The event “Women’s Strength”, hosted by Emma Bonino and organised by No Peace Without Justice and Le Contemporanee, with the support of +Europa, will be held on 6 December 2022 at “Spazio Europa” in Rome, via Quattro Novembre 149.
On the eve of Human Rights Day, it aims at supporting the struggles, courage and determination of women who take to the streets and fight for their rights, for those of future generations and for the human rights of all.
In the world’s most repressive societies, women lead the change, from Afghanistan to Iran, from Ukraine and Belarus to Iraq. This should come as no surprise: women are and always have been inherently strong.
From a young age, women are taught to be the wind under someone else’s wings, to be the “inner” force that enables men to be strong and successful in public. Now, during times of adversity, (almost always) women take on the leadership: they are the ones who manage the scarce resources to ensure the survival of the most vulnerable; they are the ones who play a series of roles to guarantee essential services and whatever else is necessary. But too often the difference – due to the ancestral patterns of respective social roles – is that women have been “allowed” to demonstrate their strength in the private sphere, but are still not allowed to do it fully in the public one.
Violence against women in public and private life is an integral part of this construct. But this is changing: violence against women in public life is increasingly in the spotlight, while women are rediscovering their strength and increasingly asking not to be excluded from the decision-making processes that affect their lives, and not to be treated as victims, but as holders of rights which deserve justice and reparation when violated.
“Women’s Strength”, with the testimonies of many activists and leaders fighting in the field, has the objective of recognizing, sustaining and encouraging these requests, for it is only this way that society as a whole can benefit from the collective strength, that is greater than the sum of its parts.
For further information, please contact gschiavoni@npwj.org
