Feminist movements are navigating constricting resources ina world where wealth and capital continue to accumulate. The question is notwhether money exists, but how it can move differently on terms that strengthenfeminist movements rather than distort them.

At two Open House sessions this week, Joy Anderson guided participants through key shifts and concrete next steps that emerged over a year of learning in the Innovative Feminist Finance community of practice.

From “new money” to power and systems

Many participants entered this work hoping innovative finance might unlock new resources. The learning has been more precise: finance is not a magic bullet, and it will never replace grants or core funding. It can, however, be an additional tool for extending time, smoothing cash flow, managing risk, and building assets when it is used with attention to power and terms.

However, seeing finance as a system of power can help people see contracts, data requirements, and deal structures as sites of contestation and negotiation.The lens enables participants to start asking questions before capital starts moving, around who sets the terms, who waits, who carries the risk, and whose knowledge counts in defining what is “investable.”

Demystifying the tools

Across the two sessions, we heard how intimidating“innovative finance” can feel in feminist and human rights spaces, especially when financial tools are associated with extractive markets or with technical language that keeps movements at arm’s length.

A key learning from one community of practice member was that much of what we call innovative finance is built from “boring, mundane instruments”: receivables finance, leases, guarantees, insurance, pooled vehicles. Once named and unpacked, these tools become usable rather than mysterious or off-limits.

The workahead is not inventing exotic new products, but repurposing existing tools sothey align with movement values and power dynamics.

Movements as economic actors

One of the most generative reframes to come out of the community of practice is that movements are embedded in, not separate from, economies, which means that organizations are economic beings with the power to intervene in the system (rather than simply grant recipients).

That means looking beyond annual budgets to assets and liabilities:
• What do we own (or influence), beyond cash?
• What kinds of assets (real estate, data, intellectual property, networks, infrastructure) could be leveraged for movement goals?
• How do we avoid turning short-term cash‑flow gaps into unmanageable debt because the underlying revenue model doesn’t work?

This shift in perspective is already prompting new conversations among the community, such as how to use reserves and where financing tools can support long-term autonomy.

Intermediaries and infrastructure as movement assets

Another strong theme across both calls was a rethinking of intermediaries, eg women’s funds, specialized vehicles, and other actors who sit between large pools of capital and grassroots organizations.

Instead of viewing intermediation as “expensive overhead”, the group now recognizes it as essential movement infrastructure when it is accountable and feminist in its practice.

We explored how well-resourced intermediaries can help change who sets the terms of financial deals, share and absorb risk more equitably, and translate between regulatory or technical constraints and movement priorities.

This is pushing us beyond isolated innovative financing deals toward a portfolio view, where a web of vehicles, intermediaries, and governance structures together make the financing ecosystem safer and more effective for movements.

From endless pilots to concrete scenarios

There was widespread frustration with perpetual “experimentation”. When organizations are on the verge of closing due to delayed payments and funding cuts, we don’t have another two or three years for pilots.

The community is now organizing its learning into:

1. A shared compendium of options
Mapping what is already being tried across contexts: existing structures,what they cost, who they work for, and required capabilities.

2. A portfolio of near-term scenarios
Concrete options that movements and funders can explore in the next 12–18 months, such as:
• Using receivables finance to bridge long government and donor payment delays
• Structures that allow movements to own core infrastructure (e.g., real estate, tech, or data platforms) over time
• Pooled vehicles where philanthropic capital and investment capital are deliberately combined, with clear rules about risk, return, and power

3. Design questions for longer-term infrastructure
What minimum infrastructure does a feminist movement need (legal, financial, operational) so that financing tools consistently strengthen the whole ecosystem, not just a few well‑resourced organizations?

Expanding who gets to use finance

Criterion’s mission is not to “fix finance,” but to expand who sees themselves as able to use finance to create social change. The Open House conversations made this emerging work more visible and more collective – thank you to everyone who attended.

The next phase is about growing communities of practice, strengthening demonstrations that already exist, and sharing tools and lessons more widely so fewer organizations have to figure this out alone.


If you’re working at the intersection of feminist movements and finance and wrestling with similar questions, we’d love to stay in conversation as this compendium and framework evolve.

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