TITLE: Adolescent Girls Legal Defence Fund Lead

REPORTS TO: Global Director of Programmes

MATRIX: Thematic Global Leads

LOCATION: Remote

REMUNERATION: Level 3. Competitive and commensurate with experience

ABOUT US

Founded in 1992, Equality Now Is an international human rights organization dedicated to ending violence and discrimination against women and girls and promoting the use of the law to advance their human rights. Equality Now fights for the protection and promotion of the human rights of women and girls around the world through legal advocacy. Working with grassroots women’s and human rights organizations and individual activists, Equality Now documents violence and discrimination against women and mobilizes national and international action to support efforts to stop these abuses. The organization’s work is focused on four main program areas: Legal Equality, End Sexual Violence, End Harmful Practices, and End Sex Trafficking.

With a global team of over 60 staff members and offices in Beirut, London, Nairobi, and New York as well as a presence in Delhi India, Tbilisi Georgia, and Washington D.C USA, campaigns are centered on four programmatic areas: Legal Equality, End Sexual Violence, End Harmful Practices (including child marriage and female genital mutilation – FGM), and End Sex Trafficking, with a cross-cutting focus on the unique needs of adolescent girls.

The organization had an ambitious 2017-2021 strategic plan which resulted in enhanced presence and work in MENA, Eurasia, and LAC regions. In 2020, in response to the pandemic, we restructured the organization to become a dispersed organization. The organization will be embarking on a strategic refresh (2022-2024) this year. Current priorities include expanding programs in MENA, the Americas, and Eurasia as well as capacity building with an emphasis on development and communications activities. The 2022 budget is $13 million.

BACKGROUND

Women and girls are discriminated against socially, economically, and in the law around the world. Equality Now seeks to bring about legal and systemic change to address gender inequality. Our programs endeavour to advocate for the establishment and expansion of laws that protect the rights of all women and girls; the repeal or amendment of discriminatory laws; and to ensure existing good laws and policies are implemented through building sustainable partnerships (particularly civil society and other local actors) that will sustain the changes and further the equality agenda. We work through four pathways, namely Legal, Advocacy, Collaboration and Resource Mobilisation.

Our work over the last 30 years has shown us the very specific challenges that adolescent girls face. Many violations of rights and many forms of violence against women and girls (female genital mutilation, child marriage, incest, rape, etc.) happen in adolescence and we have found that social systems discourage reporting and legal systems are ill-equipped to provide justice. In addition, there is very little investment in building protective assets of girls themselves to increase agency and reduce vulnerabilities.

In 2008 we established the Adolescent Girls Legal Defence Fund (AGLDF) to take on strategic litigation cases on issues impacting girls that were pervasive. The AGLDF has taken on 22 cases in 20 countries that resulted in 13 legal victories, 3 changes in law, an ongoing case at the IACtHR and 3 long term engagements with governments to bring about systemic changes in laws and legal process. The ultimate objectives of AGLDF are to raise awareness of issues of girls’ rights, and learn from girls' experiences and voices to ensure that laws and legal procedures are conducive to access to justice. Learning from AGLDF has informed work in all 4 of our thematic areas. The AGLDF original strategy is linked here, and associated report is here. AGLDF is supported by its own Advisory Board that meets once a quarter. In 2015, we started The GENEROSITY of GIRLS Fund (TGGF) with funding from a donor to invest directly in building girls protective assets and thereby reducing vulnerability. This Fund currently invests in safe spaces for girls in Bolivia, Paraguay, Sierra Leone and Kenya .

Our work with adolescent girls continues to involve (i) taking on cases of violations of girls’ rights with a view to establishing legal precedents and/or changing laws or procedures that impede access to justice; (ii) creating awareness of these issues through communications and other strategies; (iii) facilitating legal reform aimed at addressing girls’ rights; (ivi) supporting girls as activists; and (v) providing small grants to organizations that are working directly with girls to build their agency and protective assets through The GENEROSITY of GIRLS Fund..

The Position

Equality Now has not focused on strategic litigation through the pandemic years and seeks to renew its focus on AGLDF and TGGF with a view to learning from and scaling up both these efforts.

Reporting to the Global Director of Programs, this position will be tasked with refreshing the AGLDF strategy, revitalising the AGLDF board, and devising ways to learn from and possibly scale up TGGF. They will work closely with the Global Director of Programs to establish ways of working with the Global Leads of each of our four thematic areas as well as Regional Representatives to ensure that the AGLDF strategy informs work across the organization - strengthening Equality Now’s work with and for girls, especially adolescent girls across all of its program areas, ensuring that the organization is learning about what works best to support girls to bring about change their situations and listening to girls’ experiences of accessing justice, and that this learning informs all its programs as well as the grants under The GENEROSITY of GIRLS Fund.

Responsibilities

Strategy and fund development

• Reviewing the reports and assessments of AGLDF and TGGF and working with the Programme Leadership Team to review and refresh our AGLDF and TGGF strategies to ensure Equality Now is effective in bringing about positive change from the perspective of adolescent girls’ on legal protection and access to justice.
• Providing leadership to the implementation of the revised strategy.
• Developing a clear understanding of Equality Now’s value add in the adolescent girl space to inform:

1. The direction and growth of AGLDF and the role of the AGLDF Advisory Board
2. The development of TGGF, including documenting learning from this Fund to inform scaling

• Developing a portfolio of strategic litigation cases on girls rights that are girl centered and girl informed, working closely with thematic Global Leads to ensure they are embedded in long term strategic change initiatives, so that we can take full advantage of the outcomes.
• Work with the relevant Global Lead to ensure that the cases involving girls and adolescent girls follow AGLDF processes and learnings are documented.
• Working with the thematic Global Leads to integrate learning from girls’ experiences - of accessing justice (from our own and others’ work) and from an intersectional perspective - into our thematic strategies, practice and thought leadership; As much as possible, and where appropriate, learning from girls themselves.

Management

• Developing and managing the AGLDFand TGGF in ways that align with our thematic strategies.
• Instituting ways of working with the Global Leads and Regional Representatives to ensure that AGLDF strategy and work are integrated across the organization.
• Coordinating and taking responsibility for the engagement and development of the AGLDF Advisory Board.
• Generating annual reports on our work with adolescent girls, the AGLDF and TGGF, and regular updates for the AGLDF Advisory Board and donors, with a view to scaling up AGLDF and TGGF.

Representation

• Represent Equality Now in global and national fora and in the media on issues facing adolescent girls and in particular on strategic litigation cases, and creating enabling environments for adolescent girls to participate where appropriate.
• Representing Equality Now with donors and generating a social media supporter base around the issues of adolescent girls.
• Collect, collate and analyse information on Equality Now’s strategic approaches to working with and for adolescent girls -including in strategic litigation, class actions and through partners - to inform our programming and develop materials to influence others’ approaches to adolescent girls.
• Working closely with the thematic Global Leads to provide thought leadership externally and internally on issues affecting adolescent girls’ legal equality and access to justice, to influence laws, systems and procedures and accountability.

Technical Support

• Providing technical support to campaigns on the most effective and appropriate ways to ensure that Equality Now is engaging with and learning from adolescent girls’ experiences, solutions and aspirations.
• Working with the thematic Global Leads and the monitoring, evaluation and learning team to ensure all programme strategies have taken the specific experiences and needs of adolescent girls into account in programme design, delivery and monitoring.
• Advising on and supporting teams to ensure the safeguarding of girls during strategic litigation and participatory advocacy processes. Overseeing partners’ practical and psycho-social support to girls during strategic litigation.
• Ensuring appropriate attention is paid to girls’ wellbeing throughout local advocacy, media and social media campaigns.

Requirements

• A law degree or other relevant degree.
• You will have a minimum of 5 years hands on experience in rights based work and access to justice with adolescent girls, particularly in the global south.
• You will be able to evidence your skills and knowledge as a thought leader in the area of adolescent girls.
• You will have experience of the use of strategic litigation as a means to achieve legal and procedural change.
• You will be knowledgeable and confident in areas of international law that impact most on adolescent girls.
• You will be confident and experienced in public speaking, media and donor relationship building.
• You will have developed effective networks and be able to show how they brought about change.
• You will be able to demonstrate your expertise in safeguarding and child protection.
• You will be able to communicate exciting and impactful advocacy processes that you have led in a variety of formats.
• You will be conversant and confident in monitoring and evaluation, and report writing for different audiences.
• You will have a good understanding of grant management processes.
• You will be able to demonstrate good skills in project, methodology and strategy design, development and adaptation.

Desirable:

• Proficiency in French, Spanish or Arabic

APPLICATION PROCESS

To apply: Please visit: https://equalitynow.applytojob.com/apply/Qk6MUMF0AQ/Adolescent-Girls-Legal-Defence-Fund-Lead

No calls please. This is a remote position.

Due to the volume of applicants anticipated for this role, only shortlisted candidates will be contacted for an interview.

Equality Now is an Equal Opportunity employer. Equality Now is strong because it is diverse. We actively seek a diverse applicant pool and encourage candidates of all backgrounds to apply. Equality Now does not discriminate on the basis of disability, age, gender identity and expression, national origin, race and ethnicity, religious beliefs, or sexual orientation. We welcome all kinds of diversity. Consultants are selected on the basis of ability, in accordance with all country and location specific laws.

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