Womxn Advocating for Bodies, Voice and Resources
About
Power Up! exists to catalyse the leadership and voice of womxn in all their diversity. As a Consortium of womxn’s rights organisations, our goal is to actively support womxn-led collectives, movements, and organisations in their efforts to challenge and dismantle oppressive structures of power.
To address the root causes that hinder gender equality, Power Up! is committed to building, organising, mobilising, and transforming power in three strategic areas:
✊🏿 bodies, with a focus on prevention and elimination of sexual and gender-based violence against womxn and girls;
✊🏾 voice, by strengthening womxn’s leadership and womxn’s participation in political decision-making;
✊🏽 resources, through strengthening womxn’s economic strategies for economic resilience and stability, including access to and control of resources and land.
Our Partners
As a member of the Power Up! Consortium, Gender at Work aims to provide support to partner organisations working towards transformative change in countries across the African continent, the Middle East and India. We are committed to fostering spaces for co-creation, collective strategising, learning exchanges, and collaborative contextual knowledge and capacity building. Meet our partners and discover some of the activities they are implementing under the auspices of Power Up!
AFRO-BENIN is one of only two feminist organisations committed to the advancement of lesbian, bisexual, trans*, and queer individuals (LBQT) and sex workers in Benin. In collaboration with a wide range of partners, they address deeply entrenched social harmful norms through initiatives that foster personal development, self-esteem, health, entrepreneurship and community advocacy.
Alliance des Femmes Battantes (AFB) works with the media, health personnel, law enforcement and religious leaders to combat gender-based violence and discrimination against women, especially LBQT individuals and teenage mothers.
Amhi Amchya Arogyasathi (AAAS), along with the MAKAAM network, works to protect and advance Indigenous womxn forest dwellers’ individual and collective rights and access to land in India.
Blossom Bridge Initiative (BBI) promotes the well-being of LBQT individuals, sex workers, single mothers, and street children in Rwanda by facilitating access to information on sexual and reproductive health and rights, as well as mental health.
Collective for Research & Training for Development – Action (CRTD-A)’s work includes advocating for LGBTQI+ constitutional rights, campaigning for awareness of economic gender-based violence as an invisible form of violence experienced by womxn, empowering refugee girls’ civic and community participation, supporting womxn-led cooperatives to increase production of local and traditional foods. CRTD-A is based in Lebanon and works in partnership with 
Kadirat (Tunisia) and 
Doria Feminist Fund (MENA region).
DAMJ, the Tunisian Association for Equality and Justice, combats discrimination, violence, and arbitrary arrests of SOGIEC rights activists in Tunisia, providing essential legal and psychological support, particularly to transgender individuals facing persecution or legal barriers.
Kaleidoscopio is conducting an action research process focused on economic inequality to strengthen womxn’s economic livelihoods and resilience in Mozambique.
Labour Research Service (LRS) connects and supports womxn in precarious work to have their jobs made visible, recognised, valued and remunerated in South Africa, with a special focus on Voluntary Food Handlers within the country’s National School Nutrition Programme.
Ndabaga’s Sisters Organization (NSO) advocates for the rights and empowerment of LBQ individuals in Rwanda. They focus on skills development, entrepreneurial initiatives, advocacy and research for human rights, wellbeing and mental health awareness.
Por Ela empowers LBQ women in Mozambique by facilitating their access to education, employment and entrepreneurship opportunities. They also advocate for LBQ women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights.
Highlights from Gender at Work partners
Keep up-to-date with the inspiring work our partner organisations are doing to advance gender equality and dismantle oppressive structures in their respective local and regional contexts – click on the images below for some of their latest Power Up! highlights.
Learning Briefs
💡 What are Gender at Work partners’ strategies, collective understandings and principles? What are we curious about and what hopes do we have for Power Up!? In 2022, Gender at Work facilitated a collective learning process to harness lessons on the diverse strategies being implemented by our Power Up! in-country partners, as well as on the common principles guiding us all through this journey. The learning briefs below provide an overview of these lessons – enjoy!
“Listen to what I have to say”: Learning from Power Up! programme strategies
Create Spaces, not occupy them! Co-creating learning pathways in Power Up!
Illustrations from the Global Learning Series Designed by Ipsita Dwivedi, Oct-Nov 2022
Consortium Publications
💡 How is Power Up! keeping track of its goals to build, mobilise, and transform power? How are feminist principles being embedded into this process? Explore our Power Up! Consortium publications to learn more about our work, our approaches, and our learnings.
Power Up! is a collaboration with the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs under the Power of Women strategic partnership. Members of the Power Up! Consortium include Just Associates (JASS) (the Consortium lead), PEKKA, and Gender at Work together with in-country partners.
