Inclusion and Gender Empowerment in European Civil Society Organisations

1. Introduction: A participatory approach to rethinking inclusion and gender Empowerment

Amal Miri & Lore Van Praag

Part I: Introducing situated intersectionality and the relevance of participatory research

2. Power, Participation, and Positionality: A Situated Intersectional Approach to Gender Empowerment in the ReIncluGen project

Andrea Fleckinger, Lore Van Praag, Amal Miri, and Havva Akçaoglu

3. Power relations, participation, empowerment, and social work: How empowered are women allowed to become?

Andrea Fleckinger

4. Gender empowerment: CSO’s approaches and experiences of migrant women and girls

Laia Narciso and Charo Reyes

5. (Un)Knowing and Understanding: Artistic Practices as Modes of Research

Golnesa Rezanezhad Pishkhani and Amal Miri

Part II: Situated attitudes, discourses and implementation of gender empowerment in Europe

6. Migration as a Gender Equality issue? A Comparative Study on Gender Attitudes across Europe

Martina Cvajner and Margherita Odasso

7. Reinforcing gender and migration-related stereotypes: A discourse analysis of five topics in printed media articles in Belgium and the Netherlands

Loubna Ou-Salah, Myrthe Fransen, and Lore Van Praag 

8. How civil society organisations approach empowerment in Flanders (Belgium): The role of positioning, organisational cultures and identities

Kaya Klaver, Lore Van Praag, and Amal Miri 

9. Navigating the Institutional Tightrope: The Case of Polish Women’s Organizations

Dagmara Szczepańska and Renata Siemieńska-Żochowska

Part III: Practices and pathways of gender empowerment and inclusion in civil society

10. Empowering women with migration background in Italy: experts and resource centres on their own journey

Marica Balestrieri and Jessica Fabbro

11. The path to identify, dismantle and act: The importance of approaching educational practice from an intersectional perspective

Elena Alfageme, Marta Casanova, Anna Celda, Neus Garriga, Idoia Landaluce, and Emilio Romero

12. Theatre as empowering: from remembering to healing with migrantised women in Flanders

Havva Akçaoglu, Amal Miri, and Hanane El Fikri

13. The power of intersectoral collaboration, innovation and art-based tools in promoting gender equality and awareness. Lessons from Feminoteka

Katarzyna Szczepaniak and Marta Bibi Żbikowska

14. The inherent power dynamics in empowering spaces: CSOs working with migrantised women in Austria

Neda Deneva and Sarah Häckel

15. Co-Creating Software for Inclusion and Gender Empowerment

Kris Aerts

16. Conclusion: Empowerment revisited: Critical reflections across research, policy and practice

Lore Van Praag, Amal Miri, Havva Akçaoglu, Andrea Fleckinger, and Laia Narciso

Biography

Amal Miri is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Centre for Migration, Diversity and Justice at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), Belgium. Her research sits at the intersection of migration studies, critical feminist theory, and participatory methodologies. She investigates how migrantised people navigate and reshape social worlds through affective citizenship, culture, and (religious) agency.

Lore Van Praag is Associate Professor Social Inequalities and Diversity at the Erasmus University of Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Her research interests are mainly focused on environmental migration, migrant perspectives on climate adaptation, education, gender, and diversity.

Havva Akçaoglu is Researcher at the Free University of Brussels, Belgium. As a socially driven political scientist, Akçaoglu supports local and international movements in their efforts for prosperity, justice, and development.

Andrea Fleckinger is Research Fellow at the University of Trento, Italy. Her research focuses on feminist, qualitative, and participatory approaches to gendered power relations, especially victimisation, institutional dynamics, and transgenerational trauma.

Laia Narciso is Professor of Social Anthropology at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), Spain. Her expertise includes ethnographic and qualitative methodologies. She focuses on social and educational inequalities in the field of gender studies, migration, and minorities.