In the Dominican Republic, AJWS supports civil and political rights organizations of Haitian migrants and Dominicans of Haitian descent, who have been pushed to the fringes of society for decades. Many members of the latter community were thrust into statelessness in 2014 when the supreme court retroactively stripped them of their nationality — thereby severing their access to education, employment and healthcare. AJWS supports the country’s leading Haitian-descendant activists to defend the rights of their community, including advocating for legal solutions to end state sponsored statelessness, fighting xenophobic and racist application of laws, helping families access basic services, and strengthening their community’s sense of self-worth in a society that has stigmatized and demeaned them for generations.
AJWS also funds feminist organizations that fight for the rights of adolescent girls, young and adult women, LGBTQI+ people and sex workers — building social movements to reduce inequality, confront gender-based violence, advance racial justice and reshape Dominicans’ deeply patriarchal values. We enable our partners to build community agency, directly advocating for improved access to services; we also support activists to access mental health services to help cope with the emotional toll of the persecution and obstacles they face.
