Melinda Kramer, Women's Global Green Action Network.
Woman on Top
What can/should we do to get more women at the helm of environmental decision-making? -- Kirstin Henninger, Palampur, India
In villages and cities around the world, grassroots women are protecting their communities, stewarding their forests, rivers, and land, and transforming their local economies. The problem is many women leaders are isolated and cut off from each other's efforts. There are tens of thousands of grassroots women leaders who are a part of a movement they cannot even see.
Women's Global Green Action Network is building the mechanisms for women to locate each other, build their own alliances, and comprehend the powerful movement they are standing within. Through its regional hubs, WGGAN is working to identify and reach the burgeoning numbers of women "under the radar" who are not yet networked globally with other women advocates. We are empowering a new wave of leaders to harness the resources, information, and training they need to engage more readily in policy arenas where their important perspectives are often missing.
I have no doubt that with expanded access to communication tools, increased decision-making in resource flows, and a much greater stake in the natural capital of their communities, these women can begin enacting a global shift toward environmental sustainability and social renewal.
What lessons can environmental activists in the U.S. learn from grassroots women leaders in the global south? -- Jacob Harold, San Francisco, Calif.
The grassroots women leaders I have worked with model a powerful style of leadership -- one that is collaborative, participatory, and relationship-based. They are often contending with limited resources and significant social, economic, and political barriers, and therefore draw their strength from working in coalition, pooling resources and building broad alliances. Their messages resonate because they draw upon personal accounts; their campaigns persuade because they highlight the inextricable linkages between our environment and the health and equity of our communities; and their strategies last because they are designed to uphold generations to come. If provided the space, these women leaders can reign in a new wave of leadership that is grounded in connection, community, commitment, and sustainability.
Can you tell us all about the work you did prior to WGGAN? How did that work inspire you to form WGGAN? -- Rory Cox, San Francisco, Calif.
Prior to founding WGGAN, I was the program head for Pacific Environment's China and marine programs, where I worked alongside everyday citizens who have committed their lives to working on the front lines of the world's environmental challenges. These local activists -- many of whom were women -- pursued sustainable local economies, indigenous rights, environmental justice, and healthy equitable communities while simultaneously driving social change. It was in these communities where I witnessed the remarkable change that can emerge from a networked and empowered citizenry.
In working with the grassroots environmental NGO movement in China, for example, I watched people harness simple communication technologies in strategic and savvy ways in order to forward their efforts toward social change.
What is a constant obstacle in the work you do, and how do you overcome it (or try to)? -- Melissa Prior, Renton, Wash.
One of the biggest challenges Women's Global Green Action Network seeks to address is the lack of communication opportunities, information, and resources reaching grassroots women. Our founding grassroots women leaders are now working as a team to design the mechanisms for connecting women working across a broad and disparate range of communication access. We are mapping out the strategies for creating a multi-tiered support structure with regional hubs. These hubs will channel information, resources, and training between WGGAN and the grassroots.
Our central challenge as we grow is to continue to design our organization to take on a true peer-to-peer form, in which technology, trainings, resources, and opportunities are not only brought to the grassroots, but wherein local knowledge and expertise is also shuttled outward so it can inform a global audience.
Was there an experience or event in your early life that led you to value the earth and its resources? -- Jennifer Kramer, Chappaqua, N.Y.
Clearly it was the deep, intrinsic wisdom of my mother. (Hi, Mom.)
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