GCAP Europe Assembly: a view from Asia

Here are her views on the events:

Attending the GCAP Europe assembly turned out to be a valuable opportunity to connect and learn from the experiences across regions. Although I have been active within GCAP over the last three years, the relationship has always been India -> Asia -> Global, and this interaction helped immensely to open up the possibilities for operational relationships between national coalitions across the regions. I was also impressed to learn that a colleague from the Africa region had been invited to be part of the GCAP Europe discussions last year, and hope this will be a practice that all the GCAP regional assemblies can integrate in their future meetings.

The strong presence of the Eastern European coalitions in the Assembly also made real the diversity of the political and cultural contexts within Europe, in much the same way as we experience the challenge of connecting and representing the diversity of the South East and South Asia coalitions in our own region. It was very interesting to see the similarities in the campaign discussions on process and outcomes (at some points I felt that if I closed my eyes I could be back in a GCAP Asia meeting), and the ways in which campaign actions have been made operational across countries.

However it is the amazingly high energies of the group & its 'yes we can' spirit that I will take back home with me from this interaction. The large presence of young activists (both young in age & young at heart) may have been a factor, but I think Luisa's (Luisa Cruz, GCAP Feminist Task Force) description of the gathering as a 'group that represents future and commitment' puts it across best.

I hope this will be a starting point for further interaction and collaboration not only with GCAP India, but across GCAP Asia, and also strengthen the spaces for regional exchange & solidarity at the global level.