Organising and financing for sexual and reproductive health and rights: the perspective of an NGO activist turned donor.
This paper is a reflection on some of the successess and challenges that followed in the aftermath of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) Cairo, 1994, and the capacity of civil society and of donors to address them. It is written with two voices--from my experience as an NGO activist for sexual and reproductive rights since the early 1980s and my experience as a programme officer for a donor for the last 18 months. It calls for a focus on implementation of services within public health and education systems, the need to deepen the capacities of activists and build new leaders, and the value of alliances with other movements whose goals are also being challenged by macro-economic forces and fundamentalist movements. At national level, I suggest three major goals: monitoring public sector spending, strengthening public health system capacity for implementation, and advocacy and community organisation to enable shifts in public understanding of sexual and reproductive rights. Lastly, as regards funding, it calls for dialogue about funding issues between NGOs and donors, for donors to increase national capacity development in the global south and for all those committed to change in relation to sexual and reproductive health and rights to commit themselves for the long haul, given the slow pace of change.
Klugman
Barbara
B
Ford Foundation, New York, NY, USA. b.klugman@fordfound.org
D005381:Financing, Organized; D014943:Global Health; D006806:Human Rights; D009938:Organizations; D034121:Reproductive Health Services / Q000191:economics / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000458:organization & administration; D019529:Sexuality; D016387:Women's Health