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Magdalena Sepúlveda is awarded New Executives Fund grant

Magdalena Sepúlveda is awarded New Executives Fund grant

Magdalena Sepúlveda is awarded New Executives Fund grant by Open Society Foundations

 

This 15 June, Magdalena Sepúlveda Carmona, GI-ESCR Executive Director, was amongst the fourteen leaders of non-profit organisations to be awarded New Executives Fund grants by Open Society Foundations to help implement their organizational leadership visions.

Read Open Open Society Foundations press release here below:

Press Release: Open Society Foundations Announce 2021 New Executives Fund Recipients

 NEW YORK—Fourteen new leaders of nonprofit organizations have been awarded New Executives Fund grants to help implement their organizational leadership visions during a time of unprecedented global change, the Open Society Foundations announced today.

 Based in six countries around the world, from Argentina to South Africa, the recipients have backgrounds, identities, and lived experiences that have been historically underrepresented in leadership positions in their respective geographic, cultural, and professional contexts. Their work involves a range of efforts to advance open society, including through legal protection of LGBTQI rights, digital rights advocacy, gender equality, community-centered policymaking, and civic engagement.

“We are delighted to welcome these directors to our incredible community of changemakers,” said Alethia Jones, director of the Open Society Fellowship Program, which includes the New Executives Fund. “Robust, early support from funders gives new leaders a chance to realize their bold visions and have an outsized impact. We support a fraction of the incredibly talented leaders who are nominated, and we urge other funders to enthusiastically support new leaders in their fields.”

Since 2013, the New Executives Fund has competitively awarded 132 grants for a total of $12.8 million. These two-year awards, which in 2021 range from $95,000 to $135,000, are designed to give new executives the flexibility to invest in their development as leaders as well as organizational sustainability while gaining access to networks of their peers—both especially crucial in the face of current challenges brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic and the economic recession.

“Our hope is that this support can offer these leaders the space to dream and collaboratively imagine new possibilities for their organizations, together with their staffs, boards, and constituents,” said Bipasha Ray, project director of the New Executives Fund. “During this current moment in history, we need to encourage and reward bold thinking more than ever.”

2021 New Executives

Sofia Arroyo Martín Del Campo
EDGE Funders Alliance 

Sofia Arroyo Martin Del Campo became executive director of EDGE Funders Alliance in September 2019. Founded in 2012, EDGE Funders Alliance is a global community of grant-makers that aims to organize within philanthropy to raise awareness and deepen understanding of the interconnected crises threatening our common future, to increase resources for systemic alternatives that support justice, equity, and the well-being of the planet. Arroyo previously served at Sacred Fire Foundation, including as executive director from 2016 to 2018. Arroyo is based in Mexico City, Mexico.

Evelyn Austin
Bits of Freedom 

Evelyn Austin became executive director of Bits of Freedom in September 2019. Founded in 2000, Bits of Freedom blends technological and legal expertise to engage in digital rights advocacy in areas such as profiling, encryption, copyright reform, and dragnet surveillance, in both Dutch and broader European law and policy contexts. Before her appointment as executive director, Austin served as Bits of Freedom’s first “movement builder” since 2014, coordinating efforts to strengthen European networks. Before that, she co-founded and led The Hmm, a platform for contemporary visual culture. Austin is based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

Ana María Enríquez
Human Rights Funders Network

Ana María Enríquez joined the Human Rights Funders Network as executive director in March 2020. Founded in 1994 by a small group of human rights grantmakers, the network is a global network committed to advancing human rights through effective philanthropy. Previously, Enríquez worked with a range of global organizations, including UN Women, where she designed and led the Fund for Gender Equality; the Ford Foundation, where she led an initiative in support of social justice philanthropy in the Global South; and the Global Fund for Women. Enríquez is based in Medellin, Colombia.

Shereen Essof
Just Associates 

Shereen Essof became executive director of Just Associates (JASS) in March 2020. Founded in 2002, JASS generates cutting-edge knowledge about power, movements, and change to shape the theory, practice, and policies for advancing women’s rights and democratic change worldwide, with programs in Mesoamerica, Southern Africa, and Southeast Asia. Essof joined JASS in 2011, serving first as Southern Africa regional director and then Cross Regional Programmes director. Essof has also held positions at the Zimbabwe Women’s Resource Centre and Network and the African Gender Institute at the University of Cape Town. Essof is based in Cape Town, South Africa.

Chino Hardin and Kyung-Ji Kate Rhee
Center for NuLeadership on Human Justice & Healing 

Chino Hardin and Kyung-Ji Kate Rhee became co-executive directors of the Center for NuLeadership on Human Justice & Healing in November 2019. Established in the early 2000s and staffed by community and youth experts directly impacted by legacies of criminalization and mass incarceration, the center is an independent research, training, and advocacy think tank that employs a "human justice" framework to achieve community well-being, empowerment, and safety. Hardin was previously a field director at the center, with prior roles at Friends of Bedford Academy, the Strengthening Families Program, and the Institute for Juvenile Justice Reform and Alternatives. Rhee also served as the center’s juvenile justice director and then deputy director, with prior leadership roles at the Institute for Juvenile Justice Reform and Alternatives and the Prison Moratorium Project. Hardin and Rhee are based in New York City, New York, United States.

Paula Litvachky
Center for Legal and Social Studies 

Paula Litvachky became executive director of Centro de Estudios Legales y Sociales’ in February 2020. Founded in Argentina in 1979, the organization is dedicated to the promotion and defense of human rights and the strengthening of democratic institutions—nationally in Argentina, regionally in Latin America, and around the world. Litvachky, a human rights lawyer, previously served as director of justice and security at CELS since 2011, managing its national and international dossiers and developing alliances with other social organizations and grassroots movements. Litvachky is based in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Ricardo Martinez
Equality Texas 

Ricardo Martinez joined Equality Texas as CEO in December 2019. Formally established in 2006, Equality Texas works to secure full equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer people in Texas through political action, education, community organizing, and collaboration. Before joining Equality Texas, Ricardo led the national organizing and constituent engagement effort at Stand for Children. Prior to that, he spent several years with GLSEN, initially as Senior Manager of Field Services and later as the President of the Phoenix Chapter. Martinez is based in Austin, Texas, United States.

C. Nicole Mason
Institute for Women’s Policy Research  

C. Nicole Mason became president and CEO of the Institute for Women’s Policy Research in November 2019. Founded in 1987, the institute is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that engages in research and dissemination to shape public policy and improve the lives and opportunities of women from diverse backgrounds across the United States. Prior to the institute, Mason served as executive director of both the Women of Color Policy Network at New York University’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and the Center for Research and Policy at the New York Women’s Foundation. Mason is based in Washington, D.C., United States.

Nondumiso Nsibande
ActionAid South Africa 

Nondumiso Nsibande was appointed country director of ActionAid South Africa in May of 2019. Established in 2006, ActionAid South Africa is a nationally registered civil society organization that is part of the ActionAid International federation, which seeks to develop initiatives and campaigns that address systemic drivers of poverty, injustice, and inequality in South Africa. Before joining ActionAid South Africa, Nsibande served as executive director of the Tshwaranang Legal Advocacy Centre to End Violence Against Women and program manager at the Foundation for Human Rights. Nsibande is based in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Imani Rupert-Gordon
National Center for Lesbian Rights 

Imani Rupert-Gordon began as executive director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights in March 2020. Established in 1977, the center is a United States-based legal organization committed to advancing the civil and human rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people and their families nationwide through litigation, legislation, policy, and public education. Previously, Rupert-Gordon was executive director for Affinity Community Services and director of the Broadway Youth Center. Rupert-Gordon is based in San Francisco, California, United States.

Magdalena Sepúlveda
The Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights 

Magdalena Sepúlveda was appointed executive director of the Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in October 2019. Founded in 2010, the initiative is a global nongovernmental organization that promotes transformative change to end endemic problems of social and economic injustice through a human rights lens. From 2008 to 2014, Sepúlveda was the UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights. She has also served at the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, and the International Council on Human Rights Policy. Sepúlveda is based in Mexico City, Mexico.

Ricky Watson
National Juvenile Justice Network 

Ricky Watson joined the National Juvenile Justice Network as executive director in January 2020. The network, established in 2005, is a membership-led organization that supports and enhances the work of state-based juvenile justice advocates in the U.S., to join and raise their voices in demanding change both locally and nationally. Prior to joining the network, Watson served as founding co-director of the Youth Justice Project of the Southern Coalition for Social Justice and regional manager at the Unaccompanied Children Program at the Vera Institute’s Center on Immigration Justice. Watson is based in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States.

Nomzamo Zondo
Socio-Economic Rights Institute of South Africa 

Nomzamo Zondo became executive director of the Socio-Economic Rights Institute of South Africa in January 2020. Founded in 2009, the institute is a South African human rights organization that provides professional assistance to individuals, communities, and social movements seeking to protect and advance their socio-economic rights, including rights to housing, water, healthcare, fair labor practices, electricity, sanitation, a clean and healthy environment, and education. Zondo first joined the institute in 2015 and previously served as litigation director. Zondo is based in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Date: June 15, 2021

Program:  Open Society Fellowship Program

Contact: Communications This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. +1 212-548-0378

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Climate and Environmental Justice

We have advanced rights-based and gender-transformative transition frameworks through research that centres the lived experiences of women and marginalised communities on the frontlines of extractive energy policies, promoting climate and energy frameworks attentive to the social and care-related impacts of transition pathways. We have developed a clear vision for a gender-just transition, firmly rooted in gender and human rights norms, establishing both the legal basis and the direction for the transformative changes our planet and societies urgently need. In particular, the ‘Guiding Principles for Gender Equality and Human Rights in the Energy Transition’, a collective effort built through online consultations, an in-person workshop and multiple rounds of revision with activists, practitioners and experts from around the world, outline a transformative vision for reshaping global energy systems through a human rights and gender equality lens.

Our work recognises that the climate emergency is both an existential threat and an opportunity to reimagine societies built on social, gender, economic and environmental justice. We ground our advocacy in feminist and intersectional principles, prioritising the agency and perspectives of communities in the Global South who have contributed the least to the climate emergency yet face its most devastating consequences. Central to our approach is the understanding that energy is not merely a commodity but a fundamental human right; essential for dignity, health, education, work and the realisation of countless other rights. We challenge approaches to the energy transition that risk replicating the harmful patterns of fossil fuel extraction and, instead, advocate for transformative policies that ensure human rights and gender equality as central to building climate-resilient societies rooted in dignity, justice and planetary well-being.

What's next?

We will continue to challenge approaches that treat energy transition as merely a technical shift, instead positioning it as an opportunity to reimagine economies and societies rooted in dignity for all, with particular attention to communities in the Global South who have contributed least to the climate emergency yet are most exposed to its worst effects.

We will connect community-level evidence and the lived experiences of those on the frontlines of extractive policies to national reform and global norm-setting, breaking down silos between human rights, gender, and climate movements, and advancing a shared vision that recognises just transitions as not only fundamental to achieving climate-resilient and sustainable societies, but as transformative pathways that advance social and gender equality, redistribute power and resources equitably, and ensure that energy systems serve the public good rather than profit.

We will mainstream rights-based and genderjust transition priorities in key multilateral spaces (particularly, within the Just Transition Work Programme and the to-be-developed Just Transition Mechanism, within the UNFCCC) to guarantee that just transitions are advanced at all levels.

We will also translate our work, through strategic advocacy, into at least two concrete policy wins, whether promoted, adopted, implemented, or scaled, in priority countries (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Colombia, South Africa, or Kenya), ensuring these policies align with human rights standards, centre gender equality, and reflect the needs and views of affected communities.

We will build momentum for the progressive recognition of the right to sustainable energy to shift dominant narratives away from purely extractive solutions that sideline gendered impacts, community participation, and Global South perspectives.

Economic Justice and Climate Finance

Our work has transformed the global discussion on fiscal policy in a more just, emancipatory and sustainable direction. Our approach has combined both high-level, expert contributions within decisionmaking circles, with bold, impactful work on narrative change with the general public.

We have been instrumental in the inclusion of human rights as a guiding principle of the future United Nations Framework Convention on International Tax Cooperation, a multilateral instrument with the potential of raising approx. USD 492 billion per year in public revenues currently foregone to global tax abuse. In the process leading to the ‘Compromiso de Sevilla’ decided at FfD4, we proposed and succeeded in creating a specific human rights workstream within the Civil Society Financing for Development Mechanism, which was critical to ensure that explicit commitments on the matter were included in the negotiating outcome. In a context of cutbacks in multilateral institutions, we have amplified the capacities of technical experts, providing rigorous technical support and leveraging our influence to ensure the enactments of groundbreaking standard-setting instruments, such as the 2025 UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Statement on Fiscal Policy and Human Rights, and the first ex oficio hearing on the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights on Fiscal and Economic Policies to Address Poverty and Structural Inequality, leading to an upcoming thematic resolution on the matter. We have also bridged the silos between multilateral tax discussions and climate finance debates, promoting ambitious financing commitments to increase international and domestic resource mobilisation during COP 28, 29 and 30.

At the regional level, our engagement with fiscal cooperation platforms such as the Platform for Fiscal Cooperation of Latin America and the Caribbean (PTLAC), where we are member of its Civil Society Consultative Council, and the African Anti-IFFs Policy Tracker, for which we participated in the pilot mission in Ivory Coast together with Tax Justice Network Africa (TJNA), have been critical in cementing a growing engagement between tax administrations and ministries of finance with international legal experts, exploring actionable and transformative initiatives, such as the taxation of high-net-worth individuals, beneficial ownership registries and corporate countryby-country reports, to be implemented at the international level.

At the local level, our interventions in fiscal reform debates in Chile, Brazil, Colombia and Nigeria have contributed to shaping legislative outcomes in a more progressive, rights-compliant direction.

As for our leadership in narrative change, we have a measurable track record in delivering tailored, innovative campaigns which have decisively expanded economic justice constituencies by appealing to a broader tent. In Latin America and the Caribbean, we created the ‘Date Cuenta’ campaign, coordinating over 40 organisations across civil society to deliver plain language, innovative messaging connecting progressive fiscal reforms to the financing of health, education and social protection. ‘Date Cuenta’ generated over 55 original campaign messages that were tailored to the realities of seven priority countries (Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru and Honduras) and disseminated in Spanish, Portuguese and English. In doing so, we convened more than 65 online co-creation workshops with partners, coordinating a unified communications strategy which combined digital outreach, press and media coverage, and collaboration with influencers. Ultimately, ‘Date Cuenta’ resulted in more than 60,000 interactions on social media, coverage in major regional and international media outlets, including El País, Deutsche Welle, Bloomberg and France 24, and the participation of at least 63 social media influencers through 58 dedicated publications. In collaboration with Fundación Gabo and the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, we also organised a two-day workshop in Bogota with 20 journalists from 13 countries, building a regional network trained in a human rights-based approach to fiscal policy that has since generated published media coverage on outlets such as La Diaria, Ciper, El Diario Ar and Milenio. Through ‘Date Cuenta’ and our regional advocacy, we strengthened civil society engagement in key processes, including the Financing for Development track and FfD4, co-organised highlevel dialogues with states and civil society from Latin America and Africa.

What's next?

We will shape the UN Tax Convention and its Protocols so they embed human rights principles, and we will stay engaged through follow-up processes (including the expected Conference of the Parties) to support effective implementation. We will keep linking tax and climate finance so that new resources mobilised through fiscal cooperation are channelled to adaptation, mitigation, and loss and damage, in line with UNFCCC commitments.

Public Services for Care Societies

We have translated participatory research into accountability and policy outcomes.

In Ivory Coast, our work with Mouvement Ivoirien des Droits Humains and affected communities since 2023 exposed how privatisation and lack of accountability restrict access to quality healthcare. It contributed to the closure of 1,022 illegal private health centres, an executive instrument strengthening the regulation of private hospitals across the country, and the creation of a permanent complaints management committee in healthcare through a bylaw issued by the prefect of Gagnoa. Partners engaged through this process also advanced concrete improvements at facility level: members of the Gagnoa Midwives Association who took part in the participatory action research pooled resources to renovate the neonatal unit of the Regional Hospital, and the Director of the Gagnoa General Hospital launched an action plan to expand services and improve patient reception, with the facility receiving the award for best hospital in the country in 2025.

In Kenya, our research with the Mathare Education Taskforce documented the absence of public schools and the expansion of private provision, evidencing impacts on households and caregivers and strengthening demands for free, quality public education. This work contributed to stronger community agency and collective organisation, alongside ongoing strategies ranging from communications to litigation to secure a public school in the area, some involving GI-ESCR and others led independently.

Across Africa, this work is complemented by a multi-country study examining the human rights implications of austerity in education and health, including how regressive fiscal policies, rising debt burdens and persistent underinvestment undermine the financing and delivery of public services.

In Latin America, from 29 November to 2 December 2021, over a thousand representatives from over one hundred countries, from grassroots movements, advocacy, human rights, and development organisations, feminist movements, trade unions, and other civil society organisations, met in Santiago, Chile, and virtually, to discuss the critical role of public services for our future. Following the meeting, the Santiago Declaration on Public Services was adopted to demand universal access to quality, gender-transformative and equitable public services as the foundation of a fair and just society.

We are currently advancing work on care systems, linking public services and fiscal justice through integrated research, advocacy and communications, including a regional campaign framing care as a collective responsibility requiring sustained public investment.

What's next?

In Ivory Coast, we will evaluate and strengthen the complaints management committee and position it as a replicable model for other health facilities. In Kenya, we will support the Mathare community to co-design a model public school for Mabatini and Ngei wards, grounded in human rights standards. Building on our multi-country austerity study, we will drive national advocacy on financing for education and health: advancing reforms in Ghana; launching a fiscal policy and public services financing agenda in Kenya through the CESCR process and targeted coalition work; and, in Nigeria, using the new tax acts in force since 1 January 2026 to catalyse a national accountability campaign for adequately funded, quality public services. In Latin America, we will amplify locally led care pilots across 8 countries and turn lessons into influence—advancing care policies that strengthen care organisations, protect care workers’ rights, support unpaid caregivers, include disability and family networks, and redistribute care more equitably.