The United Nations (UN) Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) is a powerful legal instrument for articulating, advocating for, and monitoring women’s human rights. International Women’s Rights Action Watch (IWRAW) offers assistance to women’s rights NGOs in order to help them better advocate at the international level.

The Center for Human Rights and Development (CHRD) in Sri Lanka publicizes information about political prisoners and provides assistance to their families in order to facilitate the release of those wrongly imprisoned.

The Women and Memory Forum (WMF) in Egypt started the Women’s Stories project to allow women to rewrite traditional stories from their own perspectives, giving women an opportunity to challenge traditional texts, redefine their role in society, and develop writing skills by rewriting these stories to show an egalitarian or woman-centric perspective. 

The Kensington Welfare Rights Union (KWRU) reframes the welfare debate as part of a larger fight for human rights in order to advocate for the maintenance of welfare services.

In 1991, welfare cuts threatened the livelihoods of poor families and communities in the most impoverished district of Pennsylvania. A group of women from this area came together and organized KWRU in order to present welfare as a human rights issue, rather than an issue of personal responsibility for poverty or charity-based government responses.

The Initiative for Freedom of Expression republished state-banned materials to fight back against restrictions on freedom of expression in Turkey.

Founded by a group of 4-5 attorneys, the project initially included 45 attorneys willing to prosecute torturers. The group has grown to include 234 people providing direct or support services for human rights cases.

In the year and a half since the project's implantation, 304 cases had been brought to the Association. They have developed a reputation among the police stations which likely has a strong preventative effect. The project has also heightened judges' awareness of the problem of police torture.



Project M.O.M. Sunshine in Cameroon aims to convince companies to provide medical, psychological and nutritional support to employees living with HIV/AIDS. Their main tactic is to present the company with a plan for a practical HIV policy that reduces the cost of the treatment and that benefits the company’s public image. In particular, the project negotiates with insurance companies dependent on company contracts to improve insurance policies with regard to workers with HIV, and making them more affordable to companies.

Currently many groups working in the disability rights movement, and even the broader human rights movement, compete amongst each other in political debates and institutions in order to gain recognition, funding and policy changes.  Instead of recognizing their common goals and challenges, human rights groups often isolate themselves along victim hierarchies where, for example, someone living in poverty may be better off than someone who is physically disabled, experiences politically-motivated torture or lacks access to clean water.

The Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers’ and Exporters’ Association (BGMEA), in collaboration with the International Labor Organization (ILO) and UNICEF, developed the Child Labor Project to eliminate child labor in the 2,500 member factories, and to provide an alternative to former child laborers in the form of an education program. In 1995, the BGMEA, ILO, and UNICEF entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to serve as a basis for the implementation of the Child Labor Project, which was funded by the U.S. Department of Labor.

In the spring of 2009, five students from Utrecht, the Netherlands, operated a temporary, volunteer run restaurant, The Cultural Cookery, to engage new people and raise money for three selected development projects. Using their own time and effort to create PR, attain donations for foods, other sponsorships, and gain access to free space, these students raised EUR 8,000 in just two weeks time.