Horizons of Friendship and its partners continue to work to end gender inequality in Central America and Mexico

“I am begging you to give us more support and training about sexual violence and mistreatment of women and adolescent girls. That you can continue to help us support and empower mothers and fathers to address this” said Maria Garcia*, one of the participants during an evaluation of a Horizons-funded project working with Indigenous Women in Nicaragua.

The sentiments behind Maria’s words, highlight the need to continue to invest in gender-focused development programming. In fact, the project is one of seven projects, supported by Horizons of Friendship (Horizons) and spearheaded by women-led organizations working towards eliminating gender-based violence and addressing gender inequality. At this moment, Horizons is actively supporting 12 partners working on 18 projects in Mexico, Central America, and Canada.

However, the project, like others, highlights the potential and need to not just invest in women programming but directly invest in grassroots organizations to efficiently lead this work.

International actors and governments have noted in several forums such as the Grand Bargain Agenda, the Sustainable Development Goals, and the World Humanitarian Summit – that one of the most effective ways to achieve sustainable development is to invest more broadly in the capacity of local actors to design, implement, and evaluate aid programming.  In particular, the “localization agenda” acknowledges that the key to better programming in development and humanitarian interventions is understanding the needs, problems, and capacities of members at the community level – and this gap can be clearly filled by local actors. A strong local civil society is also the first to respond during crises and often serves to supplement service delivery in contexts where the state might not be able to do so.

However, despite the “localization agenda” and the clear need for increased support to local partners many international actors remain the key designers, implementers, and evaluators of development programs. For local partners, receiving funding from international organizations may mean losing some autonomy about decision-making, results, and outcomes. Ultimately, losing autonomy about the programs and projects meant to benefit their own communities.

A recent report by CIVICUS (an international organization aimed at supporting civil society) found that in Latin America, local civil society organizations continue to severely lack funding to operate, and less than 2 per cent of available funding for the region was directly aimed at addressing gender inequality and promoting women’s empowerment.

For Horizons, March 8, International Women’s Day, is not just an opportunity to reflect on women’s value in development, but rather an opportunity to reflect on the opportunities development organizations like Horizons can have when we invest in women-led gender programming at the grassroots level.

Unlike traditional development models focused solely on economic criteria, Horizons aims to work with partners who share in the principle that programs should help empower communities and grassroots organizations to be agents of social change both in terms of their short-term, concrete needs, and with regard to their long-term strategic aspirations.

Partner relationships constitute not only a strategy but also a methodology; in essence, Horizons and partner organizations must work together to build their mutual capacity to be part of processes of social transformation at the local, national, and regional levels, and thus contribute to the eradication of poverty, promotion of social justice and gender equality.

Partner-defined development strategies, like the strategy used to address gender-based violence in the Nicaraguan project ensures that projects are culturally sensitive and relevant in helping shape behaviours towards a safer and better world for all. In addition, through supporting women-led programming at the local level, we open opportunities for women to take leadership positions in civil society and be drivers of a development agenda, that at its core is gender-transformative.

This March 8, we hope alongside other international actors, we continue to reflect on our role towards support programming that is relevant to women like Maria. Programming that is not driven by our own ideas of what is valuable – but rather by the voices of women we aim to support.

*Maria Garcia is pseudonym – real name has been changed for confidentiality and security concerns.