The People's Forum 2026

Led by the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative

Across the Commonwealth, freedom of expression, media freedom and civic space face mounting pressure from restrictive laws, censorship, surveillance and intimidation. This session will examine how digital technologies and AI are reshaping both opportunities for civic participation and threats to fundamental freedoms. Building on the earlier session on AI, participants will explore practical measures to implement the Commonwealth Principles on Freedom of Expression and the Role of the Media in Good Governance (2024). The session will identify priorities for legal and policy reform, as well as collective action beyond CHOGM 2026.

Led by Women Against Rape (WAR) Antigua & Barbuda

Led by the Caribbean Policy Development Centre

Caribbean CSOs have consistently called for debt and climate justice, challenging a global system that reinforces structural inequalities through inequitable financial rules, exclusionary governance and insufficient accountability for historical and ongoing harms. This session invites civil society to assess progress and strengthen collective action for systemic change. It will explore an integrated roadmap for debt relief, climate reparations and just economic transformation. Voices from the documentary, Tides of Debt, will ground the discussion in the lived experiences of affected communities.

Led by the Commonwealth Health Professions and Partners Alliance

As governments worldwide wrestle with the challenge of falling productivity and fraying social tension, this session asks if we have the relationship between prosperity and wellbeing the wrong way around. It will explore the ways in which improved wellbeing is one of the most important building blocks for prosperity. The session will spotlight examples of how Commonwealth Accredited Organisations are cutting-edge partners in interventions that build prosperity through enhanced wellbeing.

Led by EarthMedic and EarthNurse Foundation for Planetary Health

Communities in the Caribbean and Pacific face many climate impacts: extreme weather, flooding, sea level rise, and climate-sensitive health and livelihood risks. Awareness exists, but practical understanding, locally relevant guidance, and sustained behaviour change remain limited. Greater community empowerment is needed. This session will share the story of a creative advocacy project, developed in partnership with the Commonwealth Foundation, to co-create climate and health community handbooks in seven Commonwealth countries.

Led by The Centre for Entrepreneurship Thinking and Practice, The University of the West Indies and  Jamaica Stock Exchange

Across the Commonwealth, civil society organisations deliver vital services in education, health, livelihoods, and community resilience — yet remain invisible to mainstream funders and investors. This invisibility is not a failure of impact; it is a failure of measurement and communication. Without robust systems to articulate and quantify social value, these organisations struggle to attract the blended finance, institutional grants, and social investment they need to scale. By sharing research and fieldwork, this session introduces a framework that translates development outcomes into language that funders, governments, and development finance institutions understand. Together, they present a scalable model for how Commonwealth CSOs can become investment-ready.

Led by Commonwealth Trade Union Group 

The event will explore the current state of workers’ rights in Commonwealth countries, and the contribution these rights make to the implementation of the Commonwealth Charter, good governance and democracy, climate justice, economic inclusion and freedom of expression. Contributions from Accredited Organisations and trade unionists from around the Commonwealth and especially Antigua and Barbuda and Barbados will explore that contribution and set out what more needs to be done in law and in practice.

Led by Caribbean Women in Leadership

Across the Global South, women and communities are navigating interconnected climate, economic and social pressures that affect livelihoods, health and wellbeing, care, safety and security. This session will bring together perspectives from the Caribbean, Africa and Pacific to explore what drives vulnerability and, importantly, what women, feminist movements, communities, governments and institutions are doing in response. It will highlight practical approaches, lessons and opportunities for addressing underlying inequalities and strengthening women’s participation in shaping more just, inclusive and resilient communities.

Led by EcoShores Sustainable Futures Network

What happens when creativity becomes a tool for climate action?

This interactive session will explore how art, storytelling, media, and culture can turn climate challenges into stories that move people, spark conversations, and inspire action. It will explore how we communicate urgent issues such as climate resilience, biodiversity, food security, plastic pollution, sustainable livelihoods, and gender equity. Participants will exchange ideas, explore creative approaches, and consider how their voices can shape public narratives, strengthen community action, influence decision-making, and advance equitable climate justice across the Commonwealth.

Led by the Caribbean Natural Resources Institute

This session will showcase the “Mission 1.5: Towards A Just Transition” documentary produced by the Caribbean Natural Resources Institute and the Caribbean Climate Justice Alliance. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with featured contributors. The session seeks to spark dialogue around the challenge of rapid fossil fuel phase-out in line with the 1.5°C goal and ensuring a just energy transition for Caribbean SIDS. In particular, it focuses on centring those on the frontlines and ensuring the rights of women, youth, Indigenous and Afro-descendant Peoples and other marginalised groups and the right to a healthy and safe environment are fully recognised.

Led by The Institution of Occupational Safety and Health 

Many of the products and services we use every day are linked to workers whose experiences remain hidden. This interactive session will use fashion and creative enterprise as a visual and engaging lens to explore modern slavery, unsafe work and the human cost of global supply chains. Led by IOSH, participants will examine real-world sourcing and design scenarios, identify occupational safety and health and modern slavery red flags, and explore practical actions that civil society, designers, SMEs and responsible business networks can take to build safer, healthier and exploitation-free Commonwealth supply chains.

Register your interest: https://forms.cloud.microsoft/e/Zc71s6LBGH

Led by The Ashley Lashley Foundation

This session will explore how freedom of expression, storytelling and creative advocacy can reshape the way climate justice is understood and communicated. Bringing together young leaders from across the Commonwealth, it will challenge narratives that portray young people, Caribbean SIDS and climate-vulnerable communities primarily through vulnerability and crisis. Through conversation, lived experiences and audience participation, participants will explore how narrative power can instead centre youth agency, leadership and locally led solutions, while creating space for young people to rewrite the climate stories shaping their communities and futures.