In the almost 14 years since Evelyne Paradis became the Executive Director of ILGA-Europe it has grown to become the largest umbrella organisation for LGBTI activism in Europe and Central Asia, playing a key and essential role in resourcing and fostering the LGBTI movement, and influencing political systems towards ever greater consideration of LGBTI people’s equality, freedom and safety in decision making and legislation. The past two years in particular have been a time of unprecedented expansion for ILGA-Europe, both in terms of staff and funding, and in our capacity to support, represent and help build a strong and strategic LGBTI movement in the region.

In this episode of The Frontline, as Evelyne Paradis hands over the reins of leadership to our new Executive Director, Chaber, we sit down with them both to talk about how ILGA-Europe has evolved as an organisation alongside the LGBTI movement over the past decades, and what’s just around the corner, both for the organisation and for the queer activist movement.

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For the past 18 years with ILGA-Europe, 15 of which she spent as the organisation’s Executive Director, Evelyne Paradis has worked closely alongside hundreds of LGBTI activists and organisations across Europe and Central Asia. As she gets ready to hand over the reins to our new Executive Director, in this episode of The Frontline, Evelyne talks about how the LGBTI movement in Europe and Central Asia has evolved over her time leading ILGA-Europe, and how ILGA-Europe’s work to build and enhance the movement has evolved and grown too.

What have been the rising priorities in queer activism, and how has ILGA-Europe been both supporting and helping lead the charge? What have been the pitfalls along the way and what are the challenges ahead? And as LGBTI communities and activists face growing opposition from powerful right wing forces across the region, how can the movement further harness is own power to push forward?

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This is the first of three interviews with ILGA-Europe’s Executive Director, Evelyne Paradis as she departs the organisation, after 18 years, nearly 14 of which she spent as its leader.

With a decade and half of experience leading Europe’s largest LGBTI umbrella organisation, which is a driving force for political, legal and social change in Europe and Central Asia, Evelyne has had a helicopter view of the growing place of LGBTI rights on political agendas and how all of this has filtered down in the everyday lives of LGBTI people across the regions.

In this episode, Evelyne talks about how politics have evolved over her time leading ILGA-Europe, which included the dawn and global spreading of social media, and how Europe’s political institutions have progressed to include LGBTI people across a broad range of portfolios and initiatives. Is the current EU political system working well to shore up and promote LGBTI equality, or are rainbow rights a victim to an advancing populism across the political spectrum? And what does it take to be a great politician at this time in the world? All these questions and more are answered in this, the first of the Evelyne Paradis exit interviews for The Frontline.

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