At the opening session of the Philea 2025 Forum, several speakers addressed the theme of the meeting, each in their own way: Power and Equality. A Balancing Act.

Before being welcomed by the president of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, António Feijó, the president of Philea, Àngel Font, said that “equality is the search for balance, equity, justice and rights” and that “when things are not in balance, it creates tension”.

And recent events around the world have made this tension more visible, stemming from systemic inequalities and historical injustices, which has triggered a movement of reflection and social accountability in relation to racial, social and economic justice. And it is in this context that this year’s Philea Forum is taking place.

Open item in modal

Open item in modal

Open item in modal

/

Previous Next Expand

Making philanthropy think

With around 850 registered participants from 44 countries, representing philanthropic associations, non-governmental organisations, European and multilateral institutions, think tanks, among others, the Philea 2025 Forum aims not only to explore the relationship between inequalities, power imbalances and the structures that sustain them, but also, as Ángel Font said, to find “ways of creating greater equality, greater balance”.

Bruno Maçães, former Secretary of State for European Affairs, took to the stage of the Grand Auditorium to draw parallels between travelling and philanthropy. “There’s a lot of travelling in philanthropy and a lot of philanthropy in travelling. Both are about discovering what has been forgotten and bringing it back from oblivion”, says someone who, after leaving government, travelled for months. “Telling those people that those places are important, and that they are also the centre of the world, is also a kind of philanthropy”.

With her life dedicated to women’s empowerment, Françoise Moudouthe (executive director of the African Women’s Development Fund, founder of the Eyala Platform and member of the Board of the Malala Foundation) has left behind three great lessons: 1. We need to “think like a feminist centred on justice. Philanthropy needs to rethink its ambition”; 2. “Movements need to be refocused. When the goal is justice, we need to focus on those who make justice happen. And those are the social justice movements” (which, for philanthropy, means thinking about who you fund – you have to help people who are living in oppression to build an agenda and their own voice). And finally, 3. “Fund like a feminist”, which means, among other things, “creating strategies and working with the beneficiaries from the outset”,

Dino D’Santiago, wearing a T-shirt that read “Free Gaza”, closed the opening session, which included other speakers such as Larry Kramer, President of the London School of Economics and Political Science, and Marija Jakovljević, Project Manager at the Dalan Foundation.

The Philea Forum takes place between 2 and 5 June.