Co-hosted by Coady Institute and The Nyapachuma Memorial Foundation

Across the globe, rising authoritarianism, democratic backsliding, growing economic inequality, shrinking civic space, a spiraling climate crisis, and declining public trust in institutions are reshaping the context for social justice advocacy. At the same time, rapid shifts in information landscapes and an increasingly polarized civil society where anti-rights and anti-gender movements are gaining momentum require advocacy approaches that are strategic, creative, and grounded in the lived experience of those most affected. Amid these challenges, the ability to find common ground and leverage a wide array of advocacy approaches, strategies, and tactics – including those used by different generations of activists and advocates – is particularly key to achieving success. Advocacy, grounded in an intersectional power and gender analysis, is a powerful means of amplifying voices, building agency, influencing change, and advancing social, economic, and ecological justice, while tending to their underlying and systemic causes.

This six-day course is a response to this challenge, focusing on the potential of intergenerational learning, collaboration, and struggle to strengthen advocacy. Every generation of advocates bring distinct experiences, knowledge, relationships, perspectives, and approaches to social change: from the wisdom and legacies of elders who have participated in liberation and anticolonial struggles to the courage, creativity, and leadership of young people, who are showing from Kenya to Kathmandu, that broad-based advocacy can lead to transformative change. Through an intersectional and decolonial lens, the course aims to equip people of all genders with a rights-based and strategic framework for advancing justice, while strengthening connections, knowledge exchange, and opportunities for collective action across generations. Through dialogue, experience sharing, reflection, and practical application, participants will explore how established and evolving forms of advocacy – from evidence-based policy engagement and community organizing to digital activism, storytelling, and movement-building – can be combined to build collective power for social change. It explores advocacy as a purposeful practice for challenging unequal power and influencing the policies, decisions, practices, and narratives that shape people’s lives. Participants will deepen their understanding of power, gender, human rights, and intersecting inequalities while developing practical skills to design, implement, communicate, and assess effective advocacy strategies.

The course uses an experiential, learner-centred approach that draws on participants’ knowledge and experiences. Through dialogue, case studies, small-group discussions, field visits, and practical exercises, participants will strengthen their advocacy skills and apply an advocacy planning process to issues relevant to their own work.