The Parity Lab: How Mathangi Swaminathan Created the First-Ever Incubator Focused on Violence Prevention for Women & Girls
“Reclaiming my power has been the hardest work I have had to do for over a decade. And that would have been impossible without finding the right people to be on my side. Find your allies!” Today’s woman dreamer, Mathangi Swaminathan is the Founder of Parity Lab - a first-of-its-kind accelerator for rural survivor-led organizations addressing violence against women and girls. A survivor of domestic violence from an arranged marriage, Mathangi’s mission is to help women in similar challenging circumstances. A graduate of the Harvard Kennedy School, Mathangi shares her inspiring and resilient journey with Women Who Win!
1. Tell us your story. You are the Founder & CEO of Parity Lab, and a graduate of Harvard Kennedy School. Tell us about your journey, and what inspired you to be the woman you are today?
I started Parity Lab after a decade of working across the technology and social sectors, exhausted by the aggressions I faced as a woman constantly in every single sphere of my life. I am not alone. 1 in 3 women faces violence in her lifetime and ~50% women face physical or sexual violence from their intimate partner. India, where I am from, accounts for 32% of the global number of missing women.
I began my entrepreneurship journey working with women from informal waste picker communities in India. As a World Bank Scholar at Harvard, I built a framework for Indian organizations to address gender bias, and spent 3 years advocating for preventive community-led resources for families in the US. During COVID-19, domestic violence doubled and globally was declared a shadow pandemic. Child marriage of girls increased by 50% along with massive reduction in girls education. Survivors have the solutions to address this, and yet, systems are not set up to listen to their voices.
Parity Lab is a first-of-its-kind accelerator for survivor-led organizations that address root causes of violence against women and girls in their communities. We identify women-leaders from marginalized communities with both an extensive track record and vision for fostering change to either prevent or respond to gender-based violence. Parity Lab is an embedded support system that strengthens their organizations, heals the core team and scales impact. Check out our short video here to learn more about the incredible leaders we support everyday.
2. You survived domestic violence from an arranged marriage in India and after several years of struggle to access the support systems you needed, you were able to pursue your dreams. How did you overcome these challenges, and what is your advice to women in similar situations?
Even in the worst of times, when I was broke, when I was severely stigmatized by the society around me for my very existence, I was fortunate enough to have at least one strong ally by my side to guide me through difficult times. Be it coaching me through B-school interviews or creating a space to feel heard, it just takes one ally to turn someone’s life around. In order to find such an ally, however, it takes time! It takes repeated discouraging encounters - so never give up!
I am relentless and have taken a lot of chances in search of my dreams. I have left well-paying secure jobs due to toxic work environments and bootstrapped nonprofit organizations without much of a bank balance!
Reclaiming my power has been the hardest work I have had to do for over a decade. And that would have been impossible without finding the right people to be on my side. Find your allies! The ones who can help you find your voice, trust your gut and take those risky chances without which any dream is impossible.
3. You are on a mission to build a survivor-led ecosystem to end gender-based violence. What are the key changes you would like to see in our society?
#1 Invest in prevention
Violence against women costs society upwards of 2% of global GDP. Despite this, funding towards this is woefully inadequate, accounting for less than 1% of total humanitarian funding. A 2022 UN report showed that only 0.0002% of $26.7 trillion of donor funding worldwide went towards ending gender-based violence that intensified during the first year of COVID-19 lockdowns.
#2 We all have the power to shift norms
Change begins at home. Men are affected by patriarchy too and our collective liberation is tied to changing gender norms in the smallest of ways. If we decide to remain quiet when our male colleague bullies his female subordinate, when we choose to victim blame our friend when she finally takes the leap of faith to confide her sexual harassment experience to us, we pass on the torch of inequity and trauma to yet one other person, to yet one other generation.
4. You are a trailblazer, and have received numerous accolades for your work, including the 2019 Jane Mansbridge Award by Harvard University for your work on reducing gender bias in Indian organizations, an Acumen Fellow, and a World Economic Forum Global Shaper. What is your next big dream?
My dream is to create, strengthen and scale strong community-led circles on-ground to prevent violence from happening. When violence does happen, the first place women and their families seek help from is their immediate personal trusted networks that are often within their own communities. Through strong community-led resources, every survivor and her family will have a safe space to heal and thrive.
At Parity Lab, we scour for unique interventions that work on either prevention or response and provide an embedded support system across capacity, community, and coaching for a year. In the long run, we aim to accelerate 100+ organizations and reach 1 million+ families by 2032. We want to reduce violence significantly, and when violence does happen, ensure at least 1 million women have a robust support system to seek help from.
5. You are certainly a busy woman. How do you relax and unwind?
As women we have been conditioned to be constantly busy. Reclaiming rest and restoration is fundamentally an act of feminism.
In practice, however, it is not easy! The physical demands of life and societal pressures to constantly keep producing require deep internal deconditioning work. Working on an issue as tough as violence in particular requires mental and physical restoration. I try to integrate wellbeing practices into my entire day: journaling, meditation, music and strict electronic disconnection times. I am constantly trying to integrate and balance my life, and I have learnt that it is a journey! I love hiking in nature with my goofy dog, reading books and spending alone time every week to rejuvenate.
Thank you Mathangi for sharing your story with us! We are excited to have you in our global women’s network!
Bio: Mathangi is the Founder of Parity Lab - a first-of-its-kind accelerator for rural survivor-led organizations addressing violence against women and girls. She has worked in the technology and development space, specifically on violence prevention, environmental sustainability and livelihoods across India and the US. She was awarded the 2019 Jane Mansbridge Award by Harvard University for her work on reducing gender bias in organizations in India. Previously, she co-directed Waste Ventures India and led efforts to provide composting and recycling services to 20,000+ households, 10+ corporates and mobilized citizens to create a zero-waste model village in Hyderabad. Mathangi Swaminathan is an alumna of the Harvard Kennedy School and holds an MBA from the Indian School of Business. She is an Acumen India fellow, a Joint Japan World Bank Scholar, and a World Economic Forum Global Shaper. She loves hiking in the woods, traveling and reading.