Ahead of tomorrow’s International Day of People With Disabilities, Jessie Meaney-Davis summarizes new research on the impact of the pandemic. People with disabilities have been disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, and not only because of the risks associated with underlying health conditions. The Disability Inclusion Helpdesk’s new report explains how the exclusion of Organisations of People with Disabilities (OPDs)

On World AIDS day, Ian Hodgson and Marina Schkot introduce a new study by Frontline AIDS. For the estimated 38 million people living with HIV, COVID-19 has meant one pandemic overlaid on another. The interaction between the two pandemics, and how the HIV community has responded, provide important lessons for the future. Sex workers, people who use drugs, adolescent girls

With schools closed and families feeling the pinch of inflation and lost income, UNICEF estimates that the pandemic has put an additional 10 million girls at risk of early marriage. Shaheen Anam of the Manusher Jonno Foundation, a Bangladeshi organization that has supported over 200 human rights and civil society groups in the last 20 years, explains why COVID-19 has

Amina Hersi, Charlotte Becker and Florence Ogola introduce Oxfam’s new paper on the ‘dual crises’ of Covid and GBV. First published on the Oxfam International blog. Women, girls, trans and non-binary people have always faced the horrific and sometimes lethal consequences of gender-based violence in our societies, throughout history, in all countries, and in all walks of life. Even before

Amber Parkes, Anam Parvez Butt, Marion Sharples and Vivian Schwarz-Blum talks us through an important new advocacy tool – the Care Policy Scorecard Everything gets a rating these days: apps, hotels, Uber journeys. And everyone wants that five-star rating. But what about government policies that affect people’s lives? What if we could rate them too, according to how impactful and

Women, Voice and Power, Oxfam’s new paper on ‘transformative feminist leadership’ exemplifies why I love working for NGOs, but also why it can get a bit irksome, especially if you’re a wordsmith. Let’s start with the good stuff. The 7 page Exec Sum (the full report weighs in at 45 pages) is stuffed full with great literature summaries, case studies,

My Oxfam colleague and regular FP2P contributor Max Lawson (right) sends out a weekly summary of his reading on inequality (he leads Oxfam’s advocacy work on it). They’re great, and Max has opened his mailing list up to the anyone who’s interested – just email max.lawson@oxfam.org, with ‘subscribe’ in the subject line. Here’s his latest effort (and thanks to Rakesh Rajani for suggesting the

I’ve come to recognize a certain format for ‘inspirational books for activists’: big sweeping statement about What Needs to Happen, then what I call ‘thousand points of light’ – breathless accounts of some activist-led efforts to achieve those goals. On to the call to arms, invoking political will. Job Done. I must be getting (even more) jaded. What’s wrong with

Powerful piece in this week’s Economist. I’ve added links to the various pieces of research it cites ‘Seventeen months into the COVID-19 pandemic, plenty of questions about the catastrophe remain unanswered. It is still unclear how SARS-COV-2 originated, for instance. Another puzzle is why some areas have had less destructive epidemics than others. Why has Florida had fewer deaths per person from

Guest post by Dhananjayan Sriskandarajah, Chief Executive, Oxfam GB In the past few weeks Oxfam’s work on anti-racism has attracted some criticism. Various commentators have characterised it as “woke posturing” or “anti-white.”   I think they have got it wrong. Let me explain why tackling racism is an integral part of Oxfam’s mission.   It is almost 80 years since a small group of volunteers,

I was speaking on a UN panel on Decent Work last week, so thought I’d better catch up with the latest Oxfam report, Not in This Together, written by Anouk Franck and Art Prapha. It provides a great case study of Covid as an ‘engine of inequality’ (and of how to write a research-based advocacy report – killer facts galore,

One of my LSE activism students asked if she could highlight the horrible response to popular protests currently going on in her native Colombia. Guest post by Daniela Duran  and Lorenzo Uribe   Colombia is entering its third week of protests and, although a lot of what is happening is new to the country, the political response to it has