Urgent issues do not exist in silos. Rather, they are cross-cutting and interdependent, particularly in a rapidly changing landscape. Efforts to address the climate crisis, for example, advance efforts for racial justice. Efforts to advance immigration justice impact access to housing and healthcare. Service providers, advocates, and movement leaders understand these intersections, and their work often seeks to address multiple issues simultaneously, with the intention that addressing one issue will have ripple effects.

Family philanthropies that acknowledge these connections through their funding strategies have an outsized impact, as well. And a funding community that explores cross-cutting issues together leverages expertise for force multiplication. This understanding motivated a joint funder convening on democracy and reproductive health, rights, and justice co-hosted earlier this year by The Overbrook Foundation, in collaboration with Funders for Reproductive Equity.

Intersecting Issues in Action: Democracy and Reproductive Health, Rights, and Justice

A case in point: a thriving democracy and the realization of reproductive rights are inextricably linked. Research shows a strong correlation between a country’s democratic health and women’s status, and experts emphasize that countering democratic backsliding requires the protection of women’s rights, including reproductive freedom. Attacks on reproductive rights are a precursor to (and symptom of) a democracy’s decline, and many of the efforts necessary to protect democracy are similarly required to ensure reproductive autonomy. In the post-Dobbs era, assaults on reproductive health, rights, and justice are intensifying, jeopardizing the health and well-being of millions of people living in the United States and their ability to participate fairly and fully in the democratic process. Simultaneously, voter suppression, gerrymandering, and other barriers to political participation, along with attacks on the judiciary and other democratic institutions, threaten the very core of US democracy and reproductive freedom.

Advocates and movement leaders at the national, state, and grassroots levels have long recognized the deep connection between a strong democracy and the advancement of reproductive health, rights, and justice, shaping their programs around these shared goals.

Read the full article at the National Center for Family Philanthropy blog.