Impacts

Below is a selected list of impact stories (as of April 2021).

• In 2021, the multilingual digital platform Forum.eu invited Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum to publish an opinion piece on the Istanbul Convention and LGBT rights and organize an online event on the same issue with the Forum’s Chair and Founder, Klaus Mueller.
• After attending the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum in 2017, Sukhdeep Singh was inspired to work on the first-of-its-kind documentary on LGBT Sikhs in the world. In 2021, his film Sab Rab De Bande was awarded “Best LGBT Movie” at the Aravali International Film Festival.
• In December 2020, Bhutan decriminalized homosexuality following a long period of legal harmonization. Six Bhutanese Salzburg Global Fellows were prominently active in the decriminalization efforts in their country.
• In 2020, the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum published 16 weekly blogs from Fellows of the Global Online Forum on LGBT* and Faith. The blogs were published on SalzburgGlobal.org and then posted on Salzburg Global’s Facebook page and other social media channels. Through this virtual medium, the Forum reached over 25,000 people through the Facebook posts alone, with an average reach of over 1,500 people per post, not including when individuals shared the posts independently. On Facebook, a conversation was established with over 1,200 interactions, including reactions, comments, and shares, from readers.
• In 2020, Salzburg Global Fellow Lee Badgett published The Economic Case for LGBT Equality: Why Fair and Equal Treatment Benefits Us All. Badgett credited her participation in the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum and the cooperation with and advice of Fellows with making the book possible.
• The ALMS 2019 international conference on “Queering Memory” in Berlin saw the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum invited to its international board. The Forum provided a paper on Museums and the LGBTI Community, curated a photo exhibit on gender diversity in Bangladesh by Mohammad Rofiqul Islam, moderated the documentary film night, and showed films by Fellows Cha Roque and Bao Chau Nguyen.
• In 2019, the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum brought 40 people from 17 countries to Kathmandu, Nepal, for the program, Advancing Legal and Social Equality in South Asia. The program contributed to national and regional discussions on LGBT inclusion across the South Asian region by providing a platform for open policy dialogue and debate. During the program, Fellows called for social and legal reforms on International Zero Discrimination Day.
• In 2018, Salzburg Global Seminar published a 200-page publication, Building a Global Community – Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum: The First Five Years, chronicling the first five years of the multi-year series. The report was supported by the German Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women, and Youth. The report includes Fellows’ stories, wide-ranging issues the Forum has addressed, and the impact the Forum has had on individuals, institutions, and ideas advancing LGBT human rights worldwide.
• In 2018, Salzburg Global Fellow and filmmaker Sridhar Rangayan revealed his participation in the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum’s first-ever program helped bring into focus the work he was doing. It also brought clarity to his LGBTQ documentary films, Purple Skies, and Breaking Free.
• In 2018, Salzburg Global Fellow Cha Roque won one of Amnesty International Philippines’ first-ever human rights awards. Roque was recognized as a human rights defender bringing about impact through her work by changing peoples’ lives. Roque said her experience at the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum helped her realize how her films could make an impact and that her voice was as important as the voice of award-winning filmmakers.
• In 2018, Salzburg Global Fellow Bao Chau Nguyen revealed conversations with Fellows at his first session inspired him to establish Hanoi International Queer Film Week, the first legal queer film festival in his home country of Vietnam. Since then, it has become an annual film festival.
• On May 17, 2018, the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forummarked the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia, and Transphobia (IDAHOT) by joining forces with the World Bank and calling for inclusion and equality for families and their LGBT children around the world. IDAHOT President and Salzburg Global Fellow Tamara Adrián revealed the Forum’s conversations inspired IDAHOT’s 2018 theme.
• In 2017, when Finland celebrated the 100th anniversary of its independence, the Finland Institute in Berlin invited Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum to develop and conduct a program on “Feeling at home: in the body, the family and the society.”
• In 2017, a “Queering of the Schloss” acknowledged LGBT people have contributed to the history of Salzburg Global and the earlier history of Schloss Leopoldskron in the time of Max Reinhardt, its pre-war owner and co-founder of the Salzburg Festival. The event built on a discovery by anthropologist Saskia Wieringa in 2013, who realized that the statues in Schloss Leopoldskron’s Chinese Room were of the East Asian transgender deity Guanyin – a feature overlooked for almost a century.
• In 2016, at the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum program, The Many Faces of Inclusion, more than 50 LGBTI activists and allies from over 30 countries came together. Fellows called for new narratives to combat discrimination.
• In 2016, in cooperation with the Dutch Embassy, the Canadian Embassy in Berlin invited Klaus Mueller, Founder and Chair of the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum, to lead the discussion on Building Structures to Support Equal Rights for LGBT People. It brought together 100 representatives from civil rights organizations, including Transgender Europe, the Hirschfeld-Eddy-Stiftung, Human Rights Watch, and Proud at Work.
• In 2015, the Forum started the “Family is…” project with the German Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, collecting testimonies for our global portrait of families today – ultimately producing over 40 video interviews and a short film Family is...?A Global Conversation. The film was premiered at the Ministry of Family Affairs in Berlin and is an open resource.
• In 2014, the German Federal Foreign Office invited the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum to Berlin to advise them on strengthening relations between embassies and LGBT human rights groups. The session issued seven recommendations and presented them in a public event at the Ministry.   
• In 2013, the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum held its first program. The seminar brought together over 60 participants from 34 countries and set a course with the Statement of the Salzburg Global LGBT Forum: Advancing human rights for LGBT people and communities. This framework of principles and priorities continues to guide the Forum’s intersectional approach and lead themes.

If you have an impact story to share relating to your participation in the Salzburg Global LGBT* Forum, please contact Klaus Mueller.

* LGBT: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender. We are using this term as it is currently widely used in human rights conversations on sexual orientation and gender identity in many parts of the world, and we would wish it to be read as inclusive of other cultural concepts, contemporary or historical, to express sexuality and gender, intersex and gender non-conforming identities.