Internal Organization

CAFRA is a significant part of the Caribbean Women’s Movement. It has a presence in 16 countries of the region and its membership comprises women who are unemployed, both those with university degrees as well as the less educated, women in the informal sector, women who work as domestics, women who do not own or know how to use a computer, women of Indigenous origins – the first peoples of the region, women of Rastafari – a group of Caribbean persons who 70 years ago began to construct an alternative way of living, women in academics, women activists, regardless of race, ethnicity, religion or sexual orientation, and region. Many of our members come from non-independent states in the Caribbean.

CAFRA is committed to understanding the relationship between the oppression of women and other forms of oppression in the society and its programmes reflect this thinking. CAFRA’s stated mission is to accelerate and channel the collective power of women in individual and social transformation, thus creating a climate in which social justice is realized.

The objectives of the Association are:

1. To promote and support the continued growth and development of the feminist movement in the entire Caribbean region.

2. To research, analyze and document the situation of women in the region from the perspective of ethnicity, class, culture, and gender relations.

3. To network with women’s organizations and other organizations which support CAFRA’s Mission.

4. To influence policy at national, regional and international levels in governments and NGOs and institutions, in keeping with CAFRA’s mission.

5. To support through the organization’s programmes of work, efforts aimed at economic self sufficiency for women.

6. To generate a new and critical examination of the nature of politics and power and women’s relationship to it as a basis for a policy on women, politics and power in the region.

7. To provide information on actions and struggles taking place in different parts of the region and to encourage international solidarity when necessary.

8. To develop action and research priorities based on needs of women in the region.

9. To foster dialogue and debate towards the development of non-patriarchal procedures, perceptions and structure.

10. To develop an institution which promotes personal growth and the most efficient use of human resources, sustainable development of the environment, and economic development.

While CAFRA continues to carry out programmes within these objectives, the environment has changed significantly from the period of its launching. In her address to the 2002 Conference on Caribbean Feminism, Dr Eduine Barriteau commented that “The political economy has been drastically reconfigured by globalization and its attendant fall outs. The current social and cultural landscape would be unrecognizable to an early twentieth century West Indian. For the past seven years gender relations have been going through the most contested and hostile phase, and the vast majority of Caribbean women continue to experience, but not necessarily accept life defined by economic hardship and attempts to reassert patriarchal dominance. A major challenge is the fragility and vulnerability of the women’s movement.