Composition Working Group
This European Working Group brings together WIDE+ member organisations and individuals, partner groups and networks and volunteers (young professionals, academics, activists) from across Europe. The current working group membership covers active organisations and individuals in Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands, Serbia, Italy, Romania, Germany, Denmark and Sweden.
The working group is a space for individual volunteers, and a mix of organisations. National networks that connect development, women’s-led and diaspora women’s-led organisations; feminist organisations with a migrant women leadership group in the organisation; or migrant women-led organisations or a network of such organisations. There is also space for individuals to take part and contribute, especially for individuals that are at national or local level working as feminists.
Focus of the Working Group
The working group aims to promote the rights and participation of migrant women, girls and gender non-conforming persons in democratic life throughout Europe. We want to debunk the simplistic narrative of migrant women as victims. As Bell Hooks articulated, there is power at the margins, and migrant women are powerful agents of transformative change.
We are committed to advocating for:
- National and European policies to be more intersectional, fully accounting for the multi-layered forms of discrimination faced by migrant women;
- The removal of barriers to healthcare services, including sexual and reproductive health services and protection against gender-based violence, regardless of immigration documentation/status;
- Victim protection and other support services for migrant women facing gender-based violence, without facing threat of deportation;
- Migration status that is not spouse dependent; migrant women should have the right to apply for or retain residence visas in instances of separation or divorce;
- Protection and respect of women’s human rights at borders;
- Promoting and centering the rights of trafficked women and girls;
- The rights of female migrant workers, especially those in sectors where employment arrangements are likely to be precarious, illegal, and abusive.
Migrant women are for us all women, including gender non-conforming persons, who displaced between countries, trafficked or who have moved from a third or European country to a destination in Europe.
Overall Activities
The working groups organises online and face to face capacity building events that allow for transnational exchange and learning. It facilitates and support national capacity building events. It engages in awareness raising, making migrant women’s work visible in international spaces including online and towards European policy makers. It undertakes joint advocacy towards the European Union, especially the European Parliament. It contributes to national and European movement building around promoting migrant women rights in all its activities.
Lots of the current activities are made possible through a collaborative European project; “Expanding Spaces For Capacity Building And Exchange To Strengthen Women Migrant Movement Building Across Europe”, supported by Open Society Foundation. There is a lot of room to learn from our previous activities and challenges and adjust our working group agenda. For example members propose certain new topics or advocacy spaces to engage with.
For an overview of recent and past activities, kindly visit our resources page. The implementation of the activities are facilitated or completed for a substantial part by the WIDE+ secretariat following the directions of the working group. The working group meets 10 times per year online and tries to meet once per year through a face to face meeting. It is structured through ad hoc activities and current projects.
Past Projects
Erasmus+ project led by WIDE+: “WE-EMPOWER: Expanding tools in Addressing Barrieres for Migrant Women to participate in Democratic Life”
WE-EMPOWER has been a transnational collaboration that encouraged and empowered migrant women to participate in civic and democratic action in Europe. Migrant women are for us all women, including gender non-conforming persons, people who are displaced between countries, trafficked or who have moved from a third or European country to a destination in Europe.
The project ended by November 2024 after 2,5 years of collaborative work among feminist/women-led and migrant women-led organisations with a shared mission to protect the rights of migrant women rights. The project partners have been NGO Atina, Romanian Women’s Lobby, ADRI Association, KULU-Women and Development, GADIP, Red Latinas, Alianza por la Solidaridad, Gabriela Germany, and the coordinator WIDE+.
You can read here about the outcomes and listen, view, or read the many materials developed: https://wideplus.org/we-empower-project/
Previous Project Reports (2017-2022)
- Report of the joint project: “Expanding spaces for capacity-building and exchange to strengthen migrant women movement-building across Europe”, that started in January 2020 up to August 2022 => WIDE+ OSF Report 2022_final.
- Report of the joint project: “Strengthening Innovative Solutions to Protect Female Migrant and Refugee Rights”, that started at the beginning of 2018 and ended in November 2019 => WIDEOSFmigrationpub2020.
Join the Working Group
We are very keen to welcome new partner organisations and volunteers! There is no formal membership to the working group.
However, the WIDE+ network is strengthened if members of the working group join the network as voting members. To find out more about the Terms of Reference of joining the group, please download this document: WIDE+ Migration & Gender WG_ Terms of Reference_2022.
You can contact the WIDE+ Secretariat coordinator: Gea Meijers at info@wide-network.org or gea.meijers23@gmail.com for more information and when you are interested to take part.
Overview of some of the webinars held in 2020 and 2021