PeiYao Chen
Global Fund for Women President and CEO
Feminist organisations are reshaping power and defending justice for women and girls—amid a fierce backlash. They need our support now more than ever.
How long does it take to topple a dictatorship? Eleven days, if you watched last year’s news about Syria. Fourteen years, if you ask the women who made it happen.
Sara, a Syrian feminist activist we support, put it plainly when the Assad regime fell: “It was the result of 14 years of hard work by civil society, and by brave Syrian women on the front lines.”
How Syrian feminist groups stood up for justice
In 2011, Syrian feminist groups began delivering aid and services to the hardest-to-reach communities. Through years of war, they provided healthcare, trauma support and reproductive care when few others could. They documented human rights abuses and demanded accountability.
They didn’t wait for peace to begin rebuilding — and they refused to give up, even at great personal risk. In doing so, they laid the groundwork for women to shape Syria’s democratic future. As Sara put it, “There will be an ending for every oppression, and we’ll always win.”
Transformation doesn’t happen in headline moments, but in the years before and after, when the world isn’t watching.
Impact of funding cuts on broader society
And yet, at the very moment women are doing this long, patient work, the systems meant to support communities are being pulled back. Last year, the US gutted USAID and froze federal funding. Organisations, including our grantee partners, were forced into impossible choices — whether to keep community kitchens open, maintain shelters or sustain health clinics. The immediate shock was real; the full damage will take years to quantify.
These cuts come when women-led organisations face compounding crises. Climate disasters trigger displacement. Political instability fuels violence. Anti-gender movements coordinate across borders. For grassroots women-led organisations, navigating overlapping crises is no longer the exception, but rather the norm.
Here’s what I know from 40 years of our work: feminist organizations accomplish extraordinary things. They reshape power structures, train the next generation, and build communities’ collective power to demand justice. These activists will keep fighting regardless. But with sustained support, they can go further—and their impact can reach farther.
This International Women’s Day, I’m asking us to rise with them. Not by celebrating for a day or supporting for a year, but by standing with women for as long as it takes. Because that’s how real transformation happens.
