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It's Monday the 26th of October 2020 and I'm with Carolina Gottardo by Zoom. Carolina is a feminist migrant human rights activist and was director of the Latin American Women's Rights Service for more than five years between 2012 and 2017. LAWS is a user-led feminist and human rights organization addressing

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the practical and strategic needs of Latin American migrant women displaced by poverty and violence. Carolina is also a member of the UN Women's Global Expert Working Group on Gender and Migration. Carolina is sharing her experience of working in the women's voluntary and community sector and campaigning for

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women's rights for the sisters doing it for themselves our kind. Carolina if we can begin with what influenced your decision to work in the sector and for women's rights. Hi Helen and thanks for the question. I migrated to London in 1998 to do my master's and I mean for personal situations I stayed in London

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and I actually started working on human rights issues from before when I was in Colombia. I'm a migrant from Colombia and most of my work at the beginning in the UK was on in general on human rights but around 2008-9 I actually started working mainly on women rights issues. What influenced me is that I did

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a lot of work on women rights and gender equality in Asia, Africa and Latin America working with a with a UK organization during those years but an organization working overseas and I felt very strongly about intersectional issues. So intersectionality was kind of the thing that attracted me so it was

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mainly about intersectionality between gender and other strands or other diversity strands. So I was for instance working with disabled women in Central America or Dalit women in India and indigenous women in Bolivia and it was just looking at that intersectionality between gender and race or disability

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etc that I became very very interested about this and since then I just continued working on gender equality and women rights issues. The thing that I or the issue that has attracted me the most is the intersectionality between gender and asylum and migration which is really what

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I have been dedicated to ever since. Oh I can hear you Helen. So were you influenced at all by the establishment of the first women's refuge? I imagine coming from Colombia you were probably not aware of the refugee being set up in the 1970s. No I

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wasn't in the UK at that time. I was actually quite young at that time and I was in Colombia so no that wasn't that wasn't so much of an influence for me but the feminist movement in the UK certainly influenced me. More in later years in my life because my first interest in the sector really came

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from this from working on women's rights issues overseas and then I started to work on women's rights issues in the UK. And what attracted you to women's rights? Basically as a migrant woman myself I just felt very strongly about the fact that is not the same for instance to be a migrant woman or a migrant man

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and the same with all the different kind of equality strands. I mean by working so closely on these issues I just could see the multiple layers of discrimination that were kind of accumulating on women and I just I just felt that something needed to be done on that on that specific issue. I have been

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working with migrants and refugees and asylum seekers initially and then then when I basically was almost a click for me to decide to join different struggles and women rights became almost the entire focus of my on my kind of career or my struggle I wouldn't call it career it's a struggle or it's a life it's a

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life of struggle and it has been ever since but it was just because of the situations that I was with with witnessing on the ground so it didn't come it didn't come as a theoretical thing it came really about meeting women that were experiencing multiple layers of discrimination and

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having the honor of working with them getting inspired by the resilience and then deciding to do something about it rather than any theory it was really much more based in practice and in pure willingness to try to do something about it. Which brings us nicely to our next section which is who has inspired you

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in the past and who inspires you now? Yeah so actually it's very similar to what I was saying before I don't get inspired by important prominent figures or something like that I get inspired by real women on the ground so the people that I found most most inspiring have been some people that you will think

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have been completely excluded by society because they have and it has been I mean I have two in my mind very clearly but there are many many that have had the honor to me but one of them I met in the UK and another I met in Australia but they are both refugee women both of them are refugee women but actually some of

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the most admirable and resilient people I have ever met so for me if any any other woman have faced what they have faced I don't even know how they would have managed but they not only they did they kind of went through all those struggles but they became leaders and leaders not only in their own community

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but also in the countries of destination so in the UK or in Australia so I'm talking about women that had to face sexual and gender-based violence and I'm talking about torture and like major issues and went through all the struggles had to leave their countries fearing persecution etc and came to

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countries where they were discriminated fully discriminated in both cases and despite all the different factors they just stood strongly and became leaders and kind of fought until the end so this is the sort of women that I admire is not it's not necessarily yeah people that you will think oh wow this person

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is more is more the women that I have been so lucky to meet and that I have seen standing against the odds and showing that women's power and that agency that characterizes women and that I find absolutely mind-blowing and inspiring one of them is from Afghanistan and the other of them is

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from Pakistan actually and I find them absolutely inspiring in the life journey and motivational for whatever I do and again they cut across this intersectionality between being women and in some and kind of survivors of domestic violence and sexual violence in one case and also being being refugees

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could you share one of their journeys with us for the archive yes I could share the journey of one of them so one of them I mean both in reality but one of them is one of them is a refugee women from Afghanistan she spent quite a long time living in Iran in a refugee camp she actually had to leave her

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children there she went at some point she went to when the situation got a bit better she was working as the head of women's service services in one of the provinces in Afghanistan in a country like that when she was there she was tortured like in the worst way and she almost died and finally she I mean after

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many many many different journeys and difficulties and traveling to other countries etc she was she was able to access the women at risk program and she ended up being resettled in Australia she came with no English like zero absolute zero English and she's now starting to become a lawyer she was a

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lawyer in Afghanistan and she became a community leader and now her English is still developing but she's an amazing like she has brought so many women from the Hasara community with her and has kind of gone through all that trauma and really has inspired so many other women that's one person and the other person

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is in the UK I had also the honor to meet this woman from Pakistan survivor of domestic violence she disabled came to the UK applied for asylum asylum application rejected this is around the time of 9-11 of 9-11 so a lot of those applications were being rejected she had no legal advice took her case all the way

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through the European Court of Human Rights by herself survived so much discrimination on the way and got her case finally approved and recognized as a during the time that she couldn't because as you know women in the UK cannot work when they are applying for asylum she actually volunteered in so

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many places and she even became an advisor for the London like the London group on refugees at that level I mean the most amazing woman and just being able to take her own case to the European Court of Human Rights and doing that I just found it absolutely incredible so these two women and there

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are many but I mean this is two I can mention and I always find very very inspiring so this is the people that gives me the drive because I always think oh my god what they have done I mean we should all be kind of fighting for women rights in any sort of way we can if people that have gone through so

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much can do it how do you think women's leadership is different to men's leadership or do you think there is a difference oh I definitely do I think that women's leadership is feminist and for me feminism is a very important word you know women's leadership is a it's about sisterhood it's about

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togetherness it's not necessarily about competition but it's more about community and it's also about solidarity and it's also about inclusion and that's very different because I think male leadership sometimes could be a bit competitive and I'm not saying that every woman is not competitive I'm not

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saying that but I do think there is a massive difference and I I will think about sisterhood sisterhood and feminism and kind of exercising it together so I certainly see a difference that's not to say that every woman will lead in that way and we have been seen many examples I mean you wouldn't say

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that say I don't know Margaret Thatcher or something like that he's going to it's a feminist leader etc obviously not I'm talking about what it what I think through women's leadership and it doesn't mean that women's leadership is what all women do I think some women actually exercise leadership like men

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because they try to fit in or to just play those dynamics of power I'm talking about women's leadership in the sense of sisterhood and not necessarily for self-interest but for some something bigger than that so I certainly see a difference and that's the one that I think we should aspire to as women

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leaders to be kind of genuine genuine feminist leaders. I cannot hear you. Can you give me an example of women's leadership in action? I think an example of that is very much like a lot of the women's leaders that I met in the UK in the feminist movement will will be an example of that I mean for me they I work very very closely with the BAMER with the BME with the BAMER women's movement

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in the UK so the leaders working for feminist organizations that work from a specific ethnic minorities and the sense of sisterhood that there was between us and and the way that I saw so many of them and the way we kind of work together and support each other and we're all going there for the cause and

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where I mean and our cause was a multiple cause it was the cause of women's rights but it was also an issue of race and it was it's also an issue of the way all these struggles got came together and we supported each other I met some so many amazing woman and I'm sure you have

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interviewed many of them but it was such a such a pleasure and an honor to work with with an amazing bunch of women and it was all about women's power and how to exercise it in that way which is inclusive and which is which is full of solidarity rather than competition. You've already touched on this but what

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makes a women's approach to leadership successful? I think it's this thinking that goes beyond individual into collective into thinking about all women into thinking about inclusion into thinking about yeah beyond one's self interest you know I mean men in a way are even the society and the way they

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are socialized is very much focused on gathered towards competition so who is the toughest the fittest blah blah all of that and that's the way patriarchy works unfortunately I mean this is exactly a sort of system we need to bring down it's not about competition it's not about patriarchy it's about

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collaboration it's about it's about togetherness it's about sisterhood it's about inclusion so women's leadership needs to be inclusive and it needs to be inclusive in many many different ways it's all it also needs to be collaborative non-hierarchical it's not about imposition it's not about

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competition it's about dialogue it's about a common approach and it's about the common good and I always think it's also a women's power of course but that's that's part of my own my own beliefs as a feminist woman that was been in this struggle for a while and what what motivates you as as a leader

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um in I mean for me a lot of the things that motivate me are the ones that I'm saying before and is the fact that I think as a leader I mean I think women together can achieve so much more that are separate separate entities or doing things by themselves that feeling of sisterhood and togetherness motivates me

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quite a lot and I have seen it operating in such positive ways in the past not to say it's perfect as I say it doesn't mean that I'm not suggesting that that everything is like oh it's all all smooth and clear I'm not saying that but I'm saying when it works it works very well in terms of my my main motivators

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is really to try to achieve change and impact on on women's lives and really for me it's always mostly about the ones that have been marginalized or disadvantaged because for me what what comes always to the fore is this intersectionality I have been talking talking to you about it so women's

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change motivates me also women's resilience motivate me clearly I mean examples I use can explain why and how definitely motivates me and also the exercise of women's power for the common good motivates me all of those things but trying to trying to achieve to achieve something that goes beyond and

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that actually has a result so it's an impact and it produces change is very motivating for me trying to see how we evolve how we together can achieve better things and how we put our grain of sand all of us to try to make that change happen. Thank you and again you've touched on on elements of this but what

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are the issues that are dear to your heart and how do you think you could influence change? So probably the issue that is dearest to my heart when thinking about women's rights and gender equality is the intersection between gender equality and migration and asylum but for me for someone like me

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clearly because these are probably the two struggles that I feel closest to so it's the struggle of women's rights and the struggle of migrants rights so the two of them coming together is what is probably the issue that is closest to my heart and I think there is a lot of work to be done there because I

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personally believe that the women's sector is not often as aware about migrants issues and the other way around the migration sector is not necessarily aware about gender issues and this happens across different countries actually it's not an issue that is it's only for one country but

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precisely and this is why it's dear to my heart because they need to raise awareness about that on the particular struggles of migrant and refugee women that face very specific issues on the top of the issues that many other women face so violence even has a different expression when it comes in in

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the multiple layers of discrimination that migrant and refugee women's women face because we're talking about always really discrimination based on gender race and migration status at the minimum that will be like you're just to begin with so raising awareness on this issue and pushing for actual change on that

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intersection motivates me a lot and this is some work that I have been doing in the UK and in different countries and I'm doing also kind of more at the global level working on this specific issue as well. So how do you think you as part of LAWS as part of the other organizations you

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have worked for and as part of the UN's expert working group has influenced change? Yeah I was thinking about this and I actually it's very nice to have a time to reflect on this and I think really for me probably in terms of how and I wouldn't say it's me I would say it's a team of us like I never like to

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attribute things to myself because I kind of see it as a part of the team but meaning the LAWS team or whatever I am team so I'm just I just might be in the position of a director there but it's not it's not only me so that's that's a very important disclaimer to begin with but in terms of LAWS for me probably

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the two kind of clear achievements is LAWS for me was very important for LAWS to become a policy organization when I also when I started it was only service provision so I was looking at many services like like casework on violence against women and girls welfare etc I was serving a lot of

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women women but it was for me very important to go beyond services because for me services are only a band-aid and to go into systemic change so to give that kind of approach to LAWS that went beyond the services much more into something more strategic and trying to influence policy was very very important

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and then I think the launch of the step up campaign that actually was me who came with that idea and I when I see what how much the campaign has has done like I when when like recently like not that recently in December 2018 when I heard how the campaign was succeeding to achieve like reporting firewalls in

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London for migrant women and I thought oh my god I I had this idea I just almost couldn't believe it how much it had gone farther so the campaign advocates for really for safety in reporting for women survivors of violence from migrant backgrounds meaning because a lot of the women who are migrants do not report

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violence so they are survivors of violence but they don't report it and that we saw all the time at LAWS and the reason why they don't report it is because they are scared of deportation and detention so because their visas they might not have a immigration status or the immigration status might be

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insecure they actually preferred sometimes to stay with the perpetrator or to deal with violence rather than to report violence and we could seen that again and again and again and these underreporting rates women being scared of the police when women being scared of going taking any sort of action to

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report violence and we started the step up campaign that LAWS started and it came up as an idea that I had to start to build up a campaign on this issue and the campaign LAWS build the campaign and then many organizations in the UK joined I had it because I was doing a lot of European work and I was getting

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familiar with this concept of firewalls between immigration control and access to services meaning access to justice meaning that if you report immigration sorry the police or or anyone you're reporting to shouldn't be disclosing your details to immigration control and the same with access to health services or

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with any service that a migrant woman wants to access and I became very familiar with that and I just thought this will be a very very good thing to do for the women that we're working with so came up with the idea of the campaigns we set up a campaign team end up getting funding for doing this and

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launched the launch the step up campaign and LAWS brought together all these group of organizations that joined that are very very strong organizations in the UK and this has there has been so many achievements ever since in terms of a step up so that I mean I couldn't actually see everything

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that happened because then I needed to move to Australia for family reasons but just the feeling of thinking that I had been like the person that generated that I just couldn't believe like how much that that because that actually has the potential of changing women's lives because if you're thinking about

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firewalls proper firewalls and then the police in London saying they are not going to report and then and then a kind of cross parliamentary group pushing on that issue that is all part of parliamentary from the two parties it's just it's just um it's just very good and one of the best things of that

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campaign is that the women including undocumented migrant women were self-advocating and for me that's so powerful so it's not me saying oh we can't report these women saying actually I'm a survivor of violence I'm undocumented and I'm coming here and saying it and I know I'm kind of a

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danger of deportation but I'm saying it so women speaking up for themselves that will never ever do this before so I I'm very happy with that obviously there is there is a way to go but that was that I'm proud of that change and then in Australia I moved from the feminist movement in the UK I'm being very active

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into working with a religious organization in the UK in Australia it was a big move and a very difficult one challenging as you might think but then what what what we have done the organization was completely gender blind and now we have started a program that is a women's safe only space for for

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women survivors or at risk of violence who are asylum seekers or migrants and it's now their main program looking at the intersection of asylum and gender in Australia it has some it has now a different number of staff and it's just won the prize for the best program in the humanitarian awards last year so it's

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amazing and this is coming out of a religious organization in the Catholic Church and also well we I have been able to train some religious people like priests and sisters on gender equality so that's good but it was it was challenging what do you think of these specific characteristics of being a

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leader in the women's sector I think I think the main word that I mentioned to you before is feminist I think of women in the leaders in leader in the women's sector needs to be feminist and feminism as we know it's a word that is very well but it's not very well understood some of us worried as a with

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rights and some people see this as a label that is negative but feminism is no more than about equality inclusion respect solidarity and all these good things that we should aspire to so a women's women's leadership should be feminist there should be also a feeling I think a women's a women's leader should

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be to believe in that sisterhood and in that solidarity that that we have talked talked about before and to look at doing things in consultation with rather than impose or or don't buy or you know if the sense of if is a women's leader to question power and to know how to manage it so we should always

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understand the sort of power we held we hold and should be able to question ourselves and question all our biases in whatever way we have them if we're meaning to be good feminist leaders and if we can't do that I think there is going to be a problem you know so it's also a question in power structures in

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every way like with gender with race etc like all of that what is your leadership style and how have you developed it my leadership style I would say is feminist definitely I is participative and consultative is non-hierarchical I don't believe in hierarchical leadership styles I

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personally they might work but it's not the ones I want to pursue you don't want people to be to be worried about you you want people to work in the same that you're working and to be all inspiring each other rather than worry about something I like it to be focused towards the common good and to be

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inclusive so that's I would say that's my leadership style I cannot even think about authoritarian models I I hate them and I even I just don't they don't come to me like I they don't come naturally to me I yeah they don't suit me obviously I have developed my leadership style through the years you know like it

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has been an evolution process like it is forever for every woman leader I mean we learn from all this we learn from and we learn from others in every way we know we learn from people that that we report we learn from people that report to us we learn from our peers and part of this leadership style is also about

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questioning ourselves and being evolving so I don't think it could be static I think it needs to be dynamic so we need to be always challenging ourselves and it's again about challenging that power I think the more the more power you get the more power you need to challenge the more you need to

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challenge power if that makes sense yeah so it's evolving I would say and I I think if it stays a stale it somehow becomes outdated so that's that's the way I will I will think about it how has your involvement in the sector impacted on you personally a lot a lot I mean I felt I always felt that I belonged to

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something bigger and as I said to you before my journey was probably a bit different because because of being a migrant woman coming from a quite conservative society like the society I come from patriarchal extremely patriarchal and conservative for me it allowed me to discover who I really was

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and that was so lovely because coming from the society where I came from I wouldn't have used the label feminist to describe myself like like say 20 plus years ago because of where I was for coming from like you know I was I was born in a conservative country to a conservative family you know all these

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things that are unto a microcosmos of what of a society and being in London and being part of the feminist sector and I mean it was again it was part of my own history but the thing is that I discovered that I had always been a feminist person but I couldn't label that because I didn't know how to and

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then it was so it was almost like because I when I was young I used to disagree with half of what I saw I couldn't even understand like issues like say house labor and the distribution in house household chores and I'm like oh but why does he have to be done by girls like you know or the

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distribution of political power or anything that was happening and that I was witnessing and that was so normal where I grew up or even the commodification the object objectification of women in Latin America is very strong like you know women need to be pretty they need to be

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dressed this way that way blah blah blah all these things you know I never liked that never and just being in this environment and yes it kind of evolving in my own style made me realize that I could finally know who I was who I had always been and I could label myself with pride so I felt I feel like belong

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to something bigger and and I felt that that I was part of this common struggle between with my sisters for women's power power so it was about growing together and facilitating the empowerment of other women and I actually do not believe that you empower anyone people empower themselves rather

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than you empowering them that doesn't really happen like that that's such a misused word but it was about that facilitating that for women to kind of discover who they are and to discover that power that they really really have it was also as part of the sector it was inspiring to see change and to know that

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there was a group of sisters working together and as I say to you before I was particularly close to our to the bomber sisters so the women from all that were leaders from other migrant communities or bomber communities in the UK because our struggle was a joint struggle it was not only a gender

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struggle it was also struggle on race and on migration so doing it together was I felt we had a lot in common how how has laws and the women's sector as a whole influenced and changed the structural position of women in the UK so lords I think the best example is the

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step up the step up my own women campaign that I mentioned to you it started by a bomber women organization which is not I mean as you know there is also some sort of hierarchy in the UK sector between mainstream organizations and BME bomber women organization is massive and that was also a struggle

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it's even a struggle within our feminist struggle if that makes sense so Lords was the organization that started this and kind of took this forward and just to see how much it has achieved for a specific group of women that are probably the most invisible and marginalized is some is very good and to

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see that it was done by by Lords by an organization that wasn't even a campaigning organization before and suddenly it just started to evolve in this way so bringing an invisible issue to the fore and trying to make it relevant and to achieve change for this group that's definitely a way where

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laws have achieved change. Lords has also achieved change for so many women I mean part of the thing that motivated me the most at Lords was to witness the journey of women so women will come as survivors of violence with very low confidence and I mean all the issues that happen when you are dealing with

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such a struggle and then it was it was very nice to see how how women were doing this process of empowering themselves bit by bit and doing their own journey also discovering whom they were and then suddenly becoming self advocates and being able to stand in front of Parliament and things like that

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so you know from starting from someone that wouldn't want to even speak to you or that the caseworker will take a long time in kind of building that trust into someone that can stand up for themselves after after kind of going through so much that was that's that's a way that Lords achieved change change definitely

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it's how it's about these women individual women journey and especially in terms of women's self-advocating for me probably the biggest group on this is undocumented migrant women because you could not think of a more excluded group I mean this is a group that no one wants to know about I mean it's women that

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don't even have the right to be there but of course they do because they I mean everyone has a right but I mean in terms of legally if there is an issue there so these are invisible women but everyone who is a survivor of violence should be to have rights I mean they are still survivors they are victims and they

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should be treated in the same way than any other woman that is from the UK or from anywhere is so this is this issue about undocumented migrant women for me is something really that has achieved change and especially about being able to attract mainstream attention from other organizations that were bigger and

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so much support for the campaign and being highlighted like in in mainstream arenas is some it's all achieving change so all of that definitely for me some even raising awareness about this in the feminist sector itself is our achieving change and how do you think the sector as a whole has impacted women's

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position I think it has impacted a lot I mean just imagine if there was not such a strong feminist sector in the UK and if there was no collective action I mean that doesn't mean that there is not still a lot to do but making this agenda shine and women's power grow and not giving up to party patriarchy is by

00:37:59.620 - 00:38:22.380

itself such a such an achievement because women rights are under threat and they still are and they are very much like today like we're facing such a backslash and we have backlash we have faced it for quite a long time and then seeing this feminist sector kind of working together and not

00:38:22.380 - 00:38:46.700

giving up is definitely part of that collective action and it's also about mainstreaming violence against women and girls you know this has been changing like it's not the same it was before it's just much more it's just much better known that what it was and it's far less accepted than what it was it really has

00:38:46.700 - 00:39:05.100

gone out to the public agenda much more it's also about bringing different struggles together which I mentioned before so understanding that the women rights struggle is one of different ones and that actually by bringing them together we are stronger so I think that's also and as part of what BAMER

00:39:05.100 - 00:39:25.920

women organizations do which is like bringing together this struggle and it goes beyond the fact of mainstreaming this and making an agenda and advancing women's power it also goes into achieving a sense of sisterhood you know this thing does so is this thing that I told you all knowing that there is this

00:39:25.920 - 00:39:50.720

group of amazing women that are there together and that are believing in your same struggle that you can count on them and that you are trying to advance something together is all of is that that is part of that is part of what has also been achieved so it goes beyond the actual change into the sense of

00:39:50.720 - 00:40:08.680

belonging the sense of feeling together this togetherness the sense of sisterhood and it I think it also goes into into increasing the confidence of the people of the women that belong to those movements you know I mean women become more confident and they become more committed to the cause and as that

00:40:08.680 - 00:40:40.200

happens they also are better able to inspire others and to kind of grow together so it's like a snowball in that way and I think it's um it's it's amazing and I know you've touched on this throughout our conversation what do you think are the greatest achievements of women's collective action yeah so is

00:40:40.200 - 00:41:01.420

that it's just it's just kind of not giving up advancing this issue making it far more relevant making not it's not so saying violence against women and girls is not okay it's not acceptable it's not a private matter it shouldn't be justified there should be no killings this is endemic you know is that is that

00:41:01.420 - 00:41:20.660

kind of increasing that collective awareness that this is wrong and that actually there needs to be accountability there needs to be accountability from whatever is happening and patriarchy is something that is simply not acceptable and there is a group of women that are simply not going to tolerate it and that

00:41:20.660 - 00:41:40.300

will go up to any kind of ends to try to stop patriarchy in the way it has been working as a kind of structural systemic issue that has been affecting us for years and years and years and again it's the same as I was saying before is this this with that sense of solidarity and togetherness and sisterhood that you

00:41:40.300 - 00:42:03.700

cannot contain because there is a point when you can't contain women women's power you can try but it's hard he's not going to be possible what do you think still needs to be done well I've been saying a lot of positive things but then on the negative side there is such a long way to go like if you look at

00:42:03.700 - 00:42:26.080

indicators in terms of gender equality I think we have years to go in every single indicator whatever you look at it political economically in economic in terms of violence against women in terms of participation etc so violence against women continues being endemic the statistics are not on our side for so

00:42:26.080 - 00:42:47.580

many issues the gender pay gap is a man is huge still political participation is still low I mean it's probably bigger than what it was before but still low you know so there is so much work ahead and at the same time it's all of that plus plus the threats of fundamentalist movements as well that are trying to to

00:42:47.580 - 00:43:12.020

get us back like in what we have achieved and you just need to see political situations across the globe that are very contemporary to sadly to to realize that the threat the threat is definitely always always there so I think I think like like in Spanish we say la lucha continua so the struggle

00:43:12.020 - 00:43:34.480

needs to continue and our fight needs to continue but I think I mean for instance you'll see in the me too movement and how widespread this has been it's kind of encouraging in terms of mainstream issues and that have gone to other parts of the media and the certain industries that were not touched by this so I think

00:43:34.480 - 00:43:52.640

we also need to find allies in in different struggles and in different sectors and continue relying on each other and continue trying to bring more women into the movement you know it cannot become it cannot be this kind of elite feminist sector that only believes that they have the truth and that

00:43:52.640 - 00:44:15.880

doesn't move is stale and has this kind of backdated ideas about how things will be it needs to renew itself it needs to use different like for instance we need to use virtual technology and different different ways of approaching and growing the movement more we need to be working with younger women we need to

00:44:15.880 - 00:44:35.800

understand what feminist means to them you know it cannot be stale it needs to be moving and it needs to be moving forward and counteracting all this all these negative trends and women's rights being under under attack it's an agenda we cannot give up on but that we need to renew constantly to try to

00:44:35.800 - 00:44:58.740

continue the interest kind of growing and to try to join with with other movements we need to be vigilant and we need to continue advancing the feminist movement and reinventing our strategies as we go along as and as the time change changes because if you look behind they have been like if you look back there

00:44:58.740 - 00:45:14.880

have been advances it's just that they are not enough and it shows that there is still a lot to do so we cannot be complacent but we cannot be over critical either so we cannot say oh everything is just a disaster now we're under attack nothing has been achieved well yeah a lot has been achieved I mean

00:45:14.880 - 00:45:37.220

you know women only got the vote in the UK in 1927 like a lot has been achieved but it's just a constant struggle and it's incremental and we need to just try to try to make it make it go faster but that we cannot achieve by ourselves and that's how we need to bring yeah younger women feminist women new technologies

00:45:37.220 - 00:45:56.020

reinvent things join with all the struggles etc so that we keep alert to the way things are changing and there are even different types of violence now that we were not dealing with before like for instance cyber violence right like that's relatively new compared with all the times you know so we have to

00:45:56.020 - 00:46:25.840

also understand how how things evolve and how to try to counteract all these new trends thank you and what are your thoughts on the future for women's rights yeah it's a little bit of what I was saying I think there is a lot of future for women rights but I think we cannot be complacent on the future of

00:46:25.840 - 00:46:45.680

women rights I think this is this is a constant struggle that we need to be investing on and that we need to be motivating more women to join to join in this in this struggle and I think we need to be we need to understand what has been achieved but we need to continue to try to strive to achieve

00:46:45.680 - 00:47:06.420

better things and to achieve them faster because I just I mean the sort of numbers that we still see in terms of violence and all of that are just simply not acceptable in a world like the one like the one we're living in so the future means more struggle but the future also means different ways of

00:47:06.420 - 00:47:25.740

thinking and the future means working with younger women and the future means continuing working together and trying to think how how do we deal with these challenges and how we just stop that not only stop their ocean but actually continue progressing women rights I mean sometimes if you think about say the

00:47:25.740 - 00:47:47.920

Beijing platform for action that was a pretty progressive document right so you would think okay how are we in terms of the Beijing platform for action and now and you know you will have like a mixed view on what has been or has not been achieved I think it's important to continue aiming high and not to give up

00:47:47.920 - 00:48:03.800

and to really really think about women's struggle as our struggle as a collective struggle and as one that we are willing to continue dedicating our lives to pursue whatever we're doing like it doesn't matter where we are saying say I'm in another country right doesn't matter I'm still pursuing the women's

00:48:03.800 - 00:48:26.840

struggle you know like and that's the way we all need to be trying to think about is that it's a common struggle for the future of women rights to to ensure that they that these threats that we're perceiving actually are counteracted and are actually advanced for equality for gender equality and for women

00:48:26.840 - 00:48:56.000

rights in the way we want to see it and in a way which is meaningful and not tokenistic. Thank you. We've kind of covered everything that we set out to is there anything that you would like to add? Just to say that I'm very pleased that this sort of project is being done because there have been so many so many

00:48:56.000 - 00:49:16.880

amazing women working in the UK sector and sometimes what we don't have is the documentation of what has been going on or these struggles or the way with the way women think or the way they work together or the way the sisterhood works the sisterhood that I'm referring to I'm very very pleased that this could be

00:49:16.880 - 00:49:39.960

documented because in reality could help other women in the future to understand what was happening during these times and to continue with that struggle because whatever happens is just time bound right now but this is a this is a this a long-term battle and it's important to to understand how how

00:49:39.960 - 00:50:01.440

it has been fought and to continue fighting it so I'm very pleased and I'm so glad that WRC is doing this and that so many women are participating and I'm really very much looking forward to hearing what my sisters have been saying I think it's a wonderful project. Thank you Carolina, it's been a pleasure

00:50:04.100 - 00:50:06.080

sharing your story.