2020 was a very different year for all of us, including the FAWCO UN Advocacy Team. A delegation of 14 FAWCO members were preparing to travel to UN Headquarters in New York to participate in the annual Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) in early March, when we learned that CSW was cancelled. UN Women informed all registered delegates of “the Secretary-General’s strong recommendation that ... stakeholders refrain from traveling to UN Headquarters. No general debate will take place and all side events planned by Member States and the UN system in conjunction with CSW64 will be cancelled.”
2020 was intended to be a year of celebrations marking significant milestones at the UN: the UN's 75th anniversary; 25 years since the 4th World Conference on Women in Beijing; 10 years since UN Women began; and five years since the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). These important anniversaries were an occasion to renew commitments to multilateralism, women's rights and making the world a better place. The official UN and NGO events reflecting on the past and highlighting ways forward were all virtual due to the pandemic. COVID-19 affected not just the format of the events, but was also an unavoidable theme. COVID-19 revealed lingering preconditions of inequalities and inadequate services and infrastructure. As countries around the world struggled to deal with health, social and economic crises, the UN and the NGO community were already thinking about the future, how to build forward and make positive changes. FAWCO's UN Advocacy Team kept our fingers on the pulse virtually, at the UN and with our collaboration partners, NGO committees, coalitions and constituencies of stakeholders.
2020 was a landmark year for FAWCO's engagement at the UN. The seven trailblazing FAWCO members who went to Beijing in 1995 to take part in the 4th World Conference on Women returned dedicated to pursuing an increased role as a UN-accredited NGO. FAWCO was granted consultative status at the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) in 1997. You can learn all about the history of FAWCO's engagement at the UN in the special 90th anniversary issue of Inspiring Women.
NGO Committee on the Status of Women New York
As all of our advocacy and organization work moved online, we discovered more opportunities to meet and connect and communicate virtually than ever before. We didn't have to leave our home offices, saved tons of CO2 emissions by not flying to meetings and conferences, and could connect with sisters and colleagues from FAWCO and the global women's movement community. Erica Higbie (FAUSA) has long been active with NGO CSW NY, even after she moved away. In the COVID-19 era of virtual collaborations, she continued to be involved in advocacy, research and education with NGO CSW NY and CSW-related activism.
NGO Committee on the Status of Women Geneva
Anne Riz-Sandweiss (AWC Bern) is Treasurer and Paula Daeppen (AWC Zurich) serves as Parliamentarian on the Board of NGO CSW Geneva. The UN in Geneva closed down in March because of the COVID-19 pandemic and partially re-opened in summer with restrictions and limited participation. The NGO CSW Geneva Board continued to work, holding meetings via Zoom. They conducted and implemented most of the suggestions from a membership survey. Paula updated NGO CSW Geneva's bylaws to reflect policy changes made over the past three years, including changes for the nominations committee, eligibility and requirements for candidates, and addressing the issue of online meetings. Paula is an advisor on procedure to the Nominations Committee for the election of new officers in April 2021.
NGO Committee on the Status of Women Vienna
FAWCO UN Liaison Laurie Richardson (AWA Vienna) continued in her role as Chair of NGO CSW Vienna. She led the drafting of statements and position papers on Beijing+25.
Conference of NGOs in Consultative Relationship with the UN (CoNGO)
Laurie Richardson represented FAWCO on the Board of CoNGO. In this role, she was one of the co-authors of several CoNGO statements including CoNGO Declaration on the UN's 75th Anniversary, and COVID-19 and Recovery: Building Back Better. Laurie also participated in a CoNGO consultation on NGO access to the UN.
US Women’s Caucus at the UN (USWC)
Pam Perraud (FAUSA) continued as Policy Chair for the USWC and helped write position papers including global policy suggestions for the US State Department and US Mission at the UN. She also helped draft letters to the State Department expressing disappointment with the US’s new policy on US treaties on reproductive rights as well as the poor representation by the US at the UN's 25th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration. Pam has also worked on the USWC’s incorporation as a 501C4 organization. A member of the FAWCO Education Team, Pam coordinates with the Target Program. In Houston, she serves as VP and head of UN advocacy for Zonta, and is on the Board of her local UN Association in Houston.
NGO Committee on Migration (NGO CoM)
Jane Politi (AWC Rome) continued her work with the NGO CoM as Co-chair of the Subcommittee on Migrant and Refugee Children, focusing on how to increase resilience among children and youth through Early Childhood Development. She worked on guidelines and good practices for the protection of migrant and refugee children’s human rights; followed up on implementation of the UN Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration and Global Compact on Refugees; and advocated with UN Missions to influence policy-makers to adopt a child’s rights-based approach to migration into national legislation, plans, programs, policies and practices, and to empower children to secure their rights. NGO CoM also presented events and position papers related to the UN Commission on Social Development and the High Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development.
Women and Gender Constituency (WGC) at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)
Ayuska Motha and Stacey Kimmig (AIWC Cologne) represent FAWCO at meetings of the UNFCCC, where FAWCO has Observer status and is a member of the WGC. At the start of the pandemic in Europe, Ayuska joined the Feminist Response to COVID-19 working group and reviewed resources to include in their COVID-19 response tracker (https://www.feministcovidresponse.com/). Ayuska and Stacey attended virtual conferences and events in place of the cancelled sessions at UNFCCC headquarters in Bonn: June Momentum for Climate Change and UNFCCC Race to Zero and climate dialogues. There were no negotiations but the goal was to exchange views and share information. Environmental civil society groups and the WGC organized virtual events and training webinars including “Momentum, Action, Justice. Cross-Climate Constituencies Virtual Town Hall” (https://climatemomentum.com/).
Ayuska and Stacey also made a presentation on their work to a FAWCO Youth virtual session, coordinated with Mary Dobrian and Ann Marie Morrow.
FAWCO SDG Awareness
The brainchild of Tammy Mayer (AAWE Paris), who received a FAWCO Foundation Education Award and wanted to give something back, was the new FAWCO SDG Awareness program. At the beginning of the Decade of Action on the SDGs (2020-2030), the time was right for a major push to disseminate information and promote action by FAWCO members and clubs. We hoped to launch SDG Awareness at the interim meeting in Luxembourg, but that wasn't possible. Instead, we initiated the SDGs Photo Project and many clubs participated, creating collages of photos of members with the SDG icons that are most meaningful for them. When Tammy stepped aside due to increasing work commitments, we were able to quickly re-boot FAWCO SDG Awareness with three team members in the lead: Katja Malinowski (AWC Berlin), Julia Rodriguez (AWC Hamburg) and UN Rep Alexandra Vo (FAUSA). The Team developed an SDGs Film Festival for the virtual regional meeting in November, and organized the 17 Days of SDGs for the members-only Facebook group.