policymakers, and UN agencies. This history and expertise informs CWGL’s current programmatic goals:

1. Equality regardless of identity

CWGL aims to achieve equality by eradicating gender-based discrimination and violence in the world of work, thereby addressing this issue systematically through accountability of rights.

2. Peace beyond the absence of war

CWGL is redefining peace and measuring it with the indicators of equality, justice, and human rights to challenge the economy of war and violence.

3. Feminist standards as the norm

CWGL is amplifying feminist thought, standards, and leadership to influence civil society and its institutions and structures, thereby addressing inequality, discrimination, and violence.

To initiate feminist movement building, CWGL ensures feminist standards in its coordination of the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence Campaign, which has been implemented in over 180 countries by more than 6,000 organizations, and the Feminist Alliance for Rights, which aims to influence the 2030 agenda from its position in the Global North with its network of Global South leadership.