Interview with Sandra Ferrer, Director of la Coordinadora, on the Fifth Ministerial Conference on Feminist Foreign Policies.
Published on 17/06/2026.
Interview with Sandra Ferrer, Director of la Coordinadora
As civil society organizations face growing restrictions and funding cuts worldwide, Sandra Ferrer examines the role Feminist Foreign Policy can play in protecting civic space, supporting feminist movements, redistributing power and resources and advancing more equitable and inclusive forms of international cooperation.
Focus 2030 : Since the first feminist foreign policies were adopted, the international context has changed significantly: rising conflicts, democratic backsliding, anti-rights offensives, and cuts to international aid. How do you assess the evolution of feminist foreign policy today? Where do you still see major gaps between political commitments and implementation?
Sandra Ferrer : Implementation, the transition from political commitments to concrete action, is always the most challenging part, particularly when it comes to advancing transformative agendas. Moreover, the growing number of conflicts, shrinking civic spaces, and the rise of neoliberal trends that challenge fundamental rights create additional obstacles to making Feminist Foreign Policy a truly transformative reality. The concept itself continues to evolve in response to these changing contexts and must constantly adapt to new geopolitical realities, requiring ongoing reflection, learning, and reassessment.
The main challenges continue to lie in funding and the redistribution of power, as these are the areas where meaningful and lasting change takes place. Civil society organizations are facing increasing threats and restrictions, while civic space continues to erode in many parts of the world. In this context, organizations need political and financial support from governments—not just statements of commitment. Investing in feminist funding mechanisms is essential to strengthening democratic spaces, and allocating resources to sustain grassroots organizations, which face growing difficulties in carrying out their work, is more important than ever.
This also requires rethinking both the origins and distribution of resources through a rights-based, intersectional, and decolonial approach that neither reproduces nor deepens historical structural inequalities. Funding must be flexible, direct, accessible, and equitable. In this sense, Feminist Foreign Policy (FFP) represents a commitment to investing in long-term processes and in building relationships of trust that enable sustainable social transformation, rather than focusing solely on isolated and short-term projects.
How to measure the progress of commitments and accountability of the states championing FFP? It is a challenge and a need, as expressed in the Civil Society Forum of FFP.
The inequalities and forms of violence experienced by women, adolescent girls, and girls around the world are rooted in social, cultural, economic, and political structures that have been built and reinforced over time. They are not isolated or temporary phenomena. Therefore, any strategy aimed at addressing them must acknowledge their structural nature in order to generate meaningful and lasting change.
Likewise, from the same decolonial perspective, it is essential to question who makes political decisions and who holds power. Collective participation cannot remain a symbolic gesture or a privilege reserved for a few. We must move towards a more equitable redistribution of power that recognizes the knowledge, experience, leadership, and agency of organizations and movements across the Global South. Those most affected by inequality, discrimination, and violence must play a central role in shaping the policies intended to address them.
Until these conditions are met, it will be difficult to speak of a genuinely transformative Feminist Foreign Policy. The progress achieved since Sweden adopted this approach in 2014 is undeniable, and it is important to acknowledge the efforts made since then, including the first Ministerial Conference on Feminist Foreign Policy held in 2022.
However, unless funding, decision-making, and power are effectively redistributed, Feminist Foreign Policy will remain more of an aspiration than a transformative political framework capable of delivering systemic change.
Focus 2030 : At a time when several donor countries are reducing their official development assistance budgets, what role should feminist foreign policies play in protecting support for civil society, gender equality, and international cooperation?
Sandra Ferrer : The role of Feminist Foreign Policies in this context is twofold. First, they must rethink how Official Development Assistance (ODA) is allocated and distributed. As I mentioned previously, governments need to critically assess whether funding is truly reaching the organizations that need it most, whether access mechanisms are equitable, and whether organizations with fewer resources, but often greater needs, are able to access funding opportunities. Particular attention should be paid to feminist organizations and movements, which are increasingly targeted by anti-rights actors, face growing restrictions on civic space, and are often among the first to experience cuts in international funding. These organizations are close to communities suffering the impact of this multiple crisis context.
To address these challenges, donor governments should adopt more flexible, accessible, and context-sensitive funding mechanisms that respond to the realities faced by these organizations. This also requires moving away from excessively bureaucratic accountability models that often create significant barriers to access, particularly for smaller grassroots organizations, without necessarily improving transparency or impact. A feminist approach to funding should prioritize trust, long-term partnerships, and local ownership, recognizing that sustainable social change cannot be achieved through short-term and highly restrictive funding cycles.
Second, Feminist Foreign Policies must play a political role in defending human rights and international law, democracy and peace, international cooperation, gender equality, and civic space at a time when they are increasingly under pressure.
In a context where several donor countries are reducing their aid budgets and anti-rights narratives are gaining influence, Feminist Foreign Policy should act as a counterweight, reaffirming that support for gender equality, human rights, and civil society is not optional or secondary, but essential for building peaceful, democratic, and inclusive societies.
This means using diplomatic influence to protect human rights defenders and feminist activists, strengthening alliances among governments committed to gender equality, and ensuring that development cooperation remains a strategic investment rather than a discretionary expenditure. At a time of shrinking resources, Feminist Foreign Policies should not only seek to improve how funding is delivered, but also make the political case for why international cooperation and support for civil society are more necessary than ever.
Focus 2030 : The Civil Society Committee aims to produce a declaration and recommendations to feed into the Ministerial Conference. What are the key messages that states can no longer afford to ignore?
Sandra Ferrer : Declarations matter because they create commitments, establish political direction, and provide a basis for accountability. However, declarations alone are not enough. The key message that states can no longer afford to ignore is that the future of Feminist Foreign Policies (FFP) will not be determined by conferences or political statements, but by the willingness and action to redistribute power, transform decision-making structures, strengthen multilateralism, and place the sustainability of life at the center of public policy.
In a context marked by growing inequalities, democratic backsliding, armed conflicts, and the rise of anti-rights movements, governments must recognize that feminism is not a sectoral agenda. It is a political framework for advancing sustainable development, equality, human rights, and peace.
There can be no sustainable peace without equality, and no fully democratic society while half of humanity continues to face exclusion, discrimination, and violence. Achieving equality requires not only legal recognition, but also parity in power and representation, as well as the guarantee that women and girls can live free from violence in all its forms.
States must also acknowledge that feminist movements and women’s rights organizations cannot be asked to wait. History has repeatedly shown that postponing gender justice in the name of competing priorities often means denying it altogether. The current global context demands urgency, not delay. This requires moving beyond symbolic commitments and ensuring that feminist actors have the resources, influence, and political space necessary to shape the decisions that affect their lives and communities.
At the same time, Feminist Foreign Policies must confront historical and structural inequalities. The histories of colonization, extraction, and displacement cannot remain peripheral to these discussions; they must be recognized as central to understanding contemporary global power relations. A feminist approach must therefore be grounded in decolonial, rights-based, and intersectional principles that challenge, rather than reproduce, existing inequalities.
Financing equality is not optional; it is strategic and compulsory. States and donors must move from a logic of ownership over resources to one of stewardship and shared responsibility. Feminist cooperation should be built on four interconnected pillars: rights, representation, resources, and alliances. This means working with feminist organizations rather than for them, prioritizing flexible, long-term support for grassroots movements, and recognizing their expertise, leadership, knowledge and agency.
Ultimately, Feminist Foreign Policies must remain political, transformative, and rooted in care, justice, and solidarity. Women and girls cannot become bargaining chips in moments of political uncertainty or fiscal constraint. If states are serious about advancing equality, democracy, and peace, they must move beyond rhetoric and commit to the structural changes required to make those goals a reality.
| The opinions expressed in this interview do not necessarily reflect the views of Focus 2030. |
