In June 2012, USIP’s Center for Gender and Peacebuilding convened a group of Afghan and Iraqi women leaders in Istanbul to map out practical steps moving forward for women in transitional countries.  The Dialogue was the first of its kind, bringing together a diverse group of women across countries and sectors to discuss shared lessons learned and best practices. Following the completion of the Dialogue in June, the Afghani and Iraqi participants felt that it’s both critical and timely for them to work with the women from the Arab Spring in order to “to amplify the voice of women.”

To maintain the momentum from the Istanbul Dialogue, on December 7-9, 2012, USIP’s Center for Gender and Peacebuilding brought together a group of Afghan, Iraqi, Libyan and Tunisian women to build on the findings from the June 2012 Dialogue and to identify common challenges and opportunities across the countries.

An example of a common cross-national opportunity is the critical importance of economic empowerment of women. The participants expressed repeatedly that economic empowerment is essential to women’s progress in all sectors of society and that investments in women yield large social and economic returns. One of the participants from Afghanistan noted that “We women of Afghanistan cannot be looked upon as a charity case.”

Another example of a common opportunity and a challenge is engaging men and religious leaders in enhancing opportunities for women across all sectors. The women all agreed that men and religious elders have a critical role to play in promoting women’s rights and opportunities, yet too often men are thought of as impediments to promoting women’s rights rather than potential defenders and supports of women’s rights. Many other lessons learned were offered in this Dialogue, which will be detailed in a forthcoming special report.