Program Coordinator: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

NWP’s mission, approach and achievements

From the beginning (1998), NWP has been an integral part of the institute’s mission to strengthen (the role of) civil society and supported establishment and development of important institutions in the field of women and gender issues, such as gender studies, empowering education, crisis and information centers; supported creation of gender studies curricula at the higher/ secondary education system, contributed towards capacity building of experts community; initiated economical empowerment program for women entrepreneurs both beginners and with advanced level; policy change; media initiatives, creation and development of information recourses, preparation of status reports and initiation of public awareness campaigns. Due to its strategic activity 5 universities both state and private included gender studies curricula into common curricula, numbers of trainers and specialists have been preparing, more than 45 schools have been teaching gender basing on Empowering Education methodology and more than 300 young people and 50 adults already went through it; numerous women, men and children used services of rehabilitation centers; 6% of women were elected to the municipal organs; 50 regional and urban women, only in 2005 year started their own business, film collection have been used at all levels for educational and community response purposes; the problem of Domestic violence, trafficking, reproductive rights issues including problems of abortions made on selective base and consequences of cross cousin marriages were raised and found their response at all levels; several journalists, filmmakers went through the program preparation and now conduct their own activities. Since last year the program has 3 major components relate to preparation of Law on Domestic violence, Gender expertise of school textbooks, Gender budgeting and have been making an attempt towards establishment of experts’ panel which will be major component of monitoring group.

In 2004 Soros Foundation in New York, the sponsor of OSI-AF, announced a change of policy, which resulted in the withdrawal of funding to countries successfully undergoing a process of democratization, the various OSI-AF programs were presented with the option of developing into independent entities. Preparations for the establishment of a new and independent entity in Azerbaijan started in 2004, when OSI-AF supported the proposal of the Network Women’s Program in New York to investigate the feasibility of such a project. A feasibility study and stakeholder analysis was conducted in two parts, in 2005 and in 2006. This study confirmed the great need for further and continued work geared towards strengthening (the agendas of) women’s NGOs and their role in civil society. Furthermore it pointed to the fact that the NWP in its eight years of existence has successfully played a unique role in terms of providing strategic direction to, and strengthening the role of, women’s NGOs in Azerbaijan. On the basis of this assessment it was recommended that the future entity builds and expands upon these existing strengths and contributions.

All interviews conducted in the context of the stakeholder analysis stressed the importance of the continuation of program work in areas with significant achievements and strong credibility, especially in the fields of convening, capacity building, policy change and grant making. The need to unite and provide a space for dialogue amongst local civil society actors as well as government, the private sector and the media was expressed. Towards this purpose, program work aimed at increasing collaborative efforts among various actors and institutions was identified as a key area of focus. In order to meet these needs and ideas the program decided to transform its program activity and act in future in form of Alliance representing by individuals from different sectors struggling for gender equality and social justice. As such, New Wave Alliance will play a movement-building role that will strengthen collective agendas and cooperation within civil society. The grant component was also identified as an important element, as it will provide mechanisms for further development of important initiatives and add further credibility to the program. Also, a grant-making component will provide funding for initiatives that other donors are unable to support. Finally, representatives of different organizations, government, funders and NGOs welcomed the transformation process and development of the New Wave Alliance, and saw it as an opportunity for further cooperation and more effective work.

Changes in program strategy: The whole 2007 year will be considered as a first stage of NWA activity. Therefore, the program will change it approach significantly and will focusing on first need issues enabling sustainability, visibility and effectiveness of NWA. The geographic scope will be based on the strategy and will include city and regions of the country but also some sub-regional initiatives within FSU, Europe and Asia. Over 2007 year the project will try to attract funds and public attention to the NWA’s activity but also to establish internal and external evaluation base deferring them from other NGOs. For this purposes, some of its funds will be spent for NWA’s internal needs: office rent, salary and etc., on participation at essential international meetings. The other part will go for local meetings and presentations. It’s important to note that the NWA will provide space (including access to equipment) to its major projects, such as Information and Empowering Education centers and also for expert panel. The fact of possessing informational and human resources, providing community with all range of information, training and expert services will make the NWA more competitive at the market.

Mission
Our mission is to strengthen the voice, influence and impact of women’s rights advocates, women’s NGOs and others, through collaboration, open dialogue, identification of key focus areas, capacity building, advocacy, media work and grant-making.

Our approach
Our approach is to act as a catalyst, broker and resource for collaborative and focused strategic initiatives that positively impact (young) women’s rights, gender equality and democracy. In more concrete terms, we:

• Analyze trends and conditions that enable positive shifts toward women’s rights, gender equality and democracy and identify key focus areas for collaborative work
• Promote collaboration, alliance building and national, regional and global linkages between women’s rights advocates and women’s NGOs
• Enable capacity building, innovation, learning and resource development for women’s rights advocates and women’s NGOs
• Provide co-ordination and expert input on national and multi-national processes geared towards women’s rights, gender equality and democracy
• Promoting collaboration among key stakeholders in public and private sectors, educational institutions, media and NGOs, especially women’s organizations
• Foster public debate and impact public opinion and policies through high quality materials, products and advocacy and by bringing together key decision-makers and public opinion leaders.
  

Four key strategies
This section reflects on four key strategies for the next year. They are:

1. Development and implementation of collaborative initiatives for social justice that promote women’s rights and leadership.
   
   In 2007-2009 years we will develop and implement strategic initiatives around the following key areas:
   
   (The programs will be implemented as a grant and operational initiatives. Operational part will consist of services such as capacity building trainings, gender schools, translations, publishing and providing of independent expertise. This part will be implemented by staff, trainers and consultants hired by the NWA. Grant component will based on re-granting to women’s ngos or researches centers to conduct ground work, researches or advocacy campaigns. Re-granting will be based on competition results.)
   
   
2. Policy change and implementation at the level of government
   
   Considering 2006 year as a preparation stage to spin-off the NWP put much efforts on capacity building of experts, creation of coalitions providing expertise in gender field. Besides, the NWP has been taking an active part in preparation of Law on Domestic violence and Gender budgeting project in 2006. It is expected that the government will adopt two laws on: “Equal rights and opportunities” and “Domestic violence” in 2007 year. When the laws adopted there will be need to establish national mechanisms on implementation and monitoring. The engagement of civil society in further planning and implementation will be very important in this case. In order to enable involvement of civil society in the process and provide dialogue among all structures, actors and facilitating community response the NWP started several pilot initiatives on monitoring in 2006. These pilot projects helped to adopt methodology and to establish panel of experts knowing mechanisms of monitoring, and providing qualitative evaluation in different directions of gender field. The process of strengthening expert panel will continue in 2007. The project will be implemented as a grant and operational program. Operational part will consist of services such as capacity building trainings and independent expertise. This part will be implemented by trainers and consultants hired by the NWA. Grant component will based on re-granting to women’s ngos or researches centers to conduct researches or advocacy campaigns. It will be based on competition and its results.
   
   
3. Young women leadership and movement building
   
   Within 2000-2006 the NWP through development and promotion of gender studies curricula at secondary and higher education levels and other educational/media or grant programs has been spreading women human rights and equal opportunities issues among young women, specialists and ngos. In 2007 the main strategy in this area is aiming at defining, preparation and further promotion of young people potential and supports their activities in the field of gender issues. The most promising young specialists will be involved in experts’ panel and in implementation of public awareness campaigns. Almost the same approach will be used for movement building which aiming at uniting NGOs, state, private and individuals to resolve flagging issues. In 2007 the NWA will invite NGOs to take part in expert panel and different action groups’ activities focusing on trainings, implementation of monitoring and public awareness campaigns.
   Beside, the NWA will continue to support further development of Information, gender and empowering education centers as key partners of the NWA. The main strategy of AGIC will focusing on accumulation and spreading of information relate to NWA activity and on all other gender relate information, performing full range of assistance including information and human resources (trainings) to monitoring groups and NWA. In 2006 Empowering Education center together with specialists from higher education sphere has been running textbook expertise the final recommendations of which will be defined and submitted to MOE and broad audience by the end of 2006. The group selected those textbooks whose revisions are expected in 2007. Therefore, there will be need to provide expertise and capacity building trainings for representatives of MOE, authors and editorial groups. The expert group could do this kind of work as they will have already experience in textbook expertise and delivering trainings for teachers. Being experienced actors in the field they will take an active part in expert panel activities in 2007. Beside, Gender Studies and Empowering Education centers will keep performing their current/ongoing activities, such as trainings for students, teachers, NGOs and etc. The next year NWA will contribute toward development of common strategy of these 3 initiatives.

   Therefore, the common activity plan for 2 directions is:

   • Conduct meetings with women’s rights advocates and women’s NGOs on the above mentioned key areas
   • Implementation of strategic initiatives, with a focus on coordination, convening an project management, capacity building, media work, grant making and linkages at regional and international levels
   • Conduct young women leadership, capacity building and information and communication technology (ICT) institutes
   • Develop a methodology for measuring social change impact
   • Attending international meetings

   The whole range of actions will be implemented in cooperation with different donors interested in further promotion of issues and monitoring over their implementation (UNIFEM, UNFPA, OSCE, ABA), state and ngos. Moreover, the NWA will broadly use in the process recourses accumulated over years. Collaborative initiatives in these areas will be developed together with existing leaders and actors in the NGO community, media.
   
   Besides, The NWA in the frame of IGPN will participate in two sub-regional initiatives:

4. Creating Advocacy Tools in the Women's Rights Sector
   
   Advocacy and public involvement are the foundations of the protection and promotion of women's rights in countries in which national mechanisms for assuring gender equality and women's social status are dismantled or fail to be implemented. This project is devoted to work on social inclusion, improving of lives and promotion of rights of the most vulnerable groups of women. This project proposes to create such tools: analytic reports on women's problems, accompanied by visually strong materials (documentaries). Such tools make it possible to conduct different advocacy campaigns intended for the general public as well as for the national and international political and legislative decision-making process.
   The project aims to create tools for conducting advocacy campaigns in order to resolve the problems of the most vulnerable groups of women in the post-Soviet space.
   Project work will lead to the creation of tools (analytic reports and documentary films) reflecting the trouble spots of women in the region in such a way that their political and economical roots will be revealed. NGO activists, gender specialists, coalitions will be invited to the cooperation by means of announcement and after the selection at local and international levels.
   The project's main targets will be:
   • to identify the legal and economic roots of the problems of the most vulnerable groups of women in the post-Soviet space and to describe them in analytic and visual materials;
   • to increase awareness among these groups of women as well as the general public about the origins of the problems that they are facing and the ways of overcoming them (using the resulting analytic and visual materials); to conduct information campaigns in order to inform the general public about the difficult situation of the most vulnerable groups of women and to influence public opinion;
   • to influence the political and legal decision-making process (using the resulting analytic and visual materials).
   
   
   
5. Gender education and women’s rights in Muslim countries
   
   

Legal rights, including those of women, should be discussed in light of the Islamic principle of justice. While acknowledging that further research by Islamic feminist scholars is needed to address changing circumstances and, to determine the influence of borderlands and different religious on country and women state; to compare the current legislation with the permanent laws of sharia and Quran interpretation of laws regarding the women. Since 2003 year the NWP initiated and supported several projects in the field. Despite these projects were pilot they enabled to determine specialists working in the field and to learn roots of the problem. Now there is need to conduct more deep work and to influence on the situation through educational and research components. These initiatives will be implemented by gender experts, ngo activists and scholars invited to cooperation by the NWA.

Strategic Goals for 2007-2009:

• To deepen women's knowledge on their rights that Islam gives them in reality;
• To provide scholars and women activists with necessary skills and knowledge to conduct a ground work on women's status in the society
• To encourage the exchange of experience and ideas in the field of women's r