Our Work
Global Programs
Our global programs support innovative advocacy and use our collective might to carry the voices of activists to advance equality and help end discrimination.
Global LBQ Program
The Global LBQ Program is Outright International’s initiative to support lesbian, bisexual, and queer (LBQ) communities worldwide. The program accomplishes this through advocacy, research, grant-making, increased visibility, and strengthening leadership capacity.
Key Points
- LBQ people face multiple forms of discrimination that limit access to education, work, healthcare, and safety.
- Outright is LBQ-founded and LBQ-led, with over 30 years of work advancing LBQ rights and visibility worldwide.
- The organization believes LBQ equality is essential to full gender and LGBTIQ equality.
Program Highlights
LBQ people confront compounding forms of discrimination, including misogyny, homophobia, and heteronormativity. Power dynamics and social norms expose them to a unique set of human rights violations, including particular risks of violence and discrimination in accessing education, health care, housing, employment, and family formation. Data on the experience of LBQ people is scarce, which negatively impacts the visibility of LBQ issues and their relevance in advocacy agendas. Consequently, the rights and issues of LBQ people are radically underserved and under-resourced, and LBQ people remain underrepresented in leadership roles.
Outright believes that a strong LBQ movement is essential to advancing human rights for all LGBTIQ people and improving all women's lives.
Outright International is an LBQ-founded and LBQ-led organization, and it has been intentional about having LBQ women at the highest levels of leadership, which has informed our initiatives throughout the organization’s history and continues to do so today.
Our commitment to LBQ issues and LBQ visibility is reflected in decades of programming, research, and campaigns that support and prioritize LBQ communities.
For three decades, Outright has placed LBQ visibility and advocacy at the center of our mission — through research, campaigns, and programs across every region.
Conversion Practices
In 2019, Outright International, in partnership with three partner organizations – The Initiative for Equal Rights (TIERs) in Nigeria, galck+, and Access Chapter 2 (AC2) in South Africa – commenced a project to document and end conversion practices, also known as conversion “therapy,” that impact lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) people.
Outright International’s pioneering report, Harmful Treatment: The Global Reach of So-Called Conversion Therapy, exposed that conversion practices aiming to change, divert, convert or suppress the sexual orientation and/or gender identity of LGBTIQ people, including with physical and psychological force, are prevalent across the world.
Program Highlights
- Build a body of knowledge and evidence on conversion practices in Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa to ensure localized data on the manifestation of conversion practices in these countries.
- Raise awareness at national, regional, and international levels of the nature and negative impact of conversion practices.
- Build a broad base of support among relevant key actors who condemn these harmful practices and are willing to work towards establishing appropriate protections against conversion practices.
- galck+ is The National SOGIE Umbrella Body, Representing LGBQ Voices Across Kenya. The galck+ has been instrumental in establishing (and re-establishing) working relationships and alliances with Government institutions and Civil Society organizations through which to inspire a society that appreciates diversity and recognizes that everyone has a right to equal opportunities irrespective of their real or perceived sexual orientation, gender, and expression. galck+ envisions a safe and enabling environment for all. A space where the fundamental principles of human rights, equality and non-discrimination and the protection of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Queer are guaranteed; that all Kenyans, regardless of their sexual orientation, gender identity or expression are accorded their rights and freedoms as guaranteed by the Constitution of Kenya 2010.
- The Initiative for Equal Rights (TIERs) is a Nigeria-based registered not-for-profit organization working to create a society where human rights are guaranteed regardless of status, identity, orientation and affiliation. We exist to protect, uphold and promote the rights and humanity of all Nigerians through advocacy, empowerment, education, and the provision of safe platforms of convergence. We were founded in 2005 as a response to the discrimination and marginalization of sexual minorities in both HIV prevention programming, human rights protection, advocacy, and mainstream human rights work
- Access Chapter 2 was initiated to promoting the human rights and empowerment of women and girls, and LGBTI+ person in all their diversities, facilitate the participation of civil society organizations at a local, national, regional and international level by creating space and coordinating platforms for engagement on governance, policy and accountability processes and by developing innovative and active empowerment for transformation knowledge for community systems strengthening and build solidarity within civil society and other various sectors.
- Pathways for Eliminating Conversion Practices: In recognizing the urgent need to respond to these harmful practices, Outright has carried out initiatives to contribute to the ongoing global efforts to challenge conversion practices. One of those initiatives was the convening of a series of expert meetings on pathways for the elimination of conversion practices. Through these meetings, we brought together LGBTQ activists, survivors of conversion practices, academics, legal professionals, medical and mental health practitioners, human rights experts, and faith leaders to identify a set of advocacy recommendations that could be used in a variety of settings to challenge conversion practices at local, national, regional, and international levels. This toolkit is informed by the knowledge and expertise of 111 experts from 40 countries who participated in global and regional consultations that Outright convened in 2021. The toolkit sets out some of the most effective advocacy strategies that have been implemented, as well as those actively being considered by various partners globally. These strategies can be used to address conversion practices everywhere. The content of this toolkit will also be valuable to anyone who wants to expand their understanding of advocacy to challenge conversion practices and how these strategies can be applied.
- Converting Mindsets, Not Our Identities: Although conversion practices have been well-documented over the last five decades in North America and Australia, no in-depth study has been undertaken to characterize the nature and extent of these damaging, degrading practices in any African country. The three research reports (galck+ report, The Initiative for Equal Rights report, AC2 report) that emerge as part of this project fill the knowledge gap by providing substantial data on conversion practices in Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa, and contribute much-needed evidence of harm to inform advocacy interventions to curtail these practices.
- The Global Reach of So-Called Conversion Therapy: This report draws on data from an extensive literature review, the first-ever global survey on the topic, and in-depth interviews with experts and survivors from various countries. In most countries around the world, discrimination, violence, and oppression based on sexual orientation, gender identity and expression and sex characteristics persist within families, faith communities, and societies at large. A manifestation of this ongoing rejection is that LGBTIQ people are considered disordered and therefore in need of “cure,” “repair,” or counseling to regain their presumed heterosexual, cisgender identities. The term “conversion therapy” is most widely used to describe this process of cis-gender, heteronormative indoctrination— that is, attempting to change, suppress, or divert one’s sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression. The term, however, suggests that treatment is needed for a disorder and that people can be converted to cisgender heterosexuality through such “treatment.” Neither is true.
Global Trans Program
Outright International’s Global Trans Program works with trans activists and advocates to support global movement building through research, advocacy, and funding.
Our goal is to increase visibility and meaningful engagement for trans people everywhere. Outright has long prioritized inclusion and centering trans activism, issues and voices.
Program Highlights
- Build relationships across the global trans community and other stakeholders to foster relations and guide and set working parameters.
- Through grants, assist trans organizations and activists who are under-resourced.
- Create regional learning institutes aimed at cultivating strong, confident leaders to provide sustainability for the movement.
- Facilitate discussions, litigation strategies, advocacy, and lobbying to obtain legal gender recognition, inclusive health care, and social services for the global trans and gender diverse community.
For information on our Global Trans Program, please reach out to our Senior Advisor of the Global Trans Program, Rikki Nathanson, who works to build on these values while ensuring the visibility of all gender identities and gender expression in our programming.
Build - Earn - Thrive Initiative
Our Build - Earn - Thrive (Bet) Initiative works to ensure that all individuals - regardless of their background, identity, or social position - can meaningfully engage in labor markets, be entrepreneurial, and build economic independence.
Our goal is to enable LGBTIQ people to have the capability to seek and obtain fair and decent work, for employers to value and seek LGBTIQ workers, and for the labor market to provide employment opportunities that respect the dignity of LGBTIQ people from start to finish.
Program Mission
Outright’s Bet Initiative aims to foster inclusive economies that advance economic inclusion and livelihood access for LGBTIQ communities. An inclusive economy is an economic system that ensures all individuals and groups — regardless of their background, identity, or social position — have equitable opportunities to participate in, contribute to, and benefit from economic activity. The term livelihoods refers to the means and activities through which individuals sustain their lives, including employment, skill development, and income generation. Therefore, economic inclusion is the constellation of processes that enable everyone to enjoy equal access to finance, education, and legal status, which is essential for actively and meaningfully engaging in labor markets, being entrepreneurial, and building economic independence. The objectives of this process include:
- BUILD: LGBTIQ people have the capability to seek and obtain fair and decent work,
- EARN: Employers value and seek LGBTIQ workers, and
- THRIVE: The labor market provides employment opportunities in which hiring, terms and conditions, and all other employment and labor decisions are non-discriminatory and respectful of the dignity of LGBTIQ people.
LGBTIQ individuals and communities will only be able to sustain themselves holistically if they can live with dignity, be included in the economy, and enjoy full access to their economic rights and opportunities. Local entrepreneurship presents opportunities when governments fail to support and protect marginalized communities. Inclusive economies are also inherently intertwined with inclusive democracies, as economic resilience yields both greater civic participation and a stronger movement.
Our Model
Outright provides support through a model that combines grantmaking with technical support, pairing funding to local LGBTIQ organizations with mentorship, where feasible. Our priority areas of focus are skills and human capital development, entrepreneurship development, financial inclusion, advocacy, partnership, and capacity building for inclusive institutions, and social enterprises.
Skills and Human Capital Development
Education and training that strengthen professional, vocational, financial, and digital skills, as well as job placement support for LGBTIQ+ individuals. The goal is to enhance employability, earning potential, and leadership capabilities in contexts where exclusion often limits access to training and fair work.
Entrepreneurship Development
Supporting LGBTIQ+ individuals to start and grow businesses through training, mentorship, business incubation, and startup support. It helps community members overcome discrimination in formal labor markets by building independent income pathways and networks that affirm their identities.
Financial Inclusion
Expanding access to credit, savings, insurance, and other financial services—such as microfinance or community-based lending—to LGBTIQ+ people who may be excluded from traditional banking institutions. This increases the ability to start enterprises, cover emergencies, and build long-term economic stability.
Advocacy, Partnership, and Capacity-Building for Inclusive Institutions
Working with businesses, government agencies, financial systems, and educational institutions to reduce discrimination and ensure that LGBTIQ+ people can access jobs, training, and services on equal terms. It strengthens policies and organizational practices to make economic systems safer and more inclusive.
Social Enterprises
Using market-based, revenue-generating strategies to pursue social, environmental, or community goals rather than primarily maximizing shareholder profit. Unlike traditional nonprofits that rely on donations, social enterprises aim to be financially self-sustaining through the sale of goods or services while directing surplus revenues toward their mission.
Our Activities
Outright, as one of the few organizations working as both a donor and technical support partner at the country level, fills in gaps and catalyzes work already underway to include LGBTIQ communities in the economy. Outright draws upon its global reach, crucial multilateral and bilateral relationships, and experience working across key thematic areas to support national and local civil society.
Outright has a strong and ever-expanding network of civil society organizations around the world, thanks mainly to our global programming and grantmaking. Our leadership at the UN as the Secretariat of the UN LGBTI Core Group boosts our credibility. Outright is strengthening its leadership role in multilateral and bilateral advocacy to increase economic inclusion for LGBTIQ communities, including at the World Bank, regional development banks, and bilateral development agencies. By offering a comprehensive approach that combines direct advocacy at the global and regional levels with technical support and strategic grant-making at the local level, we are uniquely placed to empower civil society to pursue economic and social inclusion for their communities.
Grantmaking
Since 2021, Outright has awarded over $2 million in 70+ grants to advance economic inclusion and access to livelihoods in over 30 countries. A few of our signature programs are:
Outright’s Economic Inclusion Program (2025-present) is supporting 15 grants to advance livelihoods work in 14 countries, totalling over $400,000.
The Looking Outright Fund (2024-present) is a unique partnership between the Looking Out Foundation, Outright International, and P&G. The Looking Outright Fund, housed at Outright, supports creative initiatives that aim to advance economic empowerment and inclusion and access to livelihood opportunities for LBTQ+ women in the global South and East. The program has awarded over $300,000 in grants to organizations working in Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Sub-Saharan Africa.
Outright International and LesbianGlobal launched the LBQ+ Women’s Economic Empowerment Program (2026-present), a funding initiative to support LBQ+ women-led projects that strengthen livelihoods, expand economic inclusion, and challenge systemic barriers to economic participation. The program responds to the structural discrimination, social stigma, and limited access to financial systems, which continue to shape the economic realities of LBQ communities worldwide.
Through Inclusive Solutions, Outright partnered with LGBTIQ organizations in four countries to explore what interventions could improve the employment prospects of LGBTIQ people in the private sector. This project included an extensive monitoring and evaluation component to help identify successful measures that can be replicated in other countries. Inclusive Solutions was generously supported by Google.org, Scotiabank Foundation, and The Walt Disney Company.The USAID-funded Alliance for Global Equality (2023-2025), led by Outright and implementing partner the LGBTQ+ Victory Institute, equipped key political, civil society, and faith-based stakeholders in target USAID presence countries to lead social change for more inclusive economic growth and democratic participation. As part of this program, Outright’s onward grantmaking and technical support in more than 15 countries focused on strengthening LGBTIQ movements through building LGBTIQ-led organizational and leadership capacity, economic resilience, and allyship. Nearly $700,000 in direct grantmaking support was focused on livelihoods activities.
Inclusive Development
Each year, wealthy countries provide over $200 billion in overseas development assistance to support these programs, in addition to $230 billion in financing by multilateral development banks. Outright seeks to ensure LGBTIQ people are included in all international development activities. We advocate and work in partnership with others to ensure that development policies and programs recognize the unique needs of LGBTIQ people and respond in ways that improve LGBTIQ development outcomes. Outright supports innovative programs and research to identify how governments and the private sector can support LGBTIQ people as full and equal participants in the economy.
Multilateral Development Banks:
Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) like the World Bank and regional MDBs provide $200 billion annually to governments of low- and middle-income countries, home to an estimated 500 million LGBTIQ people. Outright has three goals in its work.
- In countries that are supportive of LGBTIQ rights, MDB can provide billions of dollars to support government programs that seek to expand economic opportunities for LGBTIQ people.
- In countries that are less supportive of LGBTIQ rights, advocates can seek the implementation of non-discrimination standards according to multilateral development bank policies that prohibit the exclusion of LGBTIQ people from MDB-funded programs.
- MDBs can use their enormous influence to advocate for the inclusion of LGBTIQ people in development policy.
At the World Bank, Outright has advocated for the inclusion of LGBTIQ people in all global practice areas. Outright has also coordinated advocacy to support the request of Ugandan LGBTIQ advocates that the World Bank suspend loans to Uganda as long as theAnti-Homosexuality Act remains in place. To learn more about how you can advocate for LGBTIQ people at the World Bank, take a look at our guide.
At the Asian Development Bank, Outright has coordinated a campaign to include LGBTIQ people in the definition of “disadvantaged and vulnerable groups,” which would trigger a series of safeguard provisions to protect LGBTIQ people against discrimination and exclusion from programs financed by the Bank.
Inclusive Democracy
Around the world, democracy is under increasing pressure. Governments are restricting civic space, undermining elections, and limiting freedoms of expression, association, and assembly. LGBTIQ communities are often among the first targets of these attacks, and when participation is restricted for one group, it weakens democratic systems for everyone.
Outright International’s Inclusive Democracy Program works to ensure that LGBTIQ movements can participate in democratic processes, engage with the systems that shape their lives, and help build democracies that are more inclusive, fair, and responsive. Through resourcing, partnership, learning, and innovation, the program supports movements to strengthen their political awareness, build coalitions, and expand how democracy works and who it serves.
Key Points
- The rights of LGBTIQ people and democracy are deeply connected. Protecting and advancing one strengthens the other.
- The program supports movements to engage in today’s democratic systems while exploring new, more participatory approaches to civic and political life.
- Outright combines financial and technical support, global reach, and strong partnerships to help LGBTIQ organizations build skills, manage risks, and influence decisions.
Program Highlights
Strengthening Today’s Democracy
The program builds knowledge, skills, and confidence for LGBTIQ communities to participate in civic and political life. This includes civic and voter education, understanding political systems and power dynamics, and identifying entry points for advocacy and policy engagement. In restrictive or shrinking civic spaces, the program provides tools and strategies to help movements manage risks, adapt their participation, and defend fundamental freedoms.
Expanding Emerging Democratic Practices
The program supports new and more inclusive ways for people to participate and influence decisions, from citizens’ assemblies and participatory budgeting to digital tools and community-led initiatives. It encourages experimentation, reflection, and shared learning so that movements can document what works and adapt their strategies to changing contexts.
Reimagining Democracy
The program supports movements to influence laws, policies, and civic space conditions while countering restrictions, political violence, and other threats to participation. Through coalition building across movements, sectors, and allies, LGBTIQ organizations expand their influence and advance shared democratic and social justice goals.
Reimagining Democracy
The program supports movements to influence laws, policies, and civic space conditions while countering restrictions, political violence, and other threats to participation. Through coalition building across movements, sectors, and allies, LGBTIQ organizations expand their influence and advance shared democratic and social justice goals.
The GLIDE Initiative
The Global LGBTQI+ Inclusive Democracy and Empowerment (GLIDE) Initiative is a collaboration between Outright International, Synergía – Initiatives for Human Rights, and the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES). GLIDE puts LGBTIQ people at the helm of democratic initiatives, enabling them to participate in and influence decision-making to advance acceptance and address exclusionary laws, practices, and norms.
GLIDE works across three components:
- Resourcing LGBTIQ Engagement: Grants to LGBTIQ organizations, prioritizing medium-sized groups, so they have the resources and capacity to leverage democratic institutions and systems.
- Building an Inclusive Democracy Knowledge Hub: Research, publications, and convenings that provide concrete data on the intersection of democracy and LGBTIQ rights for evidence-based policy and reform.
- Strengthening the Inclusive Democracy Movement: Convenings, conferences, and networking that bring together civil society, academics, politicians, and activists to find shared ground and strengthen collaboration.
Outright’s Role
At a time when many pro-democracy actors are scaling back inclusive democracy efforts, Outright plays a critical role in sustaining and advancing this work. Outright supports movements to understand, navigate, and shape the full democratic ecosystem, from elections and governance to civic space and informal pathways of influence.
A core focus is helping movements operate safely and effectively in diverse and often restrictive contexts, through risk analysis, adaptive strategies, and collective efforts to defend and expand civic space. Outright also connects LGBTIQ movements to broader pro-democracy spaces, fostering coalition building across sectors and strengthening shared agendas through convening, partnerships, and shared learning.Outright works to elevate the value of inclusive participation, highlight the leadership of LGBTIQ movements, and connect democracy to everyday issues like health, education, and livelihoods.
Partners
- Synergía – Initiatives for Human Rights partners with organizations and human rights movements to protect and promote the human rights of all people, particularly those whose rights are most systematically violated. Synergía addresses capacity gaps, provides funding and strategic guidance, and leverages avenues for human rights advocacy.
- The International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) collaborates with civil society, public institutions, and the private sector to build resilient democracies that deliver for everyone. Through technical assistance and applied research, IFES develops capable electoral bodies, effective governance stakeholders, inclusive civic processes, and innovative uses of technology for elections and democracy.
For information on the Inclusive Democracy Program, including updates on grant cycles and ways to engage, please email [email protected].
Queer Legal Futures
The mission of the Queer Legal Futures program is to empower lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and queer (LGBTIQ) individuals as architects of a just legal landscape, championing protective laws and policies and advocating for reform through innovative and affirming approaches. We aim to center queer voices in shaping inclusive laws and to challenge oppressive tools that seek to suppress our rights and existence, including discriminatory legal structures and patriarchal norms.
Global Intersex Program
Our Global Intersex Program works with intersex activists and allies to protect and advance the rights of intersex people in their home countries while also supporting the growth of a global movement through capacity strengthening, advocacy, research, and funding. Our goal is to increase visibility, awareness, and inclusion and end human rights abuses suffered by intersex people across the world.
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