WomenStrong’s Leadership Transition: An Interview with Dr. Susan Blaustein and Dr. Chisina Kapungu

In 2025, WomenStrong International is celebrating a major milestone. After more than a decade of growth under the leadership of founder Dr. Susan Blaustein, the organization is handing the reins to a new executive director—Dr. Chisina Kapungu. We sat down with them both to discuss the transition and their plans for the future of WomenStrong.

Dr. Blaustein, the longtime executive director of WomenStrong, founded the organization in 2014 with a vision to connect grassroots, women-led organizations in the Global South with the resources and partners to serve women and girls in their local communities. She will continue serving WomenStrong in her new role as Chair and President of the Board and Strategic Council.

Dr. Kapungu joined WomenStrong in 2019 as Director of Learning and Partnerships, where she led the organization’s Learning Lab program with a focus on girls’ education, women’s health, violence prevention, and economic opportunity. Previously she served as Senior Gender and Youth Specialist at the International Center for Research on Women, as well as assistant professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Illinois Chicago.

The following conversation has been lightly edited for clarity and concision.

How did you two first meet, and what first caught your attention about each other?

Dr. Susan Blaustein: Well, Chisina was part of the evaluation team at the International Center for Research on Women, which we had hired to carry out our first evaluation, after three years of work. She came to visit and looked into the efficacy and increased equity of women in our programs in Kumasi, Ghana, and Washington, D.C..

When we met initially to discuss her impressions and initial findings, I appreciated Chisina’s keen interest in the partners, her curiosity and open-mindedness about them, her empathy for the women’s situations and settings, and her respect and seeming affection for the leaders (both of whom were among my very favorites). So I felt a kind of kindred spirit with her practically immediately.

Dr. Chisina Kapungu: When I met Suzy, I thought she really had a genuine interest in uplifting the voices of marginalized people. Making sure that solutions were created by them and tailored for them, so that those solutions were effective and sustainable.

And so she’s always had values that are very important to me — related to diversity, equity, and inclusion — making sure that all people’s voices are heard, and they all have a seat at the table.

It sounds like you had both a professional and personal alignment, in terms of values and goals.

Dr. Blaustein: Yes, absolutely. As Chisina just put it, “You know, [equity and inclusion] are the things I believe in.” And the best solutions are those closest to the ground, so we need to trust and empower those who know best what their communities need.

That’s what WomenStrong was founded on, and that’s how I see Chisina taking us forward into our second decade.

Chisina, what made WomenStrong interesting to you? What was so compelling that you wanted to get involved?

Dr. Kapungu: When I did the evaluation in Washington, DC, I saw how WomenStrong’s staff related to people in the community. Now, these were people in the community who were low-income. They’d experienced many, many different challenges in their lives. And I think how [WomenStrong staff] related to them on a human level is what made me really interested. At WomenStrong, they really didn’t care about hierarchy. They tried to relate to everyone, no matter what position in society they were in.

And for me, that’s such an important value of us being humans — that we can connect with each other on a deeper level that transcends race, gender, ethnicity. That’s a value you don’t find in many organizations.

Also, the mission of moving power, money, and resources to women-led organizations and amplifying their voices was an interest of mine, and I was looking for an opportunity where I would work closely and deeply with partners who are doing the work. So that’s what made WomenStrong appealing to me.

Dr. Blaustein: Our next interaction was when we hired Chisina as an education expert for the retreat of our girls’ education group. This was our first group activity with our partners, and Chisina was just so great.

And the spirit among those partners in person was so wonderful, and Chisina had so much fun with them, that they came to trust us and each other. Those partnerships are still going strong; it’s really remarkable.

Because we were able to meet in person, and because of Chisina’s dynamism and leadership, it set the tone for our whole Learning Lab community. That was really important.

Dr. Kapungu: This is funny, because I was just looking at pictures of our 2019 retreat. And I think what struck me is how collaborative we were, and how we were able to really think about what we need to do, in order to move the needle to advance gender equity.

We’re all smiling and having fun in these photos, hearing everyone’s ideas. People were very passionate about what they do, and they were so vulnerable with each other. It was all about building community and connection.

That in-person retreat really solidified our relationship with our partners. It showed them who we are, and how much we really want to support them. So that retreat, literally, has been the foundation — definitely for WomenStrong’s girls’ education and empowerment group, but also for all partners that we work with.

Dr. Blaustein: And those partners were coming from all over the world! Our girls’ education group was Afghanistan, Malawi, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Peru, Guatemala. They would not have met each other ordinarily.

And yet, when we were talking about how to engage boys and men in supporting girls’ education, they were throwing ideas back and forth. “We do it this way in the hills of Guatemala!” Or, “We do it this way in the outskirts of Mazar-i-Sharif!” It was so dynamic, and Chisina really energized it.

How has the global fight for gender equality changed over the last 10 years? And what’s your current read on the situation?

Dr. Blaustein: There’s been tremendous progress in women’s rights. But the more strength, solidarity, effectiveness, and confidence we see on women’s side, the more we see a fierce backlash and defiant clutch at control by powerful men, as though this were a zero-sum game.

The more we see this regressive authoritarian style here in the West, the more we see the traditional conservative elements heartened across the Global South. They’re feeling that they’ve been correct all this time, and that they were right to have resisted and even defied moving toward gender equity. This has encouraged really regressive, even punitive behavior that’s not just restrictive of women’s rights, but it’s actually dangerous for women and girls.

Dr. Kapungu: It’s tragic to see what’s happening currently, especially when you look at issues like the Supreme Court denying Americans’ rights to essential health care like abortion. And then you’re seeing all these executive orders — declaring that the federal government only recognizes two genders, terminating DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion) in federal agencies, revoking the Equal Employment Opportunity Act, and pausing U.S. foreign aid. So the backlash is at the center of what we’re dealing with in the United States, and you’re seeing that around the world.

I do think that in this era, we’re not understanding what we mean when we say “equity” — that equity just refers to fairness and justice to address existing inequalities. We don’t all start from the same place, due to historical and systemic disparities. So when we talk about equity, we’re really talking about tailored approaches to address specific needs — not only of underrepresented groups, but groups like people with disabilities, people in poverty, our veterans, and so on.

Equity takes into account providing opportunities to people who don’t have the same privileges as other people but who are qualified and under-represented. I think that we’re not understanding what the word means, and that this backlash is something that is going to affect us all globally. For WomenStrong, we will continue to be champions of diversity, equity, and inclusion. We will continue to invest in women, because we found that when you invest in women, you’re also investing in families and communities and in improving societies.

So women’s empowerment leads to better outcomes: in economic growth, in peace, in health, in all these areas. The current situation is tragic, but we will continue to live our values. And we will continue to voice our outright disgust, honestly, with what’s happening in the United States.

Dr. Blaustein: I think that people who’ve had it good and haven’t really thought about their position don’t want to have to think about that. They don’t want to have to share the power. They see it somehow as a zero-sum game, rather than, as Chisina said, if you improve the health for, say, low-income women, you’re also improving the health of their entire family. Then broaden that out: you’re also enabling them to earn and do all the things that will actually benefit everyone, including those people in power, in the long run.

The world is changing, the demographics are changing, and so many powerful women and other different constituencies have come to the fore. The idea that you can sort of quash them and go back to an era where only a few voices were heard is just preposterous. It’s just a question of what it will take, to continue to move the needle forward.

I think those of us who grew up in the era of civil rights really thought that the arc was bending toward justice. We saw the miracle of President Obama being elected, and we just thought it was going to be a steady trajectory. And of course, it isn’t.

Worldwide, the feeling now is that the power elites are being threatened. Climate change is forcing migration, and migration is threatening to the elites. It challenges resources and power. So this is not just a U.S. problem. And as Chisina said, that has repercussions for all our partners.

Dr. Blaustein had mentioned this idea that the moral arc of the universe bends towards justice. We know it’s not a linear path, obviously. But are there any recent developments that give you hope we’re moving in the right direction?

Dr. Kapungu: I think one area, particularly outside the United States, is that more women are holding political office and even being elected president. So there’s a lot for us in the United States to learn from them.

Rwanda now has the highest percentage of women in parliamentary positions, alongside South Africa and Senegal and Namibia. Mexico recently elected their first female president, who’s absolutely fabulous. There have been more women in leadership positions, which has been important.

I do think that in America, we have to learn about why we can’t elect a female president. What are the barriers that hold us back in that? But overall, women’s leadership has evolved, which is wonderful to see. I love it.

Dr. Blaustein: When the Roe v. Wade ruling fell a couple of years ago, we were all stricken here in the U.S. So we opened up a voluntary meeting among our partners, just to come online and talk. And it was so instructive.

For instance, our Mexican partners consoled us and said, “We got abortion rights enshrined in law here in our state, and now it’s being decriminalized nationwide. Each state will have to legalize it. It’s been a 20-year struggle, but it can happen.” And our East African partners were saying, “It’s illegal here, but we sure know how to get excellent post-abortion care, and we can give you some tips on that.” And this South-to-North sharing, given their struggles, and what and how they have surmounted them, was so uplifting, and so humbling.

Because, you know, we’ve been living with [abortion rights] practically since we were born! All of a sudden they’re stricken away, and people say it could take you 20 years to get them back. We’re like, “We don’t want to wait 20 years!” But there was really a sense of sort of solidarity, you know, from East Africa to western Mexico. They’re telling us how to handle this. It was just such a wonderful moment, and also an indicator of real progress in different parts of the world on some of these issues.

How has global philanthropy around gender issues changed in the last decade?

Dr. Blaustein: It’s similar to the progress for gender equity. Global philanthropy has begun to understand some of the challenges and power dynamics, and has begun to shift some control over the resources to those working on the ground.

But from what we hear from some of our partners, a sort of paternalistic or post-colonial controlling impulse continues, even among some funders who consider themselves progressive and trust-based. That includes telling grantees what they can and can’t do, or insisting that they follow a given program (such as a particular course in capacity-strengthening), rather than doing what the partners themselves know they need.

It’s a retention of control by the donor, in an ongoing, “we know best what you need” mentality. So there’s still a lot of work to be done, and I hope our example can serve as a model of just letting go of control and trusting those whom you’ve entrusted with your resources.

Dr. Kapungu: I’d agree with Suzy that there’s a habit of donors wanting to control their giving. But what I’m encouraged to see is a rise in donor collaboratives and donors coming together for collective action. Donors are increasingly pooling their resources and their knowledge to tackle global issues such as climate change or health crises. That’s a trend that I hope will continue. It’s even more critical now, particularly given the attacks on international development in general, for donors to pool resources.

There’s also been a rise of impact investing, where you see a lot of high net worth individuals doing initiatives that will have a social impact but will also provide a financial return. I had a conversation with an impact investor who talked about purpose with profit. It was like their motto.

We’re seeing more of a focus on mental health and climate change, as well. And overall, there is a push towards decolonizing development and moving more power and resources to community-based organizations. But there’s still a group of donors that want the traditional ways of restricted funding and being prescriptive as to how they give and telling grantee partners what they need… that discourse is still there.

But we hope that more trust-based philanthropists, like WomenStrong, will continue to educate other donors. We hope they’ll continue to show the value of giving money directly to Global South organizations and show that you’re going to have more effective, sustainable, and culturally relevant programming when you do that.

Where do you think progress can be made in the short term?

Dr. Kapungu: We have to all come together to challenge gender stereotypes, address people’s biases, and continue to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion.

Dr. Blaustein: We’ve seen at WomenStrong that local leaders are savvy enough to find the entry points and the allies and work through the wedges where and how they can to build awareness of rights among girls and women. They know how to work in coalition with sympathetic partners where they can, and to build the foundation (maybe very quietly) for structures needed for broad systemic change.

Where does progress need to be made in the medium-to-long term?

Dr. Kapungu: We need to advocate for pay equity, as well as for increasing women’s representation in leadership and decision-making, whether it’s in the workplace or the higher levels of government.

Dr. Blaustein: Progress needs to be made in building coalitions and solidarity among like-minded nonprofits and in forging partnerships with deeply resourced partners. That means local and national governments, the private sector, multilateral institutions, agencies, and so on.

The actors on the ground need to be able to forge these partnerships, and we need to make clear that this isn’t a zero-sum game. We need to show that the advancement of rights for some is an advancement for the rights of everyone.

And as Chisina said, women leaders in civil society also need to be at the table where resources are allocated and decisions are made. This is absolutely key — otherwise their wisdom is wasted, and the resources of the donors will also be wasted.

Dr. Kapungu: You just reminded me that in 2023 the U.N. Secretary General António Guterres talked about how we’re 300 years away from achieving gender equality. That’s huge. So we need to understand the shifts that need to be made to move that needle. Conversely: what are we investing in that isn’t working?

Because 300 years is a long time. And so we need to figure out what to do that’s going to have a transformative impact.

Why do you think we need to shift power and resources from donors in the Global North, to community-based organizations in the Global South?

Dr. Blaustein: Because community-based organizations have precious local knowledge, especially those that are led by women. They understand the local structures, the culture, the laws, the resistance. They know where the openings are to change, where the sympathetic voices and potential partners are. They’re the most strategic, and they’re by far the most expert and the most efficient in using resources to move their communities forward, whatever their area of work.

We were talking before about global philanthropy in the last 10 years and the shift to the ground from funders in the Global North. Before, if donors supported a large foundation’s project or a UNICEF project, they just trusted these big partners. But if they give directly — because it’s so much more rewarding to support a fabulous local organization in a place like Kampala or in Antigua — then they feel like they need to exert more control, because they don’t really know what’s happening on the ground.

So it’s almost as if this progressive shift in moving resources to the Global South comes with an increase in paternalistic thinking. I think donors in the Global North really need to trust those local organizations to do what they know is needed.

What have you seen from your partners that indicates WomenStrong’s approach is working?

Dr. Kapungu: Our approach is focused on strengthening the organizational capacity of women-led organizations. We’ve seen that the areas where partners need more help are in fundraising, leadership, development, communications, monitoring, and evaluation. So when our forthcoming outcome evaluation is finished, we’re expecting to see improvements in their systems and organizational capacity.

What we have seen currently is that partners are coming to collaborate with each other by sharing learning, expertise, and resources. For instance, we had a partner in Malawi and a partner in Peru who both were implementing gender-sensitive teaching training curricula. Both those organizations presented their projects to government officials and to other partners within their countries.

So that’s where I think we will see impact — where partners are collaborating with each other and learning from each other. They want to support each other. It’s about learning and growing, whether that’s personally or organizationally, in terms of systems.

Dr. Blaustein: I just spoke this week with our Madagascar partner. She was talking about the support she receives from our Philippines partner, and she told me they meet regularly to share tips and challenges and to talk about scaling their programs.

These are both very sophisticated NGOs, but they’re on different continents in hugely different cultural contexts — they likely never would have met, but for WomenStrong’s bringing them together, and they’re now finding ideas and comfort in each other’s work and each other’s wisdom. It’s really beautiful to see.

In general, we’ve seen our partners grow stronger, and we look forward to our forthcoming evaluation, to show us where they feel their work has been strengthened and where they need more support. I have to say, I have also seen some funders begin to shift, as they have come to realize that there was virtue in bringing those partners together, and now they’re doing it in wonderful ways. I’ve witnessed some of their gatherings online, and now they’re wedded to it. I don’t think they even remember that they were against it before.

I hope these kinds of convenings among partners continue, because, again, that’s where the expertise is. And from there, we need to raise partners’ voices to the level of the global stage, so that they can share their solutions more broadly.

How do you see WomenStrong’s approach evolving in 2025 and beyond?

Dr. Kapungu: For our grantee partners, we definitely want to focus on their sustainability. Many partners are finding they’re in financial crisis right now. Funding is getting even more restrictive, and so helping to connect them with donors and providing them with fundraising support is going to be important, as is strengthening their monitoring and evaluation system.

As an organization, we also want to leverage high net worth individuals from the Global South. Usually, we talk about wealth in terms of the Global North, but there is a lot of wealth in Latin America, Asia, and Africa. So how can we encourage high net worth individuals to use their resources for strategic investments in those regions? There’s a lot of giving that happens overall from people in those countries, and also from their diasporas, for emergency situations or school fees, or things of that sort. But how can we pull those resources to make investments that are going to be beneficial for the community?

Along with strategizing around that, we’ll focus on disseminating the impacts of our work, elevating the importance of trust-based philanthropy, and investing in global women-led organizations from the Global South. We’ll be staying true to our values on localization and diversity, equity, and inclusion. And we will continue to be a constant voice advocating for women’s rights, as well as just human rights in general.

Dr. Blaustein: Chisina is absolutely right. She was at an Africa donor conference and there was all kinds of goodwill from fabulous people. I think when they can come together and pull resources, that’s going to be very powerful.
Recently I gave a commencement address to a leadership training program for women on nonprofit boards. These were successful people from all over the world who had a lot of knowledge and resources to share. So the will is there — it’s really just a matter of raising awareness about the tools at people’s disposal.

What WomenStrong can do is energize that, so that collectively we can move the needle at scale. To echo what Chisina said, there’s a lot to be gained for everyone when we disseminate lessons learned and some of our successes, so that others can try this approach. It’s not high risk – it works!

We’ve seen the confidence growing in our partners. We’ve seen the strength among them. We’ve seen them succeed in getting larger grants and expanding their programs. We also have a new climate and environmental justice group of grantees launching in April. Because the challenge of climate change is so ubiquitous, it affects all our partners, so this will be a really interesting new avenue for us in 2025.

Dr. Kapungu: You’re seeing a lot of youth-led groups focusing on various climate initiatives, so I think that is going to be something to invest in a lot more.

Dr. Blaustein: And that’s necessary because environmental justice programs are being cut in this country now, even after huge investments over the last four years in remedying the harms done to human health, to the land, to wildlife.
We have an opportunity to remind people what’s going on, and to speak about the importance of healing communities. So it’s sort of adjacent to climate justice, because, of course, all these things are worsened with climate change, but it’s actually an issue of equity, as well. And I think we can be an amplifier in drawing awareness to this.

As we enter this new chapter of WomenStrong, what do you hope to accomplish?

Dr. Blaustein: I plan to help build out partnerships and coalitions with those who can help us advance and sustain our mission. I also hope to continue writing about the issues facing girls and women across the globe, and to help amplify the courage and accomplishments of our partners. And I want to further my friendships with our outstanding women leaders, whom I’ve come to know and love over the years.
So these would be my three personal ambitions, but the most important is helping the organization. I want to help WomenStrong become better known, and bring in new board members, advisors, and funders who can help us sustain our mission.

Dr. Kapungu: What I value about Susan’s leadership is that she has provided opportunities for staff and partners to grow and spread their wings, to test new ideas. I’ve been here at WomenStrong for five years, and we’ve really been on a learning journey. We went from restricted funding to unrestricted funding and then multi-year grants. The whole time we were nurturing that growth and understanding that when you fail, you learn. You can’t have success without failure.

So I’m not afraid to test new ideas, or to try something new. I also think that diversifying our funding streams is going to allow us to grow our community of partners and maybe delve into new areas such as mental health. You’ve seen a lot more funding going into those efforts around the globe.

I hope that’ll occur as well, but it really is about continuing our values, strengthening the capacity of our partners, and being more innovative and trying new methods that are a little bit more out of the box.

We can also advise people on how to create Learning Labs of their own. We’re seeing a lot of donors think about the importance of peer-to-peer learning, but they’re not necessarily developing the systems to promote it. We’re well-positioned to be advisors for that.

If people are curious about what WomenStrong’s future looks like, what would you tell them?

Dr. Blaustein: I would say: watch us and stay with us! We have grown. We started with two partners, and then six, then 12, and now 19, and soon to be something like 25. My vision is that WomenStrong’s approach of listening to local women leaders — trusting them, following their lead, resourcing them, connecting them so they can share knowledge, and raising their visibility on regional and global stages — is able to continue to gain strength and frankly, to be emulated by other funders.

I hope that through more efficient philanthropy and the endowment of trust in local expertise, more and more women, children, and communities are able to realize their rights and their dreams. So again I would say: support us! Follow us, learn about us. Speak out about our approach, and join our movement to advance all of our rights – it’s more important than ever, in today’s world.

Dr. Kapungu: From talking to various partners and donors, there’s a lot of hopelessness and helplessness right now. My message is, we’ve been through worse. We won’t give up. We must build our collective power and our collective resources, and come together in solidarity to fund initiatives that protect our communities.

I also think that we have to maintain our values, because some donors are thinking of changing the way that they do things. But this is the point to be firm about your values, and to talk about women’s rights and gender equity and inclusion. This is the moment for donors to take a principled stand.

There’s power in money. Donors can change the trajectory of where we’re going in the world by focusing on the issues that are most important to them. And I would encourage them to think about giving to women-led organizations, because these are the groups making the biggest difference on the frontlines.