Letter from WLP President Mahnaz Afkhami

June 30, 2009

Dear Friends:

The leading role women played in the demonstrations that led up to the recent presidential election in Iran and subsequently in protests to the government's version of the results has stunned the world. However, few people know about the quiet, thoughtful, and politically astute organizing, strategizing, and networking that have been a hallmark of Iranian women's civic activism over the past century. Iranian women have learned through their long struggle for democracy that giving their hearts, minds, energy, and sometimes their liberty and even their lives does not always result in enhanced rights and freedoms for women. They remember that their massive participation in the 1979 revolution ended in the installation of a theocratic regime led by Ayatollah Khomeini, whose first decree was to annul the progressive family protection law they had worked so hard to achieve, segregate men and women, and force them to wear the veil. They organized the first massive demonstration in March 1979, only a month after the revolution had succeeded, in opposition to the new decrees. In the next three decades the secular and the religious among them united, reached across to other social justice and democracy movements such as student and labor associations and unions, appealed to the more progressive senior clerics, expanded their political base, and posited women's issues as national issues. In June 2006 they organized the One Million Signatures Campaign for reform of family laws using mobilizing strategies: door to door outreach to bring awareness to grassroots women, and internet and social networking tools for advocacy and for connecting internal networks to regional and international efforts in order to learn, gain experience, share knowledge, and build solidarity. Increasingly they became empowered, secure, dynamic, and confident.

We are gratified that these strategies and approaches, many of which are being used by our partners in other countries, have been successful. We all realize that the process may be slow and the challenges great. Although each partner has its own socio-political and cultural context, we all know that the future of our struggle for women’s rights is intimately connected to the development of democratic societies. We know that unless we come together with other civil society and social justice networks and movements, bring in the energy and dynamism of the young, use new forms of communication to pass on our message, strive for inclusion and a shared vision, we will not reach our goal of gender equality. To accomplish our goal we need to develop civic organizations and associations that are efficient and capable of responding to the requirements of a fast changing world.

In our recent meeting of partners from 20 countries in Amman, Jordan, we focused on three thematic areas. We discussed increasing women's political participation not only in terms of numbers of women in leadership, but through building skills necessary for democratic, inclusive, non-hierarchical decision making and constituency building. We shared experiences on the process of building capacity for our organizations through pairing of partners to facilitate culture and language specific methods of strategic planning. We brought together 56 young women and 36 young men between the ages of 15 and 25 to participate in a youth technology festival where they honed their skills and learned to create advocacy campaigns using Facebook, YouTube, and other Web 2.0 technologies. The gender neutral working environment, the commitment of the young men to the advocacy work -- not just as the women’s cause but as their own -- as well as the growing interest in their campaigns and social networks from across the world, are a testament to the effectiveness of connection between youth, advocacy, and technology.

We support our Iranian colleagues' struggle for their rights and freedom. We know their struggle is ours. The goal will not be reached easily or quickly. But history is on their side and ours.

Warm Regards,

Mahnaz Afkhami
President and CEO