Feminism and the Women's Movement in the Philippines: Struggles, Advances, and Challenges this time in the arena of development work. At the same time, women's groups benefitted from the popularity of Cory Aquino, who attracted huge amounts of foreign and local funding for development projects (Constantino-David, 1990 cited in Valte, 1992: 55). By the late eighties, many women's organizations emerged and took on specific issues that, according to Estrada­Claudio(2005), could be understood based on the following general observations: (1) There was a need to translate feminist theoretical understanding into concrete programmatic actions,(2) The issue-focus approach was a necessity since there was a felt need to put emphasis on feminist issues, e.g. sexual violence/rape, reproductive rights, sexuality, legislative reforms for women— issues that social movements would usually consider as being outside of the broad national concerns, and(3) interests of donors to address gender issues also propelled a number of women's groups to set-up programs addressing these issues, propelled and inspired by the declaration of the UN Decade of Women in 1995, and with the massively attended Beijing Conference in 1985. In 1990, the Canadian International Development Agency(CIDA), one of the first foreign agencies to direct aid to Philippine NGOs, decided to establish a Women in Development(WID) Fund. After a year of discussions and negotiations, it was resolved that the Women's Forum (later on transformed into the formal network WAND) co-manage the WID Fund with the Group of 10(G-10), another women's network(WAND, n.d.). This joint venture was institutionalized under the foundation called Development Initiative for Women's Alternative and Transformative Action or DIWATA. WAND and Lakas ng Kababaihan(Women's Strength) Group of 10 or G-10 'influenced the nature and type of discourse generated by feminist activists'(Sobritchea, 2004a: 50). These two formations which had, at one point, some 200 organized women's groups as members, including approximately 30 women's networks, initiated the formation of other issue-specific alliances(Sobritchea, 2004a: 51) such as SIBOL for legislative advocacy and the Alliance for Women's Health for reproductive health and rights issues, which strengthened the capacity of the movement to respond to specific problems of women. The campaign for reproductive rights generated interest in other gender-related issues, such as sexuality, sexual orientation and sexual preference. Specific concerns were also taken up by women's organizations in urban poor communities, rural areas, among migrant women, and the like. In the same period, feminist advocates gained a critical mass and started conducting regular gender sensitivity seminars for communities, schools, government offices, and NGOs that led to increased awareness on women's issues and women's rights. By the early nineties, some colleges and universities had established women's studies. Meanwhile, the national government adopted gender mainstreaming as a strategy to make the bureaucracy gender-responsive, which led to a number of feminist academics and women's rights advocates becoming consultants to government's programs on gender mainstreaming(Estrada-Claudio, 2005). At the policy level, the post-dictatorship years was marked by significant achievements as well. The 1987 Philippine Constitution mandates that the State 'recognizes the role of women in national building and shall ensure the fundamental equality before the law of women and men'(Art. 11, Sec 14), recognizes women's maternal and economic role(Art. XIII, Sec. 14) and women's special health needs(Art. XIII, Sec 11), and allows Filipino women married to aliens to retain their citizenship if they chose to do so(Art. IV). Not long after the ratification of the Constitution, President Aquino issued Executive Order 227(s. 1987) or The New Family Code of the Philippines, which eliminated many of the discriminatory provisions in the Civil Code of the Philippines that had been based on Spanish colonial law. Also in 1987, the National Commission on the Role of Filipino Women(NCRFW), 5 held various consultation­workshops among different women's groups that resulted in the crafting of the Philippine Development Plan for Women(PDPW) 1989-1992, which became a companion volume to the Medium-Term Philippine Development Plan(MTPDP) 1987-1992. The PDPW served as the government's blueprint for integrating 5 Now the Philippine Commission on Women or PCW 5