To Sustain Ourselves, Let’s Sustain Each Other

In the embrace of collective wisdom this past June, something powerful emerged when 60 human rights defenders from across Mexico gathered to reimagine their relationships with resources, power, and philanthropy itself. 

Often, philanthropy has operated within systems that mirror colonial and patriarchal structures. The flow of money often reinforces existing power dynamics rather than dismantling them. At HIP, we recognize that our work must go beyond moving resources – we must question and transform how philanthropy works at its core. 

When these incredible defensoras came together, they moved beyond funding challenges. They excavated the deeper structural issues embedded in how we think about value, sustainability, and economic justice. 

This is how Sostenerse, Sostenernos – Sustain Me, Sustain Us came to life. This manifesto is a living document serving as a starting point for transformative philanthropy. It is an invitation to join them in building a more just, equitable, and sustainable approach to funding human rights work. 

The path forward demands courage: to cede power, to trust community wisdom, and to recognize that true philanthropy doesn’t create dependency but fosters liberation. As we carry this manifesto forward, we ask all funders to commit to resourcing the wholeness of those doing the work – their security, their healing, and their comunidad. 

The defensoras have spoken. Will you join us?

You can download the full manifesto here.

To Sustain Ourselves, To Sustain Each Other

We recognize our worth and the value of our work — we are activists, creators, and caregivers, and our contributions deserve recognition and fair compensation.

We honor the ancestral wisdom of our grandmothers, who have sustained the care economy across generations.

We reject imposed precarity and embrace abundance as a collective right. We aspire to flourish with dignity and well-being. We deserve care, job stability, and social security for everyone.

We position ourselves from a place of self-critique, constantly questioning our colonial, patriarchal, and heteronormative practices.

We recognize our bodies as territories of resistance and healing.

We celebrate the strength of our collectivity and commit to healing economic wounds from that space, breaking oppressive paradigms around power.

In mutual embrace and care, we find the energy to move forward. Self-care and collective care are political acts.

We commit to writing our own history and building a collective memory that makes our contributions and struggles visible.

We reaffirm our right to defend ourselves, to organize, and to stand together in our diverse territories, committing to a resistance rooted in tenderness, caring for our bodies, hearts, and minds, both personally and collectively.

We declare that money is not an end, but a means to transform realities and create alternatives. However, we raise our voices to demand: Pay us what we are owed! Economic justice is an integral part of our feminist struggle.

We are the fire that illuminates and transforms. We are the seeds of change. We are feminists from the Global South, advancing together in unity.