Network building consultancy team

Overview

The program “Feminist Power in Action for Women’s Economic Rights” (FemPawer) aims to strengthen the capacities of young women who face multiple discrimination of economic gender-based violence (eGBV) in Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Tunisia to become leaders for change. By holding duty bearers accountable and improving the conditions for young women in the informal sector, the program ensures that discriminated young women become advocates for their own rights and propose relevant solutions and recommendations. The FemPawer program focuses on strengthening leadership, challenging prevailing social norms, and promoting women’s economic rights (WER). It is led by four consortium partners and 35 women right organizations and have already established three national networks of young women champions in Lebanon, Jordan & Palestine, with intersecting identities.

Kvinna till Kvinna, Collective for Research and Training on Development-Action (CRTDA), The Palestinian Working Woman Society for Development (PWWSD), and Arab Women Organization (AWO), together, are looking for a Network Building Consultancy Team to support the consortium in taking forward the national networks to become a regional network, for exchanging learning, strategizing, and supporting in Lobby and Advocacy activities.

About Kvinna till Kvinna

The Kvinna till Kvinna Foundation has defended women’s rights since 1993. Today, we are one of the world’s leading feminist women’s rights organizations, working directly in areas affected by war and conflict to strengthen the influence and power of all women. We work closely together with around 150 partner organizations in 20 countries to defend women’s rights, achieve gender equality and justice, and reach lasting feminist peace. We work in both conflict-affected and humanitarian contexts, supporting women’s rights and peace building with a long-term perspective. We strive to be a flexible and reliable partner for women’s rights organizations in these contexts, supporting them to adapt their work to the state of conflict and emergencies.

About other members in the consortium

AWO has been operating in Jordan since 1970, their mandate is to promote gender equality and women’s rights. CRTDA has been operating in Lebanon and regionally since 2003 and their mandate is to promote gender and citizenship equality and social justice and to have women become politically, socially, and economically autonomous and give them the voice and agency needed to participate in political and social societal spheres. PWWSD has been operating in Palestine since 1981 as a social movement and registered in 2001, and their mandate is to strive for national liberation, gender equality, the eradication of all forms of discrimination against women, and activate women’s participation in social and democratic change.

Background

Young women increasingly find themselves with casual work or work in an informal sector where protections are limited and offer few opportunities to build new skills, especially under an environment where mobility between the formal and informal sector is restricted and slow. Informality rates are highest among youth between the ages of 15 and 24 years. Informal employment tends to be higher amongst those with lower educational attainment levels but even those with higher education are consistently engaged in the informal economy with rates between 20-40%.

Young women are more exposed to eGBV as they have limited or no access to any social protection. Despite contribution to the economy, informal workers especially women continue to be marginalized, criminalized, and unrecognized. In the informal employment sector, young women are at high risk of experiencing harassment, verbal, physical and sexual abuses, investigations (for ex. on immigration status), exclusion from legal provisions including social protection, violent enforcement of gendered division of labor. The lack of representation and voice are most pronounced in the informal sector, especially for youth and women. Their realities and concerns are not enough voiced; they are not entitled to full protection of labor laws, social benefits such as pension, health insurance or paid sick leave; they routinely work for lower wages and in unsafe conditions, including risk of sexual harassment; they are vulnerable to long term poverty. Furthermore, these aspects are enforced further with cases of harassment outside the workforce, domestic and intimate partner violence, and lack of access to justice.

The consortium plans to initiate a regional movement of young women who serve as champions for intersectional thinking and inclusion across the four countries. The network will support the women right organizations in their lobby and advocacy, by bringing in the lens of intersectional youth leadership. Country clusters are already formed in Lebanon, Palestine and Jordan, focusing on leadership, advocacy, capacity development for the young women and development of a network strategy. To further expand on the country clusters, we wish for the young women champions networks from the four countries to meet face-to-face at regional level, exchanging learning, strategizing, and supporting in L&A activities.

Objectives

1. Set up the regional network of young women by organizing three online sessions in 2023.
2. Engage with existing pool of networks, to connect young women champions to new knowledge, opportunities, resources, and each other.

Methodology

The consultancy team will be working closely with a working group composed of members from consortium partners to further elaborate the activity and define the objective and content of the sessions for 2023.

The consortium has tentatively brainstormed on potential topics to be further developed with the consultants:

1. Introductory session to get to know each other.
2. Building regional networks & what it means to be in a network. What it means to be a champion and what challenges you could face when defending women’s rights.
3. Sharing experiences of eGBV, how to tackle them, and topics that can be taken at a regional level.

Deliverables

• Concept note for each of the sessions.
• Organize and facilitate three online sessions. External experts/guests can be brought into the sessions, after we define the activities.
• One final report
  • Documenting how the regional network has been established.
  • Reporting on the quantitative and qualitative indicators that we agree on together.
  • Recommendations for future activities to ensure continuous dialogue and engagement between the young women champions.

Timeline

The consultancy related activities are expected to be carried out over a period of four months (September 01, 2023, to December 31, 2023). The first session should be scheduled for October 2023.

The consultant when planning the timeline of the work should take into consideration that a “Working Group” will be involved in reviewing and providing feedback at different stages of the consultancy.

Qualifications

The consultancy team should be composed of experts in network and movement building, who meet the below desired criteria:

• Ability to demonstrate experience in and knowledge in network building,
• Ability in facilitating group sessions,
• Professional experience working with women’s rights organizations,
• Professional experience in conducting similar work is preferable,
• Full proficiency in spoken and written Arabic and English, and French for people carrying the assignment in Tunisia,
• Ability to handle tight deadlines in a professional manner,
• Great communication skills,
• Organized and timely,
• Creative in overcoming barriers and ability to coordinate with multiple entities.

Women and people with intersecting identities are highly encouraged to apply.