Issue Brief #4: Safe and Open Civic Spaces for HIV Responses

This issue brief shares lessons and reflections on the importance of safe and open civic space for advancing rights-based HIV responses and informing the implementation of key commitments in the 2021 Political Declaration on HIV and AIDS and the Global AIDS Strategy. These include an understanding that early and broad engagement helps to facilitate the buy-in of key and diverse stakeholders; creating and maintaining safe, open and enabling spaces is critical for civil society to fully contribute to the HIV response; the relationships between governments and civil society are complex and require careful navigation; and capacity strengthening and sensitization of stakeholders is needed for meaningful engagement.