Adriana Radu, founder of the Association Sex vs. Barza: "For NGOs working for women's rights and reproductive and sexual rights, the existence of a representative in ESC is an advocacy success"

The Sex vs. Barza Association, founded by Adriana Radu, deals with education, counseling and advocacy on reproductive and sexual rights and health. Adriana started with Sex vs Barza in 2012, when she founded a Youtube channel with the same name, the first online sex education video platform in Romania. Now, Sex vs. Stork has over 500,000 followers and 70 million views on Youtube and TikTok.

Radu is also a member of the ESC plenum, being appointed at the beginning of 2021 as a representative of the civil society. Her appointment was difficult and aroused controversy at the time, but she was supported by colleagues of civil society both in and outside the ESC.

Radu says that she did not know ESC in depth before her candidacy, but about her 4-year mandate, one of which has elapsed, she says that "it is an opportunity to broaden the horizons of the organization I lead, but also of those I represent, not only with regard to the NGOs in ESC, but with regard to the structures of employers' associations and trade unions". He says that many of them met for the first time in this tripartite forum and that he got much closer to the legislative process in Romania, in all areas.

He adds that "it's important that we're there and I learn a lot from my peers, some of whom they have more experience. I realize that some of them are having discussions in parallel on certain draft normative acts at the level of the Parliament or the Government, more closely and consistently – they have a longer practice in this regard."

The collaboration with other colleagues from ESC also comes with other benefits for the non-governmental organizations that are present there. There are representatives from the ESC who have the experience of several mandates or a wider experience in their field of activity. These aspects come as a bonus to increase the internal capacity of NGOs. 

Communication in the framework of the ESC

The communication is institutional, through the ESC plenum, where representatives from employers' associations, trade unions and civil society are present. 

About the communication with the NGO area he represents, Radu says: "I strive to consult with my colleagues from the Coalition for Gender Equality and with the extensive networks every time legislative proposals come along with our area of action, in order to correctly represent our common interests, this being my primary role in the ESC. At the same time, it is important to see that the acts that come to the ESC, over which we want to have influence, also largely reflect how much we talk to the political factor in general. The more discussions we have that we are aware of or that we even provoke, the more results that reach the ESC as well."

Discoveries 

Having in mind the wide range of topics under the umbrella of women's rights, Adriana found during her first year of mandate that there is a difference between the topics addressed at the level of Parliament and Government and the topics addressed at the level of organizations. At the same time, although the proportion of legislative proposals on its subject of work is not the highest, however, when they are on the agenda, these proposals are among the most debated in the plenary of the ESC. 

Successes 

Communication with trade unions and employers' associations also meant a joint success: on December 28, 2021, the Plenum of the Economic and Social Council adopted a point of view recommending the adoption of the World Labour Organization Convention no. 190 for the Elimination of Violence and Harassment in the World of Work and the implementation of ILO Recommendation No. 206. The point of view was realized, as co-rapporteurs, by Adriana Radu and by Liviu Apostoiu (National Trade Union Confederation "Cartel ALFA"). CES was notified following the request of A.L.E.G., an organization that is a member of the Coalition for Gender Equality, together with the Sex vs. Barza Association. 

How can the coalition of NGOs be achieved at macro level?

"The idea of representation is good, but it has certain limits," adriana says. "I'm OK with the fact that some organizations are just focusing on doing good and concrete work at the level they are at, in their mission. They may not have the ability to be involved in advocacy processes and yet have more concrete impact than years of advocacy on a particular topic on which there is no consensus in society or political interest. 

Further, the idea of coalescing and building a common voice at the level of the sector is very appealing, but it entails some questions and obstacles that need to be asked in the first phase. For example, in the area of women's rights, funding is limited. This means that it's understandable that many organizations will focus on their own sustainability and their own work, before doing advocacy, for example.

Being in CES is a privileged position, you can expose your views and do advocacy. But in general, in the women's rights sector and reproductive and sexual rights, there is little funding for advocacy and rarely core funding. And to do advocacy without funds means to commit to unpaid work for many years. Doing advocacy really involves accumulating a lot of information, being present at a lot of exchanges and discussions, a lot of responsibility. To be able to do that, you must first build and attract your resources, in itself another hard job.

For me, I'm committed to doing advocacy, counseling, online education and all the activities at the Sex vs Barza Association. Fortunately, we have more and more funds and in the last 2 years we have been able to hand over from responsibilities. But I didn't find the perfect recipe here. Everything is still in the test phase."

Could it increase the role of the ESC?

"I think if there was a larger administrative apparatus, it could help to follow up the opinions from the ESC. This could make a better impact assessment. Given that it is a representative structure, I think all members are interested in seeing what happens to the opinions further and I think that, at the moment, this capacity is equal to the capacity of each individual federation – be it employers', trade unions or NGOs. If the enlarged administrative apparatus of the ESC were to take over at least part of this responsibility, it meant a good step in equalizing the resources of legislative monitoring of each structure represented in the ESC Plenum."