Foreword from the Love Alliance

The Love Alliance is a five-year pro­gram ded­i­cated to pro­tect­ing, pro­mot­ing and ful­fill­ing sex­ual and repro­duc­tive health and rights glob­ally, uni­fy­ing peo­ple who use drugs, sex work­ers and LGB­TIQ+ move­ments, and ampli­fy­ing the diver­sity of voices in these com­mu­ni­ties. Our alliance is com­posed of part­ners GALZ, SAN­PUD, Sisonke, UHAI EASHRI, ISDAO, Global Net­work of Peo­ple Liv­ing With HIV (GNP+) and Aids­fonds, and other com­mu­nity-led organ­i­sa­tions that are part of local, national, regional and global move­ments of LGB­TIQ+, sex worker, peo­ple who use drugs and peo­ple liv­ing with HIV. Together, we have a strong track record in global part­ner­ship man­age­ment, grant-mak­ing includ­ing par­tic­i­pa­tory grant-mak­ing, thought lead­er­ship, organ­i­sa­tional resilience, move­ment build­ing and capac­ity strength­en­ing, and advo­cacy.

The Love Alliance is proud to give direc­tion and sup­port to the O’Neill Insti­tute’s ongo­ing devel­op­ment of the HIV Lan­guage Com­pendium.

This Com­pendium’s first pur­pose is pro­tect­ing and advanc­ing com­mit­ments on rights- and evi­dence-based HIV-AIDS responses in the UN sys­tem. It does this by inven­to­ry­ing and sub­stan­ti­at­ing inter­na­tion­ally agreed lan­guage in UN dec­la­ra­tions and other doc­u­ments to sup­port like-minded gov­ern­ments, advo­cates and other stake­hold­ers to pro­tect pre­vi­ously agreed pro­gres­sive word­ing and com­mit­ments in new UN Res­o­lu­tions and Polit­i­cal Dec­la­ra­tions. In addi­tion, it aims to fur­ther efforts to advance polit­i­cal com­mit­ments that pro­tect the rights of peo­ple liv­ing with and affected by HIV and to estab­lish the struc­ture, sys­tems and account­abil­ity mech­a­nisms needed to uphold these.

Under the aegis of the Love Alliance, GNP+ and Aids­fonds have pro­vided and will con­tinue to pro­vide strate­gic direc­tion to the Com­pendium’s devel­op­ment. In review­ing this doc­u­ment, guid­ing its con­tin­ued devel­op­ment and pro­mot­ing its dis­sem­i­na­tion and use, GNP+ and Aids­fonds draw on their expe­ri­ence as co-chairs of the 2021 UN High Level on HIV/AIDS Multi Stake­holder Task­force.

Pol­icy and advo­cacy are key com­po­nents of the Love Alliance’s work in improv­ing and expand­ing access to sex­ual and repro­duc­tive health. We recog­nise the impor­tance of lan­guage in inter­na­tional treaties, national laws, and regional poli­cies con­cern­ing HIV-AIDS. When rights-affirm­ing and inclu­sive, lan­guage can bol­ster the author­ity and impact of com­mu­nity-led organ­i­sa­tions like ours, but it can also be weak­ened or removed to reverse this much-needed progress. Because of this, we see future areas for devel­op­ment of the Com­pendium in extend­ing its cov­er­age to regional com­mit­ments and tai­lor­ing it for impact at the national level.

We are com­mit­ted to pol­icy change that aligns with the needs and inter­ests of key pop­u­la­tions, but high-level prece­dents and evi­dence can be dif­fi­cult and time-con­sum­ing to find and analyse, espe­cially for advo­cates from under­served groups. To ensure the peo­ple most affected by HIV-related pol­icy have due influ­ence in its devel­op­ment and pro­tec­tion, they can draw from the Com­pendium to bol­ster their invalu­able input—includ­ing their lived expe­ri­ence and famil­iar­ity with local norms and laws—with inter­na­tion­ally per­sua­sive and author­i­ta­tive lan­guage.

With this col­lec­tion of prece­dent, evi­dence, and accom­pa­ny­ing analy­sis we will draw the line on what is needed within the rights-based global HIV response. As this Com­pendium is updated, we look for­ward to draw­ing and redraw­ing this line as our inter­na­tional com­mit­ments progress to a more com­plete recog­ni­tion of what is needed to respect, pro­tect and pro­vide for the right to the high­est attain­able stan­dard of sex­ual and repro­duc­tive health.

The Love Alliance