🇧🇪 WYDE Women's Leadership Programme Intern 🌸 UN Women Internship in Brussels, Belgium 📣

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls, the empowerment of women, and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security. Women's Political Participation (WPP) is one of UN Women's primary areas of work, recognizing the role of women's leadership in strong and stable democratic processes and inclusive societies. It is covered under the Entity's Strategic Plan 2026-2029 Impact Area 1, Women's Leadership and decision-making. Guided by CEDAW General Recommendation 40 and leveraging the entity's triple mandate, it aims to increase parity in decision-making, particularly at local levels, through legal reforms, special measures and institutional safeguards that prevent and respond to violence against women in public life; to strengthen institutional capacity across legislatures, public institutions, statistical offices and national women's machineries to track and deliver on commitments to women's leadership; to increase the capacity and influence of diverse women's rights organizations and networks, particularly those led by young women and those facing multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination, to hold duty bearers accountable and drive change through transformative leadership and social norms change; and to enhance the power and visibility of women leaders and their networks, including in public and private domains where women are underrepresented.

UN Women works with various partners and stakeholders nationally, regionally, and globally to ensure more women of all ages fully participate, lead, and engage in political institutions and public life. Within this framework, UN Women, jointly with the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA), the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), and United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG), has partnered with the European Union under the EU-funded framework of the Women and youth Democratic Engagement Initiative (WYDE) to implement the WYDE Women's Leadership component through a four-year programme titled "Advancing Women's Political Participation and Decision-Making through Social Norms Change, Networking and Global Advocacy." The WYDE Women's Leadership programme prioritizes changing social norms and shifting cultural attitudes that portray women's roles in communities and society as incompatible with political power, and puts specific focus on building the critical skills of young women and engaging men and boys, office holders and the media as allies for gender equality and women's empowerment. It aims to generate data and evidence on violence against women in politics, and to enhance synergies between women's rights movements, Member States, decision makers, the international community, the media, and other key actors, including the WYDE community across its different components, to maximize the effectiveness of spaces for coalition building, advocacy, and campaigning to promote women's political participation and leadership.

About the Internship

The WYDE team is looking to engage two interns in subsequent time intervals of maximum duration of 6 months each: October 2026 to March 2027, and April to September 2027. Under the direct supervision of the Programme Manager and in close coordination with the WYDE Women's Leadership team based in Brussels, the interns will support the coordination work with the CSO grantees, knowledge sharing, reporting, as well as communications and advocacy activities. Working closely with the Coordination, Advocacy and Communications Specialist and the Monitoring Specialist and Grants Manager, the interns will contribute mainly to the development of advocacy and communications materials, supporting the coordination of events and activities, monitoring and amplifying partners' communications, and assisting in documenting and disseminating programme results and lessons learned.

🗺️ Also based in Belgium and worth a look: Communications and Events Internship at a renewable energy organisation in 🇧🇪 Belgium → https://youthworkshub.org/20520

Communications and Advocacy Responsibilities

📣 Support coordination, advocacy and communications preparations for WYDE activities, events and campaigns

🎨 Support the design and development of communication and advocacy products, including social media assets, knowledge management documents, or any activity-related background documents

📊 Support the monitoring, analysis and amplification of WYDE-related communications, in particular social media, and advocacy activities of WYDE partners and grantees

✍️ Support drafting of WYDE stories and articles following corporate templates and formats as needed

📸 Support the collection of materials, such as photos and videos from all WYDE partners, to ensure archiving of all WYDE-related audio-visual products

🎬 Support the elaboration of audio-visual products such as various formats of videos

🤝 Support the WYDE Programme Intergenerational Convening Event and other regional and cross-regional activities organized by WYDE

Monitoring and Reporting Support

🗂️ Support the work with civil society organizations by maintaining data related to funded civil society and women's rights organizations

📈 Review reports to extract key results and achievements to be used in monitoring progress and for amplification purposes related to women's leadership and political participation

📋 Aid with the processing of reports through internal procedures, including file organization and uploading in systems, to assure accountability and verification of project results

🌍 Engage with funded organizations to learn from their projects and document common lessons learned across the funded projects in transforming social norms and advancing women's leadership

📅 Support preparations for knowledge exchange events with funded civil society and women's rights organizations

✅ Carry out other support tasks assigned by the supervisor and WYDE team

Learning Objectives

🎓 Learn about UN Women's mandate globally and more specifically about women's leadership and decision-making and the WYDE Women's Leadership programme

📣 Learn about UN Women and WYDE partners' strategic advocacy and communications to achieve objectives, including through global, international and regional events (International Women's Day, CSW, International Day of Democracy, 16 Days of Activism and others)

🌐 Learn about WYDE's CSO partners and their interventions at the country level

🔗 Another communications-focused internship you might like: Digital Marketing and Administrative Support Internship in 🇩🇪 Germany → https://youthworkshub.org/19826

Competencies

The role calls for the core values of integrity, professionalism and respect for diversity, and the core competencies of awareness and sensitivity regarding gender issues, accountability, creative problem solving, effective communication, inclusive collaboration, stakeholder engagement, and leading by example. On the functional side, candidates should have some knowledge and/or a strong interest in gender equality and women's rights issues, strong analytical and reporting skills, communication skills including social media management, a demonstrated ability to interact effectively with peers and colleagues, and knowledge of Microsoft Office 365 software. Some knowledge of women's and youth political participation, knowledge and understanding of the UN system and familiarity with inter-governmental processes, and an understanding of EU institutions would all be assets.

Who Can Apply

University studies in one of the following disciplines is required: international relations, social studies, development studies or other relevant subjects. In addition, applicants must meet one of the following requirements: be enrolled in a graduate school programme (second university degree or equivalent, or higher); be enrolled in the final academic year of a first university degree programme (minimum Bachelor's level or equivalent); have graduated with a university degree and, if selected, must commence the internship within a two-year period of graduation; or be enrolled in a postgraduate professional traineeship programme which is part of a degree programme and undertake the internship as part of the programme requirements.

Languages

🗣️ Excellent communication skills (written and oral) in English are required

🌐 Working knowledge of another UN language is an advantage

Remuneration

Interns who are not in receipt of financial support from other sources such as universities or other institutions will receive a stipend from UN Women to partially subsidize their basic living costs for the duration of the internship.

The Details

🗓️ Initial contract duration: 6 months (two interns engaged in subsequent intervals: October 2026 to March 2027, and April to September 2027)

📍 Location: Brussels, Belgium

⏰ Schedule: full time

How to Apply

Applicants must ensure that all sections of the application form, including the sections on education and employment history, are completed. If all sections are not completed, the application may be disqualified from the recruitment and selection process. If you need any reasonable accommodation to support your participation in the recruitment and selection process, please include this information in your application.