Joy, hope and energy to carry on

“We have to believe that things are possible.”

Posted 25. June 2025

We start with a look back: In the fall of 2024, filia invited thirteen activists from Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia to become part offilia’s new Recommendation Committee. As experts on feminist struggles in their countries and regions, we asked the activists for funding recommendations. We have been able to fund 26 of the proposed groups since fall 2024. For the first time, groups in the Baltic states and Central Asia were also included in filia’s funding radar.

Joy, Hope and Energy to Carry on

We see the Recommendation Committee as an opportunity to further develop filia’s program work in our main funding region. And not at a desk or on paper, but through trial and error and through discussions with our partners. In June 2025, the activists from the Recommendation Committee met to evaluate the past six months: Who have we reached? Whose expertise is missing? What should we pay attention to in the future? The activists spent three days in intensive discussions with us, sharing fears and exhaustion, but also friends, hope and energy to carry on. We will incorporate what we have worked out together into our further development. We have recorded individual quotes that particularly inspired us here – still in an unsorted form.

“The question of impact must be asked anew in these times. At the moment, it’s about keeping the movement alive. Impact can be that you give three people access to safer places.”

“Big Money has to be decolonized!”

“We need to know more about each other. Do you know that many people have no idea that no planes have been flying to Ukraine for years? “How do you get home then?” I am often asked. Or do you know enough about religious communities in the South Caucasus? There is still so much we need to learn from each other.”

“We should focus on supporting those who are most marginalized. That is the basic idea of decolonization.”

“We have to fuel our feminist dreams and hopes. We have to believe that things are possible. For years, many of us have been seeing everything get worse and worse, more and more hostile on a daily basis. Right now, it’s important to stay hopeful and imaginative.”

“We have to take a socio-economic perspective, because we are promoting in very volatile economic contexts. Many people who work in NGOs there are precariously employed. You want a vacation now? For many activists, this is unthinkable. Neither the current struggles nor the budgets allow for vacations.”

“For me, the most important question in grantmaking is: Does the measure lead to a redistribution of power?”

“We are good enough. We don’t need perfectionism. Perfectionism is a patriarchal, ableist idea. What does it even mean to be perfect? Good enough is good enough.”

Rebecca Bartusch