The Way I Work... Activist Mabel Van Oranje’s Campaign To End Child Marriage

“Any girl, anywhere in the world, should have the opportunity to choose her future and follow her dreams,” says Mabel Van Oranje – a social and political activist working to end child marriage. 

Despite affecting one in five girls globally (12 million every year) it’s an issue that gets relatively little attention. Princess Van Oranje – she’s a member of the Dutch royal family – has spent the past decade working to change that, including founding VOW For Girls, a movement which supports community-led solutions, particularly led by girls and women, to end child marriage and improve girls’ lives across Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean. 

“If you care about girls’ rights, education, health, violence or poverty, you should know about this issue. It has such lasting and harmful impacts,” she says, recalling a meeting with a young girl in northern Ethiopia which had a lasting impression on her. “She told me that she did not know her exact age [she had been married], but that she was between five and seven years old. My daughters were five and six at the time. I realised that if they had been born in Ethiopia, this could have been their fate. I believe that geography should not determine or limit our destiny.” 

Despite the size of the challenge, Van Oranje remains hopeful and full of energy for the cause. “A world without child marriage is entirely possible,” she says. “Promoting human rights and ending child marriage is not just a job but a calling for me, deeply intertwined with my sense of justice, passion and purpose. There’s so much work left to do and so much we can achieve together.” 

Here, she sits down with Service95 to discuss her working life, tackling “impossible” problems and why you should always take time out to smell the flowers… 

How I Start My Working Day… I know it’s better to spend the first 30 minutes of the day without your phone. However, I am almost always tempted to reach for mine straight away, both to check the news and to start the day with some connection and love. I send messages to my daughters Luana and Zaria, who are at university and school. I like to play Wordle and share the result with my mother. And I check which friends and family have a birthday or other celebration and send them a message.  

My Working Playlist… I travel extensively for my work, but when I am at home, I often play [pianist] Keith Jarrett’s The Köln Concert. It is a story of things not going to plan: a damaged, too-small piano was placed onstage and Jarrett arrived late and exhausted. Despite – or maybe because of – these challenges, Jarrett made the best of the situation, the concert was an enormous success and its recording became the bestselling solo album in jazz history. His improvisation under less-than-ideal circumstances serves as a reminder of the beauty and success that can emerge from serendipity. 

The Places That Inspire Me… In my work I have had the pleasure of visiting lots of countries and meeting many different people. Time and time again, I find my mind returning to inspiring activists with deep community knowledge who I have met and who work relentlessly on community-led solutions. I have been inspired by, and learnt a lot from, people working in many parts of the world driven by the same love of their community, a deep sense of justice and a steadfast belief that change is possible.  

The Most Surprising Thing I’ve Ever Done Is… Working with Archbishop Desmond Tutu on ending child marriage was a great joy and incredibly rewarding. He was such a humble and honest man, and we shared a lot of laughter together. I remember how shocked he was when he first learned about the global scale of the issue, and his subsequent commitment was incredibly impactful. He widely shared that he was as committed to ending child marriage as he had been to ending apartheid.  

What I Do When I Need To Find Inspiration… Sadly, I have lost two people who were not only incredibly dear to me, but also acted as my compass: my husband [Prince] Friso [of Orange-Nassau] and my sister Klien [Nicoline Wisse Smit]. I could share everything with them, and I deeply valued their advice. They always supported and inspired me – and kept me centered.  

I have found that appreciating the small things of daily life brings a lot of consolation and inspiration, such as a beautiful sky, the smell of flowers, an exchange of smiles with a stranger or a stimulating conversation. I also love to watch modern dance or let myself be overwhelmed by beautiful art.      

The Career Dream I’ve Yet To Realise… Is a world without child marriage. A world where every girl can make her own life choices – and decide if, when, and to whom she wants to marry. 

The Best Career Advice I’ve Ever Received… One of my first bosses taught me that setbacks and unexpected developments are not failures but opportunities to learn and adapt. Flexibility and the willingness to adjust are key components of success. In the same vein, I learned that you do not need to have certainty that something will work for it to be an important pursuit. In fact, some of my proudest achievements have come from trying things and taking risks and this can lead to bold and transformative work. Things don’t always work out, and certainly not the way you expected. But if you do not try, you will never know. 

The Advice I’d Give My Younger Self… Do not be afraid of your ambition for changemaking and do not believe people who say certain things are impossible. When I started working on ending child marriage, I was often told that “this problem is too big and complex to address”. But I have first-hand experience that what might seem impossible is actually possible. The progress made over the past decade in reducing child marriage and supporting girls to access different opportunities is testament to what can be achieved. 

Find out more about VOW’s work and how to donate at VOWforGirls.org 

Katie Teehan is Editorial Director at Service95