(Strasbourg) The World Forum for Democracy 2018 will be dedicated to the topic of “Gender Equality: Whose Battle?” (Strasbourg, 19-21 November). The Forum, sponsored by the Council of Europe, is intended as a space to discuss “key challenges” for current democracies and to contribute to their “evolution”. The 2018 edition will be focused on women: a hundred years after the birth of women’s rights movements, the #MeToo movement “brought into sharp focus the pervasive extent of violence against women in all walks of life”, and this could be the time for a radical change “in the way that women are perceived and treated”, the organisers said. This needed change should have two objectives: to eradicate all violence and discrimination against women; and to achieve gender equality in public, private and economic life. The goal of the Forum will be to “identify not only what further activity we might undertake, but to help spur ideas and actions that others can take, too”. The programme includes a number of workshops and round tables; Pedro Sánchez, Prime Minister of Spain, and Marlène Schiappa, French Minister of State for Gender Equality, will both take the floor and address the Plenary. Other plenary debates will focus on “Women and Power”, “Sexism, Discrimination and Violence”, and “Women, Security and Democratisation”. The programme also includes the conferral of the “Democracy Innovation Award”, and several satellite events. The long list of speakers includes high-ranking officials from the Council and European institutions, academics, opinion leaders, and journalists. For further information and the programme, please visit: https://www.coe.int/en/web/world-forum-democracy