WOMEN REDEFINING DEMOCRACY FOR PEACE, JUSTICE AND EQUALITY ANTIGUA, GUATEMALA: MAY !" # !$, $""% 1 WOMEN REDEFINING DEMOCRACY FOR PEACE, JUSTICE AND EQUALITY ANTIGUA, GUATEMALA: MAY !" # !$, $""% 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS 4 Bringing Down the Walls - Making Democracy Matter - by Mia MacDonald 38 DAY THREE 8 INTRODUCTION 39 Reflecting Back, Looking Forward - Transitioning from Day Two to Day Three 8 The Context and Moment 39 Panel #4 – Media and Communications as Democratizing Tools for Women 8 The Nobel Women’s Initiative 41 Small Group Discussion – Women Redefining Democratic Participation 9 Conference Aims 43 Panel #5 – New Perspectives and Strategies for the Future: Making Democracy Meaningful to Women, Peace and Justice 10 Agenda 45 Women in Iran - The One Million Signatures Campaign 46 Concluding Panel - Redefining Democracy 47 A New Definition of Democracy 11 DAY ONE 12 Conference Opening and Welcome 14 Imprisoned Laureate: Aung San Suu Kyi and Burma’s Struggle for Democracy 48 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 16 Panel #1: Women and Democracy – The Promises and the Realities 17 Defining Democracy 50 CONFERENCE MEDIA 18 Small Group Discussion 50 Nobel Women’s Initiative Media - Press Release 20 Panel#2 – Women’s Struggles for Democracy from Outside the Institutions of Governance and Power 52 Nobel Women’s Initiative Media - A Sample of Conference ‘Tweets’ 21 Israel and Palestine 53 Participant Reflections - A Collection of Conference Blogs 22 Closing of Day One 53 Defining Democracy from the Bottom Up by Anisha Desai 54 It’s So Hard to Find Obedient Girls These Days by Hadeel Al-Shalchi… 55 Democracy: The Preserve of Special People and O!ces? by Gladys Aber 24 DAY TWO 57 External Media - THE NATIONAL, May 15, 2009 25 Reflecting Back, Looking Forward - Transitioning from Day One to Day Two 26 Concurrent Session #1 - On the Inside: Women’s Experience with Elections and Government 58 APPENDICES 28 Concurrent Session #2 - Women’s Human Rights and Building Democracies 58 Appendix A: Conference Participants 30 Panel #3 - Women Organizing in Conflict and Militarized Situations 60 Appendix B: The Nobel Women’s Initiative Closing Statement: A New Definition of Democracy 33 Sudan and Darfur 60 Appendix C: Petitions and Declarations Signed by Conference Participants 34 Special Panel: Women in Guatemala 60 Statement Objecting to Travel Bans Imposed on Iranian Women’s Rights Activists, Preventing their Freedom of Movement and Association 35 Violence Against Women in Guatemala 61 Free Burma’s Political Prisoners Now! 36 Closing of Day Two 61 Declaration in Support of Guatemalan Women 2 3 of reprisals from the Burmese junta’s security agents. Two women from Iran, Soraya Azizpanah and Nargess Mohammadi, had their passports confiscated as they were about to board their flight in Tehran. O!cials informed them that they were prohibited from leaving BRINGING DOWN THE WALLS: the country. Others came from conflict zones such as Sri Lanka Making Democracy Matter (then in the final days of a bloody, decades-long civil By Mia MacDonald war), Democratic Republic of Congo (where sexual violence and resource exploitation often go hand- in-hand), and the Darfur region of Sudan (where displacement, sexual violence and death continue to he agenda of the Nobel Women’s Initiative conference held in Antigua, occur). In Guatemala itself, women rights advocates such “other-ing” has been used repeatedly to justify Guatemala was broad and urgent. How are women redefining democracy for described violence, corruption and “social cleansing” said. Menchú’s response: to form a new political party that constraining women and democracy. “We cannot peace, justice and equality? The context was multi-part: a global financial crisis, that threaten them in a country still recovering from crosses ethnic, class, gender and generational lines; a party claim that we are democrats and deprive half the persistent deficits of democracy or a lack of it altogether, wars large and small, a brutal, four-decade-long civil war that took a based on equality. T people in society of their human rights,” Laureate entrenched gender-based violence, and accelerating climate change. All pose challenges particularly massive toll on the approximately 60% Shirin Ebadi declared. and risks to women’s equality and power. But the conference’s mandate was also clear: of the country’s population with indigenous (Maya) Ghanaian MP BB said that without more women in create three days in which 100 women from around the world could share strategies and origins. elected positions in government, laws will remain “gender a!rm alliances to advance “deep democracy” that protects and promotes human rights unfriendly” and the fight for gender equality a sham, noting Other discussions focused on strategies to strengthen women’s roles in peace building, and ways of securing and equity wherever it’s practiced. It is hardly surprising that a major theme of her experience as one of just twenty-one women MPs in equal rights from skeptical or hostile governments the conference was women’s resilience and her country’s parliament. Participants agreed that it was and their supporters. Younger feminists were Despite resistance, opposition, and threats of violence, there are myriad opportunities for resourcefulness in advancing democracy in often- necessary for more women with feminist values—not just encouraged throughout the conference to share women to expand their participation in and influence on governance systems. In doing di!cult terrain. women—to enter elective politics and to get there, to bring so, the possibility exists for a transformation of democracy, and with it, a transformation men along with them. new models of organizing they are using to expand democratic space. Solome Nakaweesi Kimbugwe of the world at large. The conference setting, a historic hotel high in the hills outside Another thread of conversation explored in the o"ered a spirited overview of how Generation X Guatemala City, in the shadow of three volcanoes, was conducive to connection, conference was the power of women learning from Sessions also delved into the challenges to women’s solidarity, feminists are working with “audacity” across Africa. individual reflection, and the unleashing of women’s power. each other’s experiences across regions. At an including nationalist struggles, ethnic conflicts, colonialism, They’re taking on new issues, including the politics of informal lunch session, activists from Zimbabwe and the antagonism to gender equality of anti-feminist sexuality and the diversity of African women, while The four Nobel Women’s Initiative co-founders attending—Shirin Ebadi, Mairead Maguire, discussed their country’s slow recovery from the women who have benefitted from a patriarchal system. Such learning from those who went before. Rigoberta Menchú Tum and Jody Williams—outlined the conference’s objectives and rapacious policies of long-time president Robert divisions have posed challenges for women working to build their visions of a redefined democracy at the opening plenary. They made clear though Mugabe under a power-sharing deal with the dialogue across ethnicity in Sri Lanka, for religious and secular Anisha Desai, another young feminist, described that they, too, were in Antigua to listen and to learn from the women assembled. Gather opposition. Hope Chigudu and Teresa Mugadza were women in Palestine, and for older and younger feminists the her work to bring the voices of US women of color more than 100 extraordinary women from the Americas, Asia-Pacific, Africa and Europe clear: for women in Zimbabwe, if there ever was a time world over. to broader attention through creative, determined together with four women Nobel Peace Laureates and there’s certain to be serious for them to play a larger role in the governing of their outreach to the mainstream media. She and small analysis, spirited conversation, and, on the conference’s last night, a festive—and well- country, this is it. Breaking down barriers between genders, peoples, minorities attended—dance party. and majorities, ideologies (“ists” and “isms”), generations, groups of participants discussed ways of reaching out to the media to apply feminist “frames” to issues and Laureate Rigoberta Menchú Tum described with great the economy and everything else, and even human beings, promote women’s perspectives and expertise. Such For a number of participants, just coming to the conference meant courting danger. honesty her failed campaign for the Guatemalan other species and the environment, was another important work within the alternative media has enormous value One of the Burmese activists in exile who attended used a pseudonym, due to the risk presidency in 2008. People told her she didn’t look conference theme. So too was the need to reject the in o"ering a voice to countless unheard women, and like a president they’d known (male and wealthy), she oppression of deeming someone “other” than what we are; can also inform traditional media coverage. 4 5 Katana Gégé Bukuru described how women in the The day after the conference ended came a troubling About a week after the elections, the Iranian regime In a memorable moment during the conference, Shirin Democratic Republic of Congo and other central reminder of how challenging the environment can be for cracked down on the post-election dissent, jailing Ebadi redefined democracy as not only a method of African countries joined forces in a regional network rights activists. Burmese Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi was hundreds of civil society leaders and rights activists; government, but as a culture. “We have to create it to confront the violence of both armed militias and arrested after a bizarre incident in which an American man an unknown number were also killed by security within ourselves,” she said, “and then bring it to our the governments fighting them. “With a strong swam across a lake to her home. The Burmese military junta forces and religious militias. Among those arrested, families, to the country, to society, and international foundation and network,” Bukuru said, “they can’t shut charged Aung San with breaching the terms of her house after a raid on their home, were conference panelist organizations.” down all of it.” arrest.