Vital Voices Global Partnership is the preeminent non-governmental organization (NGO) that identifies, trains, and empowers emerging women leaders and social entrepreneurs around the globe, enabling them to create a better world for us all. We provide these women with the capacity, connections, and credibility they need to unlock their leadership potential.

We are at the forefront of international coalitions to combat human trafficking other forms of violence against women and girls.
We enable women to become change agents in their governments, advocates for social justice, and supporters of democracy and the rule of law.
We equip women with management, business development, marketing, and communications skills to expand their enterprises, help to provide for their families, and create jobs in their communities.
Our international staff and team of over 1,000 partners, pro bono experts and leaders, including senior government, corporate and NGO executives, have trained and mentored more than 5,000 emerging women leaders from over 150 countries in Asia, Africa, Eurasia, Latin America, and the Middle East since 1997. These women have returned home to train and mentor more than 100,000 additional women and girls in their communities. They are the Vital Voices of our time. For more information, please contact: Alyson Wise, Global Network Communications Coordinator.

Who is involved?
The Vital Voices staff has vast expertise in global women''s issues and is led by President, Alyse Nelson Bloom, who has worked with Vital Voices since its inception.  The organization is governed by a strong bipartisan Board of Directors led by Board Chair, Melanne Verveer, who has more than 25 years of nonprofit and public service experience.

Vital Voices also has a Global Advisory Council, made up of women leaders from every region of the world, who advise Vital Voices about the most pressing issues facing women in their countries and work with Vital Voices to address them. In addition, Vital Voices has Global Network Chapters and thousands of network members throughout the world--from Russia to Venezuela--and partners with leading corporations, universities, nonprofits, foundations, and governments around the world who share our dedication to improving the economic, political and social status of women everywhere.

How did it all begin?
Vital Voices grew out of the United States government''s successful Vital Voices Democracy Initiative, which was established after the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing to promote the advancement of women as a U.S. foreign policy goal. Now, we are building on that record by providing skills, networking, and other support to women around the world, whether they are combating human trafficking in Ukraine or building women''s entrepreneurship in Vietnam.

The nonprofit Vital Voices Global Partnership grew out of the U.S. government''s successful Vital Voices Democracy Initiative. The Vital Voices Democracy Initiative was established in 1997 by then-First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton and former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright after the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing to promote the advancement of women as a U.S. foreign policy goal.

Under the leadership of the Vital Voices Democracy Initiative, the U.S. government, in partnership with the Inter-American Development Bank, the United Nations, the World Bank, the Nordic Council of Ministers, the European Union and other governments coordinated Vital Voices conferences throughout the world, bringing together thousands of emerging women leaders from over 80 countries.

These conferences launched regional Vital Voices initiatives that continue to give women the skills and resources they need to lift up themselves, their communities and their countries.

The overwhelmingly positive response to the Vital Voices Democracy Initiative led to the creation of Vital Voices Global Partnership as a nonprofit non-governmental organization (NGO) in June 2000. Vital Voices is now continuing the work of advancing women''s economic, political and social status around the world, by providing skills, networking and other support to women around the world, whether they are working to increase women''s political participation in Latin America or promote women''s entrepreneurship in the Middle East.