Tag Archives collective agency

No feminist march for tonight: What spontaneous activism can teach us about maintaining unity in diversity

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The last-minute cancellation of the Feminist March that was set to take place in Amsterdam earlier this year due to safety concerns and organizational challenges led the organizers and participants of the march to ponder the challenges facing feminist activism. In this blog article, Elliot YangYang, who attended the event as a participant, reflects on what transpired and highlights the importance of maintaining agency amidst external pressures.

Photo by Claudio Schwarz on UnsplashPhoto

On 10 March, just two days after International Women’s Day, a march for women’s rights organized by Feminist March was set to take place in Amsterdam. Feminist March is an organisation that focuses on protests and different feminist programmes. The purpose of the march with the same name was “to work to strengthen the bonds within the feminist community and build a brighter, more equitable future for all of us.”

But the march was unexpectedly cancelled approximately three hours before the official assembly time through an announcement by the organisation, which on its official website and social media platforms cited safety concerns, exacerbated by unpredictable circumstances, the presence of law enforcement bodies, and a shortage of volunteers for crowd control. While the official event was cancelled, some participants nevertheless gathered and unofficially marched through the streets of Amsterdam.

Five days later, the organization released a statement announcing its dissolution following the resignation of some board members and the general manager, citing the inability to meet the expectations of supporters and allies. This came as a surprise to those of us who had signed up to participate in the march, yet it is unsurprising given the myriad challenges that feminist movements face. This article reflects on my experience of the spontaneous march that took place after the formal event’s cancellation and offers reflections on the challenges facing feminist marches today.

The show must go on

Even though I knew that the event had been cancelled, I still made my way to the original gathering location, Dam Square. It was comforting to see that, despite the significantly reduced turnout, around 100 people had nevertheless gathered there, spontaneously giving speeches and walking together from Dam Square to Museum Square. Most of them came on their own initiative, and their demands were varied, ranging from concerns about the current war in Gaza, to women’s rights in general, to the rights of queers and a variety of other demands. The crowd gathered spontaneously to form an improvised protest space.

When I arrived at Dam Square, a group of Palestinian protesters were already on the scene, separately protesting the war on Gaza. Then the feminist community joined the protest they had started in solidarity with the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, aligning with the “intersectional” ethos advocated by the third wave of feminism.(1) The topic of focus remained close to the feminist interests of responding to real crises, especially to wars disproportionately affecting women, children, and marginalized and vulnerable people. The marchers thereafter split up: feminists and protesters against the war on Gaza remained on the scene, while a group of Turkish feminist activists began waving their flags and initiated a separate walk.

Showing up instead of staying away

As an activist, I often find myself grappling with the following concern: under the umbrella structure of the march as a spectrum that accommodates all individuals, how can organizations and individual activists alike navigate different challenges without losing sight of their core objectives and the issues they seek to address?

The failure to communicate different perspectives and expectations seemed to be a core reason for the Feminist March’s cancellation and the eponymous organization’s dissolution. It is a pity that this impeded our efforts. But we can also learn from it. 

I posed the above question to Came Bilgin and Song Song — two participants of the march whom I interviewed. Before that, we had a conversation about their experiences as activists. Came Bilgin is a feminist activist from the Workers’ Party of Turkey, which insisted on continuing the march despite its cancellation. She mentioned that rallies and marches represent an active presence of activists, especially in environments such as Turkey fraught with state violence and pervasive social malice. Therefore, despite being aware of the decision to cancel the march, she still appeared at the scene along with other members of her organization to participate in the march. They did not think it would have been more dangerous to participate in a march in the Netherlands than in the feminist marches in Turkey, which shows a different perspective from the organizers of the march, who believed that it was not safe to protest.

This sentiment resonated with Song Song, a Chinese student studying in the Netherlands who had participated in the march as an individual. They also emphasized the importance and symbolic significance of simply showing up, which protesters did even when facing severe violence during protests in China. Thus, they also felt that despite possible safety concerns, it was worth showing up.

On-site photos (Workers’ Party of Turkey). Photo provided by the organiser.

Both interviewees expressed their discontent regarding the organization’s abrupt cancellation of the event and voiced their disappointment about the diminished turnout compared to previous years. Nevertheless, they commended the spontaneous march that ensued for showing the persistence of the protesters in marching for their cause.

Finding a voice and maintaining agency

Song Song’s response in particular opened up my exploration into how both organizations and individuals maintain their agency when setting agendas before and during marches. ‘This was my first time shouting feminist slogans in Chinese at a rally; it had never occurred in an organized form before. We don’t necessarily need them [the Feminist March organization itself],’ remarked Song Song. They believed that because it was an unorganized, agenda-less march, they had the opportunity to tell their story in their own language. This reflects an ongoing power dynamic where activists from different backgrounds seek to use their own language to voice their concerns and to legitimize their agendas in organized gatherings. Finding their voice in marches led by organizations from the global north can be challenging, particularly for activists from the global south, who often cannot hold large-scale protests and rallies in their own countries.

However, this is not an insurmountable problem. The decentralized place-making of spontaneous marches directly undermines this barrier. The configuration of the march as a form of “autonomy” can be “reconfigured by new and complex scale politics that reconfigure the relationship between the scale (and location) of its activities. This creates the conditions for future possibilities. In this way, a more grassroots, decentralised and extensive network can be formed.” As soon as these actors from the global south are able to reconstruct the march with will, the march spontaneously takes place.

On-site photos (Asian feminists). Photo provided by the organiser.

Improvisation and spontaneous alternatives

In her article on “margin spaces,” American author and social critic Bell Hooks suggests that our lives depend on our ability to conceive alternative possibilities, often improvised. The spontaneous march that occurred on 10 March directly responded to the challenges faced when organized marches fail. The unplanned and improvised marching creations of the activists instead created space for radical culture.

Not deterred

This march moreover took place amidst the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, which exacerbated the challenges faced by those marching for other causes amidst the tensions between the political stance and actions of the Dutch government and the societal response. However, the spontaneous marchers who still showed up on the scene did not relinquish their feminist identities and spaces, demonstrating both their ability to assess and respond to risks and their wisdom in conceiving alternative solutions, thereby truly asserting their agency in shaping discourse and action. The “decentralized” mode still embodies its radical potential that emerges from scarcity and its ability to create spaces of resistance.

Endnotes

  1. Mann, S. A., & Huffman, D. J. (2005). “The decentering of second wave feminism and the rise of the third wave,” Science & society, 69 (1 — special issue), 56–91.

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About the author:

Elliot Yang Yang

Elliot Yang Yang is a queer feminist who studied Human Rights, Gender, and Conflict Studies at ISS, specialized in Women and Gender Studies. His research interests include transnational queer feminist movements and the intersections of gender, sexuality, and immigration.

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Women’s Week | The power and limits of women’s collective agency in fragile contexts: from pastoralist communities to refugee environments by Holly A Ritchie

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Women’s groups and networks have been cited as key instruments for fostering women’s pathways of social and economic empowerment. Yet, with limits to collective agency, Holly Ritchie argues that the emergence of broader women’s movements and struggles remains cautious and constrained in a context of fragility.

The need for empowerment in fragile contexts

In rising above the #MeToo Movement and championing change, women’s groups and networks have been cited as key instruments for fostering women’s ‘individual and collective journeys of empowerment’ (Cornwall 2016), and opening up critical space for cultural transformation and development. Such strategies may be particularly vital in fragile environments where strong patriarchal norms and attitudes persist.

For women in such contexts, ‘gender-transformative approaches’ are urged to appreciate both evolving gender norms, as well as power relations that underpin gender inequalities. Williams et al. (1994) indicated that understanding different types of power was crucial to unwrapping women’s empowerment. At an individual level, ‘power-to’ is the capacity to act, permitting agency and creativity. ‘Power-within’ relates to inner strength, referring to self-confidence, self-awareness and assertiveness. Meanwhile, ‘power-with’ involves collective power, such as through women’s groups and networks that may provide strength to their members through solidarity and support.

Collective action promoting pathways of empowerment

Beyond an activity or intervention that is carried out on women, or for women, traditional feminists and recent empowerment researchers highlight the importance of women’s recognition of their own power alongside women’s active collaboration in promoting pathways of empowerment (Cornwall 2016). In particular, women’s collective action and organisations is emphasised as a ‘force for positive change’, at both a local level, and through their influence on laws and policies that can promote gender equality (Htun and Weldon 2010).

At a grassroots level, women’s organisation through savings groups, such as Self Help Groups (SHGs) and Village Savings and Lending Associations (VSLAs), are viewed as fundamental tools for stimulating women’s empowerment and market development. Beyond facilitating access to assets, they are described to be ‘gender-transformative’ in opening up opportunities to challenge discriminatory gender norms and barriers, for example domestic labour inequities, sexual violence, and unequal access to education and health services, reinforcing gender inequalities, and inhibiting inclusive growth, and development.

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Somali women attending a ’16 days of Activism’ event in Eastleigh, Nairobi, Kenya. Photo: Holly A Ritchie

In marginalised rural communities in East Africa, NGOs such as CARE have established VSLAs, predominantly with women (20-25 per group). In my research in remote parts of Somaliland[1], pastoralist women’s social organisation in VSLAs was shown to boost women’s skills and financial literacy, as well as enhance women’s confidence to be household contributors. This has both encouraged petty trading activities and business initiatives, and triggered women’s greater involvement in household and community decision-making.

For pastoralist women that have often missed education, participation in such groups was described to be the ‘largest driver of change’ in women’s lives, influencing control over their livelihoods, changing perceptions of women, and even fostering new self-beliefs amongst women that they could be community leaders: “Before women’s roles were confined to the household but now we are outside of the house, in public, creating role models for other women…there is a big change in community attitudes”.

Women’s empowerment in fragile settings

In practice in fragile settings, women’s empowerment may often be more subtle and gradual however, and one dimension of empowerment (e.g. participation in decision-making) may have knock-on effects to other dimensions of women’s lives over time (e.g. access to resources and markets) (Mahmud 2003), particularly if there is contextual receptivity and space for individual and collective agency. Yet with instability and a lack of trust, there may also be structural setbacks to individual achievements and collaborative endeavours, and non-linear pathways of change.

Meanwhile, insights from my refugee research have illuminated tentative trends of women’s ‘forced’ empowerment in displacement contexts, and links to collective action (Ritchie 2018). Prompted by circumstance, refugee women elaborated various cultural challenges as they endeavoured to support their families through forging new social and economic norms. Yet such new practices – including women’s increased public mobility, and new work norms in enterprise – remained uncertain, without a process of negotiation and agreement with male family members, and with little environmental support.

My research looked at the precarious nature of changing gender roles and relations for refugee groups, particularly as men remain excluded with little access to acceptable work, and struggled for their own identity and authority (Kleist 2010). In protracted refugee environments however—such as Somali refugees in urban Kenya—the research highlighted women’s own cooperative strategies boosting solidarity and support for new practices through the development of organised groups, and even engagement in social activism.

The need for a ‘critical consciousness’

Yet with situational fluidity, my recent refugee research in Kenya indicates that women’s refugee groups may be vulnerable to a loss of leadership and momentum, as group heads are granted asylum in the US and elsewhere, curtailing the development of refugee groups, women’s cooperation and a broader movement for social change. Ultimately, for women’s own growth and development, Kabeer (2011) highlights the importance of a ‘critical consciousness’ amongst women that may unleash women’s greater struggles for ‘gender justice’. But arguably with limits to collective agency, the emergence of such movements and struggles remains cautious and constrained in a context of fragility.

[1] Ritchie (forthcoming)  ‘Trends in Gender and Pastoralism in the Horn of Africa’.Synthesis paper. CARE International.

References

Cornwall, A. (2016) ‘Women’s empowerment: what works?’ Journal of International Development 28 (3): 342–359.

Htun M, Weldon L. (2010) ‘When do governments promote women’s rights? A framework for the comparative analysis of sex equality policy’, Perspectives on Politics 8: 207–216.

Mahmud, S. (2003) ‘Actually How Empowering is Micro-credit?’, Development and Change, 34: (4): 577-‐605.

Kabeer, N. (2011) ‘Between Affiliation and Autonomy: Navigating Pathways of Women’s Empowerment and Gender Justice in Rural Bangladesh’, Development and Change 42(2): 499–528.

Kleist, N. (2010) ‘Negotiating respectable masculinity: gender and recognition in the Somali diaspora’, African Diaspora. 3(2): 185–206.

Ritchie (2018) ‘Gender and enterprise in fragile refugee settings: female empowerment amidst male emasculation—a challenge to local integration?’, Disasters, 42(S1): S40−S60

Williams, S., Seed, J. & Mwau, A. (1994) Oxfam Gender Training Manual. Oxford: Oxfam.

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Holly A Ritchie is a (post doc) research fellow at the ISS, with a strong interest in gender, norms and social change in economic development in fragile environments. Her work has spanned Afghanistan, East Africa and the Middle East. Ritchie’s blog article titled  Hyper-masculinity: a threat to inclusive community development in fragile environments can also be viewed on the ISS Blog.