GI-ESCR 2022-2025 STRATEGIC PLAN
This strategy document describes GI-ESCR ‘s organisational goals for the next four years and how we intend to reach them. Its priorities will continue to be relevant beyond 2025 and will provide the scaffolding for our work in the decade ahead.
Our strategic plan for the period 2022 to 2025 is bold, grounded in the work we do with and for others, flexible, and based on evidence and shared learning.
Our Practice
We are agile, constantly looking for innovative ways to advance social and economic justice, gender equality and human dignity. We reach out to people and engage with their diversity, values and experiences, as far as possible in their own languages. We see our work as a cycle, an upward spiral of iterative and cumulative change in which local and global actions influence and benefit each other. We
→ Work with, through and for partners.
→ Change the narrative.
→ Build bridges between disciplines and geographies.
→ Push the frontiers of human rights.
→ Look for strategic opportunities.
→ Learn from our experiences and share what can be scaled up.
Measuring impact
GI-ESCR understands that it is important to measure the impact of its work. If we do not measure its impact, our model of change cannot be effective.
However, most of GI-ESCR’s activities do not lend themselves to simple forms of measurement.
→ GI-ESCR cooperates with many actors which makes it difficult to isolate GI-ESCR’s specific impact.
Some of GI-ESCR’s activities are very local in nature; others are highly international and large-scale. Very different forms of evaluation are appropriate for each.
→ Most of GI-ESCR’s outcome goals are political in nature: this means that results are unlikely to be measurable by a simple metric, or measurable quickly, and cannot be claimed by one actor.
→ Much of GI-ESCR’s activity is facilitative, opportunity-led, and progressive (evolves over time).
All these factors make simple evaluation methods more difficult to use.
GI-ESCR therefore considers the following elements to measure the quality or shortcomings of its work:
→ The degree to which partners in a (large-scale or local) activity consider that the work that was undertaken together had positive effects or achieved agreed goals.
→ The degree to which partners in an activity consider that GI-ESCR made specific expected contributions, surpassed partners’ expectations, or underperformed.
→ The partial or complete success of activities for which specific goals or outcomes can be set (steps in reform of Chile’s constitution, adoption of a human rights norm, campaign by a local community), and the quality of the outcome achieved, including the quality of GI-ESCR’s contribution to it.
→ The scale of institutional and public support that GI-ESCR’s activities attract; the number and variety of organisations that join social movements it facilitates or supports; the degree to which partner organisations value its contributions to their alliances and (where relevant) its facilitation skills.
→ The degree to which GI-ESCR is successful (or not) in enabling local and national actors to influence international actors and policies, and participate with effect in international fora.
→ The degree to which GI-ESCR achieves specific organisational objectives (with respect to partnerships, staffing, funding, communications, and governance).
Finally, it should be underlined that most of GI-ESCR’s activities and programme are intersectional and cross-cutting. This means that success in one dimension (for example, affirming women’s rights) may not be accompanied by success in another (achievement of an environmental goal). GI-ESCR needs to take this into account in all its attempts to evaluate and measure the impacts of its work.
GI-ESCR’s Theory of Change
GI-ESCR is a small and agile organisation. Our theory of change focuses on our capacity to shape the larger ecosystem that determines decision making. GI-ESCR identifies concerns and issues that fall within our mandate and tools that add value. We work on these issues by, on one hand, assembling evidence and arguments that lead to new narratives with power to rally social and political majorities, and, on the other, ally with other organisations to build coalitions that have enough momentum to advocate successfully. Transformative narratives together with broad social coalitions have the power to strengthen the institutional human-rights framework, influence public and institutional attitudes, and change thinking.
Our values
We believe human rights are universal, indivisible, interdependent and inalienable, and that they are shaped by law and social relations. They are norms and, more importantly, shared values. Their ultimate purposes are to remove asymmetries of power between individuals in society, challenge oppression, end the subordination and marginalisation of groups and individuals, and promote individual agency, autonomy and respect for the inherent dignity of every human being.
In our practice, we attach particular importance to the human rights principles of equality and non-discrimination, including systemic and intersecting forms of discrimination. These principles underpin all our efforts. Gender equality is critically important because the full and equal participation of all is essential to achieve justice and ESC rights. We apply the principle of non-discrimination to everything we do, not least our relations with each other and our partners. This means that we strive for equality of treatment and condemn discrimination of all kinds, including on grounds of race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, poverty or social condition.
More generally, as an organisation that puts solidarity and empowerment at the heart of its activity, we expect our own conduct, and also the conduct of institutions that we try to influence or with which we cooperate, to advance and promote:
→ Respect and trust.
→ Diversity and inclusion.
→ Participation.
→ Collaboration and solidarity.
→ A sustainable future for all.
In addition, we promise to
→ Act professionally and with integrity.
→ Be bold and take risks in support of our goals.
→ Remain independent at all times.
Harnessing collective power
GI-ESCR is well positioned to harness collective power and to break down silos between disciplines. We will continue to collaborate with organisations, movements and groups to consolidate our role as a bridge, providing grassroots actors and communities access to global fora in particular.
We will connect with new constituencies; continue to develop horizontal forms of collaboration; explore innovative strategies (in addition to traditional ‘naming and shaming’); and use narratives that resonate with people’s feelings to give technical concepts meaning.
To build collective power we need counter-narratives that influence public opinion and change citizens’ perceptions of rights and human rights organisations. We will strengthen our legitimacy by forming new and deep alliances with other NGOs that have robust links with communities and nonNGO actors.
We value relationships and partnerships highly. They are at the core of GI-ESCR’s methodology and are critical to establishing and realising human rights. We are committed to cultivating solidarity and more equitable partnerships – to forms of collaboration that value the knowledge brought by every partner, share resources fairly, practise equitable decision-making, and cultivate mutual learning and respect.
Our strategy is to facilitate the access of partners, to strengthen human rights standards, and ensure that experts in the human rights mechanisms understand the perspectives of the public, and of marginalised communities in particular. We learn from community-based organisations, and disseminate their alternative approaches; when requested, we work with them to increase their capacity by providing training and facilitating their access to human rights experts, decision-makers and other influential actors, thereby enabling them to shape ESC rights standards.
We also value partnerships with other human rights and ESC rights actors, including networks, international organisations, UN agencies, States, and experts.
With our partners, we think and act, globally and locally, where our work at one level is enriched by, and strengthens and supports the other.
