In this special issue of The Ideas Letter, five thoughtful pieces reckon with South Africa’s predicament today.

Open Society Foundations@open-society.bsky.social · 2w ago

In the latest edition of The Ideas Letter, William Shoki of @africasacountry.bsky.social, Brian Kagoro of Open Society, Panashe Chigumadzi, and @nicdawes.bsky.social discuss the dashed hopes of South Africa after apartheid amid stubborn inequality, high unemployment, and rising xenophobia.

What changes in governments around the world when women hold political power? The policies they pursue—on development, on participation, on human rights protections. When women lead, everyone’s outcomes improve.

Powerful states are flouting international legal norms. Both the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the images from Gaza that we’re seeing today are horrific, with the devastation of the Palestinian people being streamed to us live. I think this is a moment of global shame that will stay with us.

Open Society is contributing $1.5 million to support an equitable, locally driven recovery after the devastating earthquake in Colombia’s Pacific region, where more than 30,000 families are now homeless.

Open Society Foundations@open-society.bsky.social · 4w ago

We’re launching a $1.5 million rebuilding fund to support an equitable, locally driven recovery following the earthquake in Colombia’s Pacific region.

The task before those fighting for universal human dignity is not the restoration of a vanished order, but the patient work of making a better one. We are the authors of our own stories.

The human rights movement has long defined itself in the negative: no to torture, no to censorship, no to detention without trial. These refusals are necessary, but they are not enough. In Vienna, for CEU’s 35th anniversary lecture, I spoke about the new world we must dare to build.

It’s time for the world to step up and pursue justice for Afghan girls and women. Five years after the Taliban’s takeover of Kabul, I joined @bbcnewsnight.bsky.social to discuss the growing push for international justice:

The attacks on civil society are led by those who want to discredit the principles of open society, free expression, and debate. Civil society is not afraid. And if necessary, we will go to court to defend our constitutional rights.

Open Society Foundation-Präsidentin: „George Soros wurde gezielt verunglimpft“

Binaifer Nowrojee im Interview: „Ein Großteil dessen, was man in den Medien über ihn liest, ist Desinformation.“

falter.at

Without international justice, women and girls in Afghanistan, and the victims of war in Ukraine, Gaza, and Sudan risk being abandoned, the crimes against them unacknowledged, and the perpetrators free to repeat them. My latest for @data.ft.com:

The ICC is all the women of Afghanistan have left

Trump’s vow to dismantle the international court will inaugurate a new era of impunity

as.ft.com

Financial Times@financialtimes.com · last mo.

Opinion: Donald Trump’s vow to dismantle the international court will inaugurate a new era of impunity. ft.trib.al/LuxDq5s

Since taking over Afghanistan five years ago, the Taliban has imposed a brutal and misogynistic regime. As I wrote in the @financialtimes.com today, international courts are their only avenue for justice. But at the same time, international justice is under attack.

The Taliban’s oppression seeks to remove women from public life and steal futures from girls. My piece for the Australian Strategic Policy Institute on why Australia should take the case to the ICJ:

Australia can lead the international legal case against the Taliban’s violation of women's rights | The Strategist

The Taliban has issued a decree that further enables child marriages in Afghanistan and restricts women’s and girls’ ability to leave such unions. As the repression accelerates, Australia should build...

aspistrategist.org.au

The crises we face today are real. But we know in the communities closest to the harm is where we’ll find solutions. It’s heartening to be surrounded by leaders and community builders from every region of the world at UCLG World Congress. @open-society.bsky.social is proud to be your partner.

Universality was never meant to be uniformity. It does not require that the world speak with one voice. It is precisely the meeting of many traditions—cultural and legal, new and old, on every continent—that gives human dignity its true universality.

The rights we now take for granted—abolition of slavery, the vote for women, the end of colonial rule—were not granted from above. They were won from below, by people who organized, argued, persuaded, suffered defeats, and kept going.

Nearly a decade ago, an authoritarian leader forced CEU out of Budapest. You did not watch the closing of a society from a distance. You lived it, and you persevered. That leader is now gone. Your commitment to open societies continues.

Today’s advocates of dignity and justice understand that the law alone will not save us. I say this as a lawyer who knows that the first international convictions for rape as an instrument of genocide came because the survivors I worked with refused to let prosecutors look away.

To honor the freedoms we were once most proud of, we must defend democratic institutions, protect everyone’s dignity, and resist the lie that rights are zero-sum. One standard—for Gaza, Sudan, and Ukraine—because a standard applied selectively is no standard at all.

A multilateral system’s future depends on welcoming, not managing, a wider coalition—looking at who sits at the table, who sets the agenda. The same test falls on philanthropy: Support frontlines. Transfer power. Stand as allies, not saviors.

Recent events, including the fatal shooting at a mosque in San Diego and stabbings targeting the Jewish community in London, show how the demonization of faith communities can deepen divisions in society and lead to terrible violence.

Antisemitism and anti-Muslim hate have flared across the west, with each rising to record levels. But, as I write in the @theguardian.com, these two hatreds have rarely been seen as related dangers—let alone confronted as a common threat to societies.

As I discussed on the @womensagenda.bsky.social podcast, we have to both defend women’s rights and advance them. Having women in leadership positions isn’t a trade-off—it’s win for everyone.

At @open-society.bsky.social, we just committed $300 million to defend freedoms and create economic opportunities for all in the U.S. We are partnering with people who are looking beyond the hard times of today to imagine an affirmative vision for the next generation.

Open Society Foundations@open-society.bsky.social · 4mo ago

We’re doubling down on our work in the United States with a $300 million investment to expand rights, foster economic dignity, and rebuild our democracy.

The U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran was not just a war against the Iranian military. It was a high-speed, systematic assault on an entire society—with little prospect of accountability. We must effectively regulate this new, high-pace, mass-scale of warfare before it becomes the norm.

The U.S.-Israeli Attack on Iran: When Death Comes Faster, and Destruction Becomes Wider

The U.S.

linkedin.com

Prejudice, dehumanization, and violence against Muslims and Jews––fueled by deep injustices in the Middle East––have led to corrosive hate. This week, we were proud to announce a new $30 million, three-year initiative to address an alarming surge of antisemitism and anti-Muslim hate.

We are living through a broader moment that demands we name what we are seeing. The organizations and institutions that protect our democracy are under sustained and coordinated pressure.

So great to speak with Dina Chaerani at @womendeliver.bsky.social about how bodily autonomy is the first right women need: “If women cannot control when they have sex, who they have sex with, when they have children, how many children they have—they cannot control their lives.”

At Women Deliver, Binaifer Nowrojee Talked Sex With an Influencer

The Open Society Foundations president turned the conversation into a message about reproductive rights.

laprogressive.com

Congratulations to Open Society President Binaifer Nowrojee @nowrojeeosf.bsky.social for being named one of Washington DC’s 500 Most Influential People of 2026 by @washingtonian.com!

Behind each social justice movement lies decades of organizing––women, LGBTQ+ communities, Indigenous and Afro-descendant communities, care workers, and informal workers building power from the ground up, often at great personal cost. @womendeliver.bsky.social

At Women Deliver 2026, I’ve been inspired by courageous feminists on the frontlines of the fight for gender justice, often in the most difficult situations. From grassroots movements to feminist approaches to tech, thousands of women leaders are moving power where it belongs. #WD2026

Today, I’m thinking of Makan Nasiri, the only child whose remains have still not been found two months after the horrific massacre that killed more than 165 students at the Shajareh Tayyebeh elementary school in Minab, Iran on February 28.