[Oe List ...] The death of Rev. Zan White

[Susan Fertig]

Fascinating.  One of the frustrations I felt at the main UN Women's
conference in Beijing was the large numbers of Arabic and predominantly
Muslim African nations whose delegations were headed by men, who probably
coerced all the votes of their female delegations. Every morning those male
heads of delegations would go through the area where there were tables where
organizations could put their literature, and they would scoop up and throw
away the literature on women's rights that they didn't approve of.  I was
appalled and yet no one stopped them even when officials were notified. I
know we'd hoped to see a resolution denouncing female genital mutilation at
that conference, but the voting delegates couldn't get it passed.  The main
resolution that did succeed was one demanding inheritance rights for women.


 

Susan

 

From: oe-bounces at lists.wedgeblade.net
[mailto:oe-bounces at lists.wedgeblade.net] On Behalf Of David M Dunn
Sent: Monday, August 13, 2012 4:38 PM
To: Order Ecumenical Community
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] The death of Rev. Zan White

 

On Aug 13, 2012, at 1:55 PM, Susan Fertig <susan at gmdtech.com> wrote:





David, What is the HuaiRou Commission? 

Five of us traveled as the ICA official Observers Delegation, led by
then-ICAI Pres Shizuyo Sato, to the UN Women's Conference in Beijing in
1995, and, with the others in our delegation, I led an ICA ToP workshop in
HuaiRou at the Shadow (NGO) Conference there (standing room only even though
we were competing in the same time slot with Hillary Clinton and/or Gloria
Steinham, as I recall).  So I'm very curious about the HuaiRou Commission.

Susan

 

 

You'll recognize the connection immediately in this narrative from the
Huairou Commission's website <http://www.huairou.org/history> :

 

----

The founding members and leaders of the Huairou Commission came out of the
global women's movement, working relentlessly to advance women's meaningful
participation in UN conferences and other global processes.  Grassroots
women's groups were largely absent from these global processes  for years.
A common concern was growing among women committed to advancing grassroots
women in development that the global women's movement was not ensuring
processes for including grassroots women themselves in their agenda-setting
and advocacy, and that the issues poor communities were dealing with on a
daily basis such as basic services, access to food, livelihoods, water and
sanitation, etc, were not being prioritized. 

The Women, Homes and Community Super-coalition, consisting of GROOTS
International, Women and Habitat Network, International Council of Women and
WEDO joined together at the 4th World Women's Conference in Beijing to
ensure that issues women were dealing with in their homes and poor
communities were addressed.  GROOTS International organized a Grassroots
Tent as a space for grassroots women's organizations to gather and share.
The other super-coalition members joined GROOTS in the tent, located in the
civil society village in Huairou, a suburb of Beijing.  

It was in this tent where Wally N'Dow, then Executive Director of the UN
Commission on Human Settlements (now UN Habitat) announced the formation of
the Huairou Commission.  He "Commissioned" the members of the Super
Coalition to monitor Habitat II in 1996 from a women's perspective, and he
named them the Huairou Commission.  He appointed 50 women leaders to the
Commission including high level women leaders within the UN. For the first
time, an organized group of women had a central role to play in the human
settlements arena.

Our relationship with UN Habitat remains strong as we ensure space for women
to organize and participate with a women's voice in UN Habitat initiatives.
>From its original position as an advisory body to Habitat II in Istanbul, HC
over the years has evolved into a global movement for grassroots women's
empowerment in development cutting across diverse themes, sectors and
actors. We have grown into a partnership entity, focusing on grassroots
women taking leadership, linking them with partners and facilitating peer
learning.  HC believes that a paradigm shift needs to occur in how
development policies are made and implemented, for people and institutions
to stop thinking of grassroots groups as projects and start thinking of them
as change agents and partners in development.  HC has grown to implement and
model this paradigm shift.  Eventually, thematic areas of work began to
emerge from the work across different networks, and our thematic Campaigns
were developed and operationalized.  The work grew from the work that
grassroots women's groups were doing and from the joint priorities of the
Member Networks of the Huairou Commission.

----

 

 

 

David

 

 

David Dunn
740 S Alton Way 9B
Denver, CO 80247
--
dmdunn1 at gmail.com
720-314-5991




 

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