Lessons Learned from 25 Years of Resistance and Remembrance
Communities Drive Change
justice programs in their home communities through skills building. This phase of UNITE will explore three primary threads: 1) how the legacies of colonialism and slavery manifest as systemic racism today; 2) how histories of domination and exclusion related to Indigenous rights, land rights and economic rights connect to the disproportionate impact of climate change on poor and marginalized communities; and 3) how amplifying historically silenced narratives of women, victims, racial and ethnic minorities and other excluded communities can counter the extremism and discrimination so prevalent in contemporary societies. The academy will bring together human rights defenders from Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), and ethnic and racial minority groups in Europe and North America to learn from and with one another. By providing training and mentoring, ICSC will equip participants with new skills to develop context-specific, victim-centered and gender responsive memory initiatives in their local communities. In addition, financial and programmatic support will be provided to all participants to develop relevant pilot initiatives in their communities, such as exhibitions, advocacy campaigns, policy change initiatives and oral
“At the Ford Foundation, we are steadfast in our belief that those closest to the problems are the ones who hold the keys to impactful and lasting solutions. UNITE is a bold initiative that recognizes the value of empowering the next generation of leaders to tackle the intersecting crises, from racial and gender discrimination to climate change, that they face firsthand. By grounding these young leaders in the experiences and context they need to think critically, we can better find innovative solutions for change, because we can’t achieve a brighter future without first learning our lessons from the past.”
— Juliet Mureriwa, Senior Program Officer at the Ford Foundation, one of UNITE’s inaugural funders
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