World YWCA | World YWCA | About us | Organisational structure

Organisational structure

Value based and volunteer driven, the World YWCA movement is built on a strong foundation of grassroots leaders with an intimate knowledge of the challenges women face in their communities. The organisation is guided by their experience and expertise.

The World Council is the quadrennial legislative meeting of the World YWCA, which brings together over 600 representatives from the 100 national associations affiliated to the global YWCA movement. It has primary responsibility for determining the policy, constitution, strategic directions and budgets of the World YWCA. The Council also elects a 20 World board members that is representative of all regions and serves as the governing board of the World YWCA.

World YWCA President

Susan Brennan , from Australia, is a barrister in administrative, town planning and

environmental law. Former co-president of the YWCA of Australia, Susan Brennan, who succeeds Mónica Zetzsche as president, began her life in the YWCA as a young woman leader on the board of her local association in Melbourne, Australia.She was recruited to the National Executive Committee at age 24 and was active in the development of a national policy framework to guide the advocacy of the YWCA of Australia, attended the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing as a young woman delegate for the YWCA of Australia and represented the YWCA in the drafting of an Optional Protocol to the Women’s Convention at the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women in New York.

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In the press

The Australian newspaper ‘The Age’ featured an article on the Word YWCA President Susan Brennan on January 30, 2008. Susan discusses the challenges facing the movement, highlighting the work of the YWCA on a global level. ‘One specific issue the YWCA works incredibly hard [on] is HIV and AIDS’ says Brennan. ‘ The face of HIV and AIDS in the world is young, female, black and poor. That’s what she looks like. And it’s critically important for young women to have the information, and the esteem and the confidence to negotiate sexual relationships that don’t put them at risk’. The World YWCA President also shared her ambition for the organisation over her four-year term, ‘to be as active on the issue of violence against women as we have been on HIV because [this issue is] so persistent, so universal’. Expanding on Christian basis and the commitment to elevate status of women, Brennan argues ‘We are standing as a feminist organisation and saying it’s not consistent with principles of Christianity to beat your wife, to infect your wife, to treat her disrespectfully’.

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World YWCA General Secretary

Nyaradzai Gumbonzvanda , from Zimbabwe, has over 10 years of experience with the United Nations, where she served as Regional Director for the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) in Eastern Africa, human rights officer with UNICEF as well as national child rights advisor in Liberia and Zimbabwe respectively. For many years, she has worked in the women’s rights movement on issues of constitutionalism, inheritance, property and land rights. Gumbonzvanda also served as interim coordinator for the Zimbabwe Women Lawyers Association during its formative stage and in the Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs in Zimbabwe as a law officer.