News
Donors and Activists Collaborate to Advance the Human Rights of Sex Workers
Donors and sex worker activists from around the world gathered in Amsterdam on December 9 and 10 for a convening hosted by the Open Society Public Health Program and Mama Cash. Participants at the meeting developed an initiative entitled, "Collaboration to Advance the Human Rights of Sex Workers," which will work toward the vision that societies uphold and respect the rights and self-determination of sex workers of all genders. The collaboration seeks to generate new funds, improve existing grantmaking efforts, and advocate on issues affecting sex worker communities. It will support sex worker-led organizations with core operating costs, capacity building, and crisis response. This initiative is especially innovative in that sex workers will be at the heart of the grantmaking process.
In the coming months, the collaboration will establish its governance structure, into which participants will be drawn from sex work and donor communities. A new fund will be slated to accept donations by autumn 2011. In addition to the new fund, the collaboration will also be involved in advocating both within donor communities and externally in order to assist the sex workers' rights movement in its long-standing efforts to become more visible at the global level.
For more information on the meeting including the agenda, participant list, and reports, please see the Open Society Public Health Program Seminar Series website.
