Feminism & Gender

Never will women’s rights be sacrificed in talks with the Taliban and never will the Afghan government close women shelters. These are the promises President Karzai made to his people in the middle of a heated debate on women’s rights in Afghanistan. These are two major commitments. Judging by the overall political trends in the country, it might not be easy to stick to them. The Afghan population and international community should watch about the implementation and take the president by his word.

Ten years after the adoption of UN Resolution 1325 "Women, Peace and Security", the Gunda Werner Institute (GWI) of the Heinrich Böll Foundation in cooperation with the German Women's Security Council and Peace Women Across the Globe hosted an international conference.

It is an undeniable fact that women and men are affected differently by wars and conflicts. However, the assigned stereotypes – men as fighters, women as victims – do not do justice to the complex reality. Speech for the international Conference "Coping with Crises, Ending Armed Conflict"

 International conference of the Gunda Werner Institute in cooperation with the German Women's Security Council and PeaceWomen Across the Globe. Date & venue: October 28-30, 2010 at the Heinrich Böll Foundation in Berlin.  more»

Arsham Parsi is an Iranian LGBT Human Rights activist who lives in exile in Canada. He is the founder and head of the Iranian Railroad for Queer Refugees (IRQR), an advocacy group on behalf of LGBTs fleeing Iran. We had the chance to speak to Arsham Parsi during his visit to Berlin in early May.

Despite real changes for the Afghan people, especially women continue to suffer from human rights abuses in many areas of life. This policy paper focuses on progress and shortcomings in the area of womens rights and their participation in society, followed by a number of recommendations on how to further improve the condition of women in Afghanistan.

Recently, the power of the Taliban in connection with the attitude of the society was widely discussed, but once again gender and women issues were not highlighted. Durre Ahmed, chairperson and senior research fellow at the Centre for the Study of Gender and Culture in Lahore, about the current situation and development of the gender discourse in Pakistan.

A group of Afghan women activists from politics, media and civil society in Afghanistan met in the office of the Heinrich-Böll-Foundation in Kabul. Now they adress an open letter to the Members of Parliament.

This toolkit is a joined venture of the Heinrich Boell Foundation Afghanistan and UNIFEM Afghanistan and an outcome of the joined research project on women legislators in Afghanistan.

The roundtable conference was conducted by the Heinrich Böll Foundation in cooperation with the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC). The report is an analysis of the roundtable recommendations.

The film by Nana Yuriko describes the experiences of 5 single women in the Joint Land Titling process in Cambodia. By giving voice to these women, the Heinrich Böll Foundation hopes to contribute to improvements in the recognition and registration of women's land rights in Cambodia.

This short film by Ian White delivers insight into a women radio programme in Cambodia. Together with the Solidarity and Community Development Association the Heinrich Böll Foundation designed a training and radio programme to encourage women's participation in politics.

Gender mainstreaming needs to become an issue for society as a whole. To fundamentally change the relationship between the genders, we need not just a legal framework, but bottom-up policies, a strengthening of initiatives that target equality, and more men on board.

This paper aims, firstly, to tackle the gender political challenges of the future and to renew our understanding of gender democracy. Secondly, it gives an outline of our programme focus, defines our aims and tasks, and sets out terminology and tools of gender democratic policy.

Religion continues to have a public dimension throughout the world, and from the point of view of women’s rights to equality, there is much at stake in how religion and politics intertwine. For that purpose, the Heinrich Böll Foundation conducts an extensive research project in collaboration with UNRISD to explore the effects of this blending of religion and politics on women’s rights and gender equality.