Anik, who supports grassroots women-led nonprofits in Indonesia, breaks down feminism, justice, and sustainable change.
A: Our organization is a resource organization. We mobilize resources in terms of funds, networking, knowledge, and volunteers. Besides mobilizing resources, we do capacity building and monitoring and evaluation for our partners. Every year, our women’s fund goes to five or six women’s group across Indonesia that support survivors of sexual violence.
A: I think feminism is not just equal rights for men and women, but people treated with justice. For me the most important thing is, if you say you are a feminist, it is about how you implement the value of justice to others. It’s about how you take sides of a woman who experiences violence. In that way, feminism in America, Asia, and Africa is the same. Our strategy has to be a combination of international feminist values and knowledge from the community because it is in the community that we can look to see the roots and future solutions of our problems.
We set up the women’s fund because we want to support the women who are working to change structural gender inequality. When we talk about the feminist and gender perspective, we cannot just talk about charity work, we must talk about structure also. Through the women’s fund we can support structural changes, expand their networks and reach, and educate our groups on feminist frameworks.
A: For my job, success is if there is sustainable change within our partner organizations while they are part of our programs. In order to take on structural injustices, organizations that work for social change must develop their internal capacities. Success is transparency in an organization and equal power distributions.
A: Sometimes I feel tired. With hope, I start with why I live first. I’m still learning, but I think the assignment of being human is to find balance. For me, the highest values are mercy and love. Those values give me a reason for why I do what I do.
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