On 27 January 2014 the Norwegian women’s rights organisations founded the Norwegian Women’s Lobby (NWL), a new umbrella organisation for the Norwegian women’s movement that will work to eliminate all forms of discrimination against women and girls.

The aim of NWL is to promote women’s human rights, on the basis of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, the Beijing Platform for Action and other fundamental international agreements. The establishment of NWL was initiated by Torild Skard, the former Chairman of UNICEF, and was in accordance with the recommendations of the government-appointed Gender Equality Commission of 2010, which was chaired by Hege Skjeie. The Norwegian Women’s Lobby is modelled after the Swedish Women’s Lobby. Our member organisations constitute the core of the women’s movement of Norway and have been championing women’s rights since 1884; the Equality and Anti-Discrimination Ombud described our founding organisations as “the very foundation of the efforts to promote women’s rights in Norway.”

The board consists of

  • Margunn Bjørnholt – President (Norwegian Association for Women’s Rights)
  • Fakhra Salimi (MiRA Resource Centre for Black, Immigrant and Refugee Women)
  • Marta Trzcinska (Legal Aid for Women)
  • Lone Alice Johansen (Secretariat of the Shelter Movement)
  • Madeleine Schultz (Women’s Front of Norway)