In celebration of Human Rights Day, Counterpart’s senior director of governance, Kourtney Pompi, reflects on Counterpart’s 60-year commitment to supporting locally-driven programs that champion democracy, human rights, and good governance while remaining responsive to the U.S. governments’ evolving strategy and commitments.
Our commitment to supporting democratic progress
Counterpart has a number of effective programs that support more resilient communities, policies, and programs. In Timor-Leste and the Dominican Republic, for example, our efforts illustrate how governance and rights can address environmental changes and how they impact communities. Beyond our USAID programs, Counterpart ensures that this holistic approach is embraced across all of our activities, including our Resilient Food Systems programs. In our USDA-funded McGovern Dole school feeding program in Senegal, for instance, our work with local community members inspired them to approach their own government and advocate for government resources to be allocated to expand the school feeding opportunities.
Participants of the “Innovating Together: Artificial Intelligence, Women, and Open Government” program discussed how artificial intelligence tools can be used to better serve Ecuadorian citizens.
Through our USAID-funded New Partnerships in Open Government in Ecuador, Counterpart has identified a need to more closely link public and private sector work to ensure that Ecuador’s commitment to the Open Government Partnership is a success. We successfully built a coalition, bringing together leaders from both the formal and informal civil society, as well as the private sector, to identify key local challenges and develop locally driven solutions that resonated across key stakeholders. This type of collaborative work represents a critical element of Counterpart’s locally driven sustainable approach to partnering with communities in any country where we work.
Strengthening social cohesion
At Counterpart, we help our partners push for transformative changes to their countries, their communities, their families, and themselves, taking on entrenched power structures that foster privilege and inequality. We work with our partners to explore new mechanisms for engaging people in public life, particularly those that are most marginalized.
Counterpart’s USAID-funded Rights and Dignity project, in partnership with Fundación Gloria de Kriete, held a series of workshops for students from universities across El Salvador to educate them on their rights, civic duties, and rule of law so that they may become human rights defenders.
Through the USAID-funded Rights and Dignity program, Counterpart is working to ensure that civil society and key governmental decision makers have the tools, capacity, and skills to promote and advocate for human rights in El Salvador. The project fosters networks of communicators committed to equality and justice, taking a significant step towards promoting human rights.
Advancing democracy through countering disinformation
Counterpart is countering disinformation with digital tools to strengthen good governance across its projects, particularly when it can help to further the rights of youth, women, and other marginalized community members. Last month, Counterpart took part in a Global Democracy Coalition panel discussion, “The Impact of Gender Disinformation on Democracy.” Organized by Fundación Multitudes, the panel highlighted the impact of disinformation on women’s political participation and the far ranging impacts that it can have on women’s confidence in their government, their community, and in their willingness to be a part of civic life.
In another example from Timor-Leste, Counterpart’s NGO Advocacy for Good Governance Activity works within Timor’s traditionally patriarchal society to strengthen the ability of women to work in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) fields, while advocating for improved rights and access to education for the next generation.
Counterpart knows that the civic engagement of women is vital to building healthy communities; women must have a role in the decision making that affects their lives. When misinformation, disinformation, and a lack of access to current technology targets women, it divides communities, fosters gender inequality, and breeds mistrust.
A local NGO in Maubisse, Timor-Leste, a partner of Counterpart’s USAID NGO Advocacy for Good Governance Activity, supports advocacy efforts to add water points and improve access to clean water in partnership with the local and national government.
Elevating anti-corruption initiatives
Corruption is a leading contributor to democratic backsliding. It erodes citizen trust and confidence, undermines security and stability, and dampens foreign investment, economic opportunity, and growth. Endemic corruption and the rampant impunity of corrupt actors erodes citizen trust in their governments and negatively effects the ability of governments to provide the services their people depend on, which in turn weakens nation states and produces regional instability.
To combat this backsliding, Counterpart’s work in places such as El Salvador under the USAID-funded Transparency and Integrity Project, which is geared toward supporting citizens whose livelihoods and access to key public services are routinely, directly, or indirectly affected by corruption. Of equal importance is the critical work our team does in partnership with local government institutions whose public functions and service provision are negatively affected by a lack of accountability, transparency, and responsiveness. Counterpart is committed to ensuring that all citizens have a platform to demand a more transparent and responsive government.
Today, on Human Rights Day, we are reaffirming Counterpart’s commitment to these values, building on Counterpart’s 60-year history of championing local partners and supporting human rights, governance, and equality in all the communities in which we work.
