Community partnership allows for cross-sector, intersectional collaboration that strengthen demands for gender equality and enriches strategies to achieve it. Women and gender diverse people experience gender discrimination in different ways, depending in part on their particular communities and identities. Women know the issues that affect their safety, freedoms, and full participation in society. LEAF works with community organizations to ground its legal advocacy in women and gender diverse people’s unique lived experiences of gender inequality.
LEAF is grateful for its community partners, as partnerships always strengthen demands for gender equality. LEAF’s partnership with the Institute for the Advancement of Aboriginal Women (IAAW) exemplifies this truth. In 2016, LEAF and IAAW partnered to intervene in the appeal in R v. Barton (the court case that acquitted Barton for the killing of Cindy Gladue) and the inquiry into Justice Robin Camp. The collaborative approach to these matters enabled us to advance strong arguments against the systemic discrimination Indigenous women face in Canada’s systems of justice. LEAF is pleased to participate in such partnerships in our effort to address ongoing violence against Indigenous women.
