Voices from across the globe have for some time been posing the question “how do we reclaim our cities to be locations of possibility for all who live in them?”, aligned to gender-responsive resilience and intersectionality in policy and practice (Grripp).

What role can each one of us play to be agents of the change that we want to see? How do we hold leaders accountable? And how do we prioritise women and children in the design of cities and infrastructure where their needs, rights and access requirements are paramount?

Our local news is often about yet another murder of an innocent woman, or of rape, such as the recent Krugersdorp gang rapes. Yet, in spite of their frequency, not nearly enough of these cases make it to the news, and even more cases go unreported.

What will it take to restore law and order, to restore our culture of ubuntu that everyone talks about? When you talk about feminism, people have many images that are anything but feminism. If feminism is about all genders having equal rights and opportunities, it’s a no-brainer that we should all be feminists — men and women, girls and boys. However, we need inclusion, because focusing only on gender leaves other groups within the same gender uncatered for.

Hence the need for “intersectional feminism”, because women are not a homogenous group. It is important to acknowledge the interplay between gender and other forms of discrimination, like race, age, class, socioeconomic status, physical or mental ability, sexual identity, religion and ethnicity.

To be a true ally of intersectional feminism you need to accept your privilege as a middle-class woman who lives in the upmarket city, or as a white male anywhere in the world, in order to learn and understand the positions and the journeys of other feminists who are more disadvantaged than yourself. That’s part of the building blocks needed for feminist cities and spaces, where all are safe and free to thrive.

As privileged educated groups, whether in business or academia, we tend to club together and articulate our own views of injustice against women. However, we need to take the time to listen and make space for the views of others. Our platform as privileged men and women should be used to bring the voices of other feminists to have a seat at the table.

As a privileged woman and leader, I know that I have a responsibility to lift as I rise, to solve for the weakest in the value chain. That means not being a spokesperson for the weakest but opening the space for them to articulate their issues and their experiences. No freedom is complete without everyone being free and safe in whatever space they find themselves.

We also need to acknowledge that women experience hurtful micro-aggressions in their daily lives — from both women and men. Our patriarchal society makes us prejudicial to others which is reflected in our utterances and actions, especially against women.

Men and women should call each other out — as Mam Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, once said “the overwhelming majority of women accept patriarchy unquestioningly and even protect it, working out the resultant frustrations not against men but against themselves in their competition for men as sons, lovers and husbands. Traditionally the violated wife bides her time and offloads her built-in aggression on her daughter-in-law. So, men dominate women through the agency of women themselves.”

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We need to unlearn and reject the prejudices that our patriarchal society feeds us. As men and women, we should acknowledge women for the contribution they have made since time immemorial, through their leadership and their sacrifices.

Leaders have the power and responsibility to make our spaces safe and liveable for all humans, with equal opportunity to thrive. Our job as citizens is to make them accountable.

When women and children are not safe to walk as they please anywhere in our spaces and at whatever time of day or night, then our leaders have failed us.

When women take their destiny into their own hands to earn a living but are violated by men, raped and/or killed, then our leaders have failed us.

When perpetrators of crime freely roam the streets and repeat their heinous crimes with no recourse, then our leaders have failed us.

It is not the systems that fail us but the leaders who put the systems, policies, and practices together that fail us — leaders from all sectors of our society.

Eradicating gender-based violence and femicide (GBVF), inequality and poverty requires a truly collaborative, transdisciplinary, and multi-pronged response. Passing laws, ploughing more money into policing and writing new laws is not enough.

Leaders should be accountable for their actions and areas of responsibility. Serving with integrity, using an intersectional feminist approach, is the starting point. Solving for the weakest in the value chain forms part of the building blocks for an equal and just society.

It is that intersectional feminist approach that guided the GBVF Response Fund’s allocation of funds to 110 community-based organisations and the four intermediary organisations operating in multiple GBVF hotspots in rural, urban, and informal settlements across all nine provinces of South Africa, focusing on prevention and justice without neglecting mental health.

Our approach as the fund is collaborative, using limited resources to make an impact. Instead of rehashing the statistics of victims and survivors of GBVF, this month of August we have decided to “Flip the Switch” and shine the light on men, especially young men.

Partnering with universities and TVET colleges, our “Flip the Switch” initiative is aimed at galvanising men around combating GBVF. Men need to play a meaningful role in building social cohesion and eradicating GBVF and gender inequality. It is mostly men who lead our institutions and leadership comes with responsibility.

We all have to be feminists and lead using an intersectional feminist lens, building one space at a time until the entire country is free – and every space is a “Feminist City”. May the spirits of our 1956 heroines guide the way to our true emancipation. DM