Our Mission
Our mission is to contribute to Africa’s re-birth and renewal through the advancement of a just, equitable, coherent, collaborative and visible political order that supports gender equality, health equity and socio-economic justice for sustainable development. We pursue our goals through the direct engagement of parliamentarians, political leaders, policy makers and communities across Africa.
We are committed to arresting inequality, inequity and injustice through: – Promoting active citizenry and inclusion in relevant policy, legislative, financing and accountability cycles; fostering context-responsive and transformative policies through strengthened translation and dissemination of evidence; and priming, positioning and advancing gender equality, health equity and socio-economic justice in relevant policy and political processes.
African Renaissance plays a key role in capacitating actors to continually engage on topical issues that advance their health, gender and socio-economic wellbeing. We lend our expertise to the ecosystem by enabling meaningful and strategic access to political elements, legislative processes and policy streams. We work with state and non-state actors – at regional, sub-regional, national and sub-national levels as we believe these are key in accelerating growth and sustaining an enabling environment for effective service delivery and sustainable development.
Our Programs
Advancing Gender Equality
The African Union Partnership Platform
African Renaissance and the African Union Women Gender and Youth Directorate (WGYD) have established the AU Partnership Platform. This collaboration platform focuses on strengthening partnerships, voice, visibility and accountability to support the realization of Aspiration 6 AU Agenda 2063.
African Union Agenda 2063 is Africa’s premier plan that seeks to transform the continent into a global powerhouse by 2063. It outlines Africa’s collective vision through 7 aspirations and 20 goals. The Agenda provides a framework for Africa’s renewal and transformation in the 21st century.
AU Agenda 2063 envisions an Africa that is united, democratic, and prosperous. and emphasizes the importance of peaceful cooperation and effective development strategies in realizing Africa’s full potential.
The National Sanitation Policy Initiative
In 2020 an estimated 3.6 billion people lacked safely managed sanitation services.
Gender-responsive youth-friendly and socially inclusive water sanitation and hygiene interventions hold the key to accelerating the achievement of the desired gender impacts that are specifically articulated in SDG 3, 5 and 6. African Renaissance through the National Sanitation Policy Initiative supports the integration and mainstreaming of gender into national sanitation policies and policy development processes. We understand that the impacts of poor sanitation disproportionately affects socially excluded populations that are marginalized, vulnerable and disadvantaged – and we respond by paying special attention to the needs of women and girls with a particular focus on ending open defecation, improving health for all and improving school attendance and learning for girls by raising awareness on menstrual health and hygiene practices
Affirming Health Equity
Fostering Socio-Economic Justice
In working to Reduce Inequalities, we are committed to support efforts that empower and promote the social, economic and political inclusion of all, irrespective of age, sex, disability, race, ethnicity, origin, religion or economic or other status.
African Renaissance undertakes to support efforts that ensure equal opportunity and reduction of inequalities of outcome, including platforms that seek the elimination of discriminatory laws, policies and practices and promoting appropriate legislation, policies and action in this regard. We will also support efforts that ensure enhanced representation and voice for developing countries in decision-making in global international economic and financial institutions in order to deliver more effective, credible, accountable and legitimate institutions. These efforts contribute to SDG Targets 10.2, 10.3, 10.6.
Socioeconomic justice is a concept based on the premise that all individuals and groups are entitled to be treated fairly and with equal justice under the law, regardless of their social status or economic position. International laws, agreements, treaties, and covenants between nations help promote and protect the human rights of all people. These laws help ensure that all individuals, regardless of their race, class, gender, or age, are entitled to basic rights and opportunities that help to promote their socio-economic status.
The primary international convention addressing socioeconomic justice is the United Nations International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). This covenant was adopted in 1966, and it outlines the principle of equality and non-discrimination, along with the right to an adequate standard of living, health, education, as well as other social, economic and cultural rights. It also introduces measures aiming to reduce poverty and promote the right to work. Through this Convention, countries are obligated to incorporate international human rights into their domestic law and ensure they are followed.
Additionally, some human rights treaties, such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), both address specifically gender-based discrimination and the social and economic rights of children. These Conventions obligate obligate states parties to take action and enforce laws that protect the disadvantaged from socio-economic injustice.
Furthermore, the International Labor Organization (ILO) has created and enforced a range of labor standards, such as establishing minimum wages, prohibiting forced labor, and promoting social security, which seek to ensure economic justice for workers around the world and regardless of their social status. The ILO’s standards support the ability of marginalised communities to access employment, education and healthcare more easily, ultimately contributing to progress towards a fairer and more just world.
The positive developments in international and domestic law mean that now more than ever, countries have the means and the responsibility to ensure all individuals can have access to rights and opportunities to get, and stay, out of poverty. Economic and social justice, as outlined by coherent international laws and conventions, creates a framework for empowering marginalized communities and enabling greater social mobility. Establishing and upholding international standards, then, are an essential part of promoting socio-economic justice for all individuals, regardless of their social and economic background.
Africa alive, healthy, empowered and dignified.
We educate
We advocate for social protection to reduce poverty and arrest vulnerability.
We build
Working towards ending open defecation, improving health for all, improving school attendance.
We call
We call for and foster multi-sectoral transformative and context-responsive interventions.
We publish
We partner with stakeholders to conduct research and share facts for strategic planning and action.
country
linkages
policy
engagements
parliamentary
champions
policy
amendments
FROM AFRICAN LEADERS
he world’s interactions with Africa are not necessarily motivated by altruism, but by the self-interest of states seeking to maximize their opportunities and minimize their costs, often at the expense of those who are not in a position to do either.
WANGARI MAATHAI
AFRICAN HEROI have taken a moment here to rest, to steal a view of the glorious vista that surrounds me, to look back on the distance I have come. But I can only rest for a moment, for with freedom come responsibilities, and I dare not linger, for my long walk is not ended.
Nelson Mandela
African heroToday we are faced with a challenge that calls for a shift in our thinking, so that humanity stops threatening its life-support system. We are called to assist the Earth to heal her wounds and in the process heal our own - indeed to embrace the whole of creation in all its diversity, beauty and wonder. Recognizing that sustainable development, democracy and peace are indivisible is an idea whose time has come
WANGARI MAATHAI
AFRICAN HEROI had no epiphany, no singular revelation, no moment of truth, but a steady accumulation of a thousand slights, a thousand indignities and a thousand unremembered moments produced in me an anger, a rebelliousness, a desire to fight the system that imprisoned my people. There was no particular day on which I said, Henceforth I will devote myself to the liberation of my people; instead, I simply found myself doing so, and could not do otherwise.