Dear Friends and Partners,

Thinking back on the past year, it’s hard to believe how much has been accomplished in such a short time. While the Center for Partnership Studies continues with many new and exciting projects, I want to take this time to highlight the work of SAIV, the Spiritual Alliance to Stop Intimate Violence, which has flourished over the past year. I am proud to report that our educational CD-Rom, the cornerstone of the movement to end intimate violence, along with our program to enlist the help of religious leaders throughout the world, is nearing completion. We have succeeded in adding a number of illustrious world leaders to our already impressive list of advisors and directors including Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa and Queen Noor of Jordan, who are committed to the work of SAIV and its mission to end intimate violence.

What I am most excited to announce, for the first time here, is that thanks to your generous contributions, SAIV has also established a granting fund whose purpose it is to identify and help support small, grass roots organizations throughout the world who are actively involved in the mission to end gender discrimination and intimate violence while fostering communities dedicated to the ideals of partnership.

These are our first four grantees, many of which I would like to add happen to be run by male religious leaders - helping to break the belief that the work of Partnership and ending intimate violence are women’s issues and not the concern of all of society.

In India, we are recognizing the outstanding work of Swami Agnivesh and his organization which stands up daily against the selective abortion of female fetuses.

We have recognized the work of Father Gonzolo Ituarte of Chiapas Mexico. Facing danger, Gonzolo’s group challenges the high degree of violence against both women and children in Mexico.

In Thailand, where human trafficking, one of the worst social ills that festers in societies that do not address issues of partnership and partnership based economics, is one of the highest in the world, SAIV acknowledges the work of the Ven. Dhammananda, of Bangkok and Ouyporn Khaunkeuw, of Chiang Mai, and their programs for victims of prostitution and violence against women. Dhammananda is the first fully-ordained Buddhist woman in Thailand for several hundred years and a courageous campaigner for women's rights and Chiang Mai is Director of the Buddhist International Women’s Partnership for Peace and Justice.

Our fourth grantee is Levi Weiman-Kelman, a Rabbi in Jerusalem who has created an educational program to stop intimate violence, an oft-ignored problem in the Middle East.

As I stated, each of these small but powerful groups represent a significant contribution toward ending violence and gender discrimination. They are not alone. We have already identified eight additional organizations throughout the world that deserve our admiration and funding, including Lucinda Kalinkana (Maasai Mara, Kenya), leading a women’s cooperative project on female circumcision (African Traditional Religion) and a group run by Ela Gandhi (granddaughter of Mahatma Gandhi).

Knowing your dedication to the partnership movement, you are probably asking how can I and my community get more involved?

1. First and foremost, please share this information with as many people as possible. Poverty and silence are what feed gender discrimination and intimate violence. We need to spread the word and gain as much support as we can for these good and deserving organizations. Very soon, you will be receiving an email copy of the first SAIV Newsletter – which we hope you will share with friends, colleagues, and other email lists.
    
2. Next, please donate to the Center for Partnership Studies and the SAIV Program. Let your voice be heard through your financial support. Education is our strongest weapon against gender discrimination and intimate violence. We need your support to continue on with these programs. Please send your tax deductible gift to Center for Partnership Studies, PO Box 51936, Pacific Grove, California 93950, USA, or online at our secure donation website: Invest in Partnership
   
   For donations of over $150.00 we will send you an autographed copy of one of my books.
    
3. If you know of others who are in a position to make a significant contribution to this work please contact me directly.
   

It is truly an exciting time for the Partnership Movement. Those of us who have committed ourselves to it, are being joined by thousands more each day as the world at large is finally waking up the fact that we can no longer ignore the victims of intimate violence and the link between intimate violence and international violence, including terrorism.

There are many more grantees that desperately need our financial support. Now that our educational CD-Rom is in its final stages of readiness, it will need significant funding to complete its distribution.

Please take a few moments now, and consider this plea. If you’re wondering why your help is so valuable please look no further than this heart-wrenching story highlighting the effects of gender inequality and intimate violence from the front page of last Sunday’s New York Times. While discussing the problems facing young women in Africa, it quotes “There is a lot of talk, but the value of a girl child is still low….society still clings to the education of the boy and sees the girl as a trading tool.” The results? The spread of AIDS, high infant mortality rates, as well as armies filled with child soldiers just to name a few. Africa is not alone; this is a pandemic worldwide problem that needs our attention.

This continues to be the work of the Center for Partnership Studies: to foster understanding, to educate, to show the link between “women’s and children’s issues” and social violence, poverty, and other global problems, and to put an end to gender inequality and intimate violence. Please, lend your much needed support today.

In Partnership,
Riane Eisler

PS: To all of you who have volunteered your time and resources, please accept the Center’s heartfelt gratitude. Just look at what we have created in a short time.

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