Posts Tagged ‘funding’

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750 NGOs in Geneva: dynamic ecosystem for international governance work

August 29, 2019

On 29 August 2019, the Département présidentiel (PRE) of the Ville de Genève published “Un écosystème dynamique de plus de 750 ONG à Genève” in which – for the first time – researchers of the University of Geneva have made a survey of the NGO world in Geneva.  The study – in French – has some fascinating key findings:

Read the rest of this entry »

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New Zealand funds much-needed human rights monitoring in the Pacific

August 22, 2019

Susan Randolph – Photo: RNZ Pacific / Mackenzie Smith

On 20 August 2019 Mackenzie Smith wrote in Newsie.co that New Zealand is supporting a new rollout of human rights monitoring in the Pacific. Funding of $US400,000 will allow the Human Rights Measurement Initiative (HRMI) to expand its programmes in the region. The non-profit organisation which is holding workshops in Auckland this week said it would use the money to build data sets on economic and social rights in the Pacific. Its development lead Anne-Marie Brook said it was the first time they had accepted money from a government and a clause had to be inserted into its contract with New Zealand’s Foreign Ministry to safeguard HRMI’s independence.

[see also:https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2019/03/07/pacific-human-rights-defenders-can-do-more-to-deal-with-extractive-industries/]

“Because human rights are so politically sensitive, it’s really clear that human rights needs to be measured independently of government because governments often face conflicts of interest,” she said. HRMI’s data on the Pacific is porous and often anecdotal, according to its economic and social rights lead Susan Randolph. The funding would allow more comprehensive data to be collected to help Pacific governments and civil society groups tackle human rights abuses, she said.

In Tuvalu, where the country’s first human rights institution was set up only late last year, the Chief Ombudsman Sa’aga Talu Teafa said they were still figuring out the best approach. “It’s very young, we call it very young. That’s why we are here to learn and to know what other institutions or what other human rights defenders are doing regarding human rights implementation,” he said.

It’s the same in Samoa, where recently the Ombudsman’s office, finding no data on violence, had to come up with its own to produce a report.

Tuvalu Chief Ombudsman, Sa'aga Talu Teafahome.

Tuvalu Chief Ombudsman, Sa’aga Talu Teafahome. Photo: RNZ Pacific / Mackenzie Smith

New Zealand Human Rights Commission’s Pasifika advisor Tuiloma Lina-Jodi Vaine Samu said the Pacific had a history of resistance to human rights monitoring because of faith-based systems. “Our religions, our faiths, our churches, are very, very important to us. But so are our traditional, cultural, ancestral beliefs as well,” she said. “At hui like this we are able to come together, fono, and talk about these issues, these mindsets, so that we can advance human rights forward.”

https://www.newsie.co.nz/news/160079-nz-funds-human-rights-monitoring-pacific.html

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James Goldston adds voice to debate on future of the human rights movement

August 21, 2019

, Executive Director of the Open Society Justice Initiative and previously in the Office of the Prosecutor at the International Criminal Court, wrote on 20 August 2019 an opinion piece in ‘Balkan Insight’ entitled: “Illiberal Populism: A Wake-Up Call for Human Rights”. His conclusion is that human rights defenders need to up their game but be under no illusion that they alone can defend liberal values. “The battle against illiberal populism will ultimately be won in the arenas of politics and power — in voting booths, legislative offices, the media and the streets.“

The writer focuses on 3 critcisms often thrown at the human rights movement:

  • Foremost a lack of concern with economic inequality (Indeed, over the past four decades, the international human rights movement has grown hand in hand with obscene disparities of wealth).
  • Secondly over reliance on legalisation. (Norms and standards go only so far if they are not implemented in real life – a preoccupation with legal claims has blinded the movement to the underlying moral values that move many to action.)
  • Finally, critics argue, it overlooked people. (.. rights defenders have spent so much time refining arguments for courts and legislatures that they have failed to .. cooperate meaningfully, with the victims, survivors, family members and others on whose behalf they purport to advocate)
The criticisms – although overblown especially by populist leaders – contain truth, and they lead to clear prescriptions, says Goldston: We must pay more attention to economic suffering. We must relearn how to speak less like lawyers and more like people. And we must work more collaboratively with like-minded groups that don’t identify themselves as rights defenders, but whose contributions — whether through science, technology, economics, or the arts — can foster rights awareness.

Some of this is happening, see e.g. https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2019/08/05/amnesty-internationals-global-assembly-2019-deserves-more-attention-big-shifts-coming-up/

.. But rolling back reactionary politics worldwide requires not just rights activism but also deeper engagement in political debate and elections. That’s a task not just for the rights movement, but for everyone.The author notes that although annual philanthropic funding for “human rights and social justice” has increased worldwide in recent years, it remains under $3 billion. {and human rights defenders a tiney partof that, see: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2019/07/18/important-report-to-help-you-understand-human-rights-grantmaking/]

……

Illiberal Populism: A Wake-Up Call for Human Rights

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Four Honduran woman human rights defenders say why funders need to prioritize social movmements

July 25, 2019

This video is part of an editorial partnership with the Fund for Global Human Rights.

In this video, Miriam Miranda, executive director of OFRANEH – the Honduran Black Fraternal Organisation – talks about the importance of funding social movements, not just structured NGOs (which inherently seek to sustain themselves). She also discusses the need for more funders to support work happening at the community level. She shares her thoughts on how flexible funding allows activists to respond to the changing needs of their communities and the difficult context in which they work. She stresses the critical importance of donors trusting their partners on the ground and building trust-based relationships.

Denia Castillo, coordinator of Red De Abogadas Defensoras de Derechos Humanos (Network of Human Rights Defenders), shares why grassroots activism is often the most effective to way to spur on social change. This is because activists on the ground best understand their communities and the challenges they face, and they don’t have the costs of much larger organisations – allowing for resources to be distributed closer to the ground. She also talks about the need for international funders to provide flexible funding, which allows grassroots groups to adapt their plans and support their communities in the emergencies they often face on Honduras.

Indyra Mendoza, executive director of CATTRACHAS – a feminist lesbian network – provides insight into the importance of funding and working with non-registered entities. In countries where governments are cracking down on the work of activists and NGOs, restrictive legislation is making it harder to register as an NGO or operate freely as a registered NGO. For this reason, many activists and groups doing critical work for their communities choose not to register as NGOs, which creates difficulties for them in receiving foreign funding and support.

Bertita Caceres is the general secretary of COPINH – Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organisations of Honduras. She is also the daughter of COPINH’s founder Berta Caceras, who was murdered in 2016 because of her campaigning work to stop a hydro-electric dam from destroying indigenous lands and livelihoods. Bertita shares her thoughts on the importance of international allies helping build the capacity and strength of organisations like COPINH, specifically around security and protection. She also shares how important it is for groups like hers to have international partners and funders use their positions of power to speak out on behalf of grassroots groups and apply pressure internationally in a way that supports their strategies and advocacy on the ground.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/frontline-insights/we-need-relationships-based-on-trust-how-supporters-can-help-honduran-activists/

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Important Report to help you understand Human Rights Grantmaking

July 18, 2019

785 foundations in 43 countries made  23,000 grants totaling  $2.8 Billion in 2016

The Advancing Human Rights initiative is a research project to document the landscape of foundation funding for human rights and track changes in its scale and priorities. It uses grants data to map the human rights issues addressed, funding strategies used, and populations and regions served. For those considering human rights-related grantmaking for the first time, this website offers an introduction to the field.

With limited resources and immense challenges, now more than ever human rights grantmakers and advocates are asking critical questions about the human rights funding landscape: Where is the money going? What are the gaps? Who is doing what? The Advancing Human Rights initiative is a collaboration between Human Rights Funders Network and Candid, in partnership with Ariadne and Prospera, to track the evolving state of global human rights grantmaking by collecting and analyzing grants data. The goal is to help human rights funders and advocates make more informed decisions, discover opportunities for collaboration, and work more effectively.

It is a very well structured and easily accessible document. Remarkable is that human rights defedners as a category receive only 1% of all grant money while – perhaps predictably – youth and women together score some 46%. However, it is likely that human rights defenders are the recipients of many of the grants but that these are categorised differently.

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InSPIREurope: new EU-Funded Initiative to Support Researchers at Risk to be launched in September

July 11, 2019

Ten European partner organizations announce an ambitious new initiative to be launched this September to support researchers at risk. The initiative – InSPIREurope – is a ten-partner project funded under the European Commission’s Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions and coordinated by Scholars at Risk Europe at Maynooth University, Ireland.

InSPIREurope will forge a coordinated, cross-sectoral, Europe-wide alliance for researchers at risk. InSPIREurope project partners include: Scholars at Risk Europe, hosted at Maynooth University, Ireland (Project Coordinator) • Alexander von Humboldt-Stiftung, Germany • European University Association • Jagiellonian University, Poland • University of Oslo, Norway • University of Gothenburg, Sweden • PAUSE program, hosted by the Collège de France • Stichting voor Vluchteling-Studenten UAF, Netherlands • Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece • Scholz CTC GmbH, Germany.

InSPIREurope begins from the view that excellence in research depends upon open scientific debate, and is driven by a multiplicity of ideas, cultures, people, and perspectives. When researchers are at risk and excluded from participating in the global research circuit, whether due to discrimination, persecution, suffering, or violence, not only are individual lives and careers at risk; the quality, the very future of research is also at stake. With record numbers of researchers at risk reaching out, there is no one country, government, NGO, or enterprise that can meet the scope of the challenge alone; an ambitious and concerted approach is required. Toward this goal, and in recognition of a shared commitment to excellence in research and to the principles of freedom of inquiry and academic freedom that are essential pre-conditions for world-class research, the InSPIREurope project will facilitate transnational cooperation between European and national initiatives and programs in support of researchers at risk. Further information, including project webpages, will be available when the project begins in September.

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The EU Human Rights Defenders’ mechanism – a short overview

May 28, 2019

Many readers of this blog wil already follow ProtectDefenders.eu [see also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2018/02/27/10611/]. Still, for those who don’t here follows a short overview taken from a 31 May 2019 communication which gives an impressive tally of the last three year: 

Over the past three years, ProtectDefenders.eu – the EU Human Rights Defenders mechanism implemented by a Consortium of international civil society organisations, has emerged as a solid, successful and crucial tool for at-risk human rights defenders, and as an increasingly referenced instrument within the international human rights defenders community. As per the three-years report, ProtectDefenders.eu has stepped up the practical support available to HRDs at risk and local human rights NGOs, and mobilised resources in favour of at least 30,018 defenders in a timely and comprehensive manner.

In a context marked by the increasing demand for support from human rights defenders operating in the most difficult contexts, ProtectDefenders.eu…

  • has granted emergency support to 1,402 human rights defenders at high risk, in order to implement security measures, such as emergency relocation, individual security, medical support, or legal support. Over the past three years, the countries from which the highest number of HRDs received support were Syria, Burundi, Honduras, Russia, China, Iran, and DRC.
  • has facilitated and funded temporary relocation programmes for 459 human rights defenders (and their families when needed) with the support of comprehensive accompaniment schemes within host institutions from all over the world. For this purpose, ProtectDefenders.eu has maintained and broadened the EU Temporary Relocation Platform, supported the creation of new host organisations and engaged as an essential counterpart for human rights defenders in need for relocation and for host organisations.
  • has expanded the capacitites of more than 173 local human rights organisations, communities, and groups operating in the most dangerous contexts, through funding (such as seed-funding, core-funding and lifeline support) and contributions to develop sensitive initiatives and capacity-building programmes.
  • has provided capacity-development and training for at least 6,673 defenders aimed at empowering them to better manage their own security and to develop effective stragies and action to help them advance their their work in defence of Human Rights.
  • has provided effective guidance and immediate responses to 2,600 human rights defenders thanks to direct access to the 24/7 hotline, the ProtectDefenders.eu single-entry points, and direct contact with the Secretariat.
  • has monitored the situation of at least 1,323 human rights defenders in the field, through 284 fact-finding and advocacy missions, trial monitoring, accompaniment, or visits to prison.has mobilised public and media attention, as well as political responses on more than 5,100 individual cases such as attacks or threats against defenders through appeals, letters or petitions:
  • has reached out to at least 4,289 of the less connected, most targeted and at-risk defenders around the world, through 60 initiatives, such as missions to remote areas.

ProtectDefenders.eu aims at reaching out to the less connected and particularly targeted defenders and these groups (such as Women Human Rights Defenders, LGBTI+ rights defenders, land and environment rights defenders, indigenous rights defenders, or defenders from remote areas) represent approximately 75% of the beneficiaries.

https://www.protectdefenders.eu/en/newsfeed.html#newsletter-article-288

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Lack of funds forces lack of oversight by UN

May 20, 2019

Thalif Deen wrting for IPS on 20 May 2019 relates that the “    

The Geneva-based Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) says six of the UN’s 10 treaty bodies are being forced to cancel their sessions this year due to financial reasons. The situation has been described as “an unprecedented consequence of some UN member States delaying payments due to the Organisation.” Anna-Karin Holmlund, Senior UN Advocate at Amnesty International, told IPS: “Amnesty is deeply concerned by member states’ delay in paying their assessed contributions, which will have a direct effect on the ability of the UN to carry out its vital human rights work.” By 10 May, only 44 UN member states – out of 193 — had paid all their assessments due, with the United States owing the largest amount.

The OHCHR said last week the cancellations meant that reviews already scheduled with member states, as well as consideration of complaints by individual victims of serious human rights violations — including torture, extra-judicial killings, enforced disappearances -– will not take place as scheduled. “The cancellation of sessions will also have numerous other negative consequences, and will seriously undermine the system of protections which States themselves have put in place over decades,” said a statement released by the OHCHR.

The chairpersons of the 10 Committees are deeply concerned about the practical consequences of cancelling these sessions and have sent a letter to the UN Secretary General and the High Commissioner for Human Rights, requesting they, together with Member States, explore ways of addressing this situation, “as a matter of urgency.”..

http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/05/uns-mandate-protect-human-rights-takes-another-hit/

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UK issues call for applications for funding human rights defenders work

May 14, 2019

On 13 May 2019 the UK Mission to the United Nations in New York issued a call for Programme Fund bids for the fiscal year 2019-2020.

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The UK Mission to the United Nations in New York is running an open call for project bids for funding under the Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s International Programme in support of the UK Government’s objectives at the UN in New York on Freedom of Religion or Belief and Human Rights Defenders. Funding will be available for ODA-eligible projects running between 1 April 2019 and 31 March 2020. Bids will be accepted from civil society, including NGOs and think tanks, as well as international organisations, including UN offices, agencies, funds and programmes. As a first step, interested parties must submit a written expression of interest to uk@un.intby Tuesday 21 May.

For more information on the programme, guidance for bidding, and additional deadlines, see the Programme Fund form below.

Programme Fund: Call for Bids for Funding

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Excellent news: HURIDOCS to receive 1 million $ from Google for AI work

May 8, 2019

Google announced on 7 May 2019 that the Geneva-based NGO HURIDOCS is one of 20 organizations that will share 25 million US dollars in grants from the Google Artificial Intelligence Impact Challenge. The Google Artificial Intelligence Impact Challenge was an open call to nonprofits, social enterprises, and research institutions to submit their ideas to use artificial intelligence (AI) to help address societal challenges. Over 2600 organizations from around the world applied.

Geneva-based HURIDOCS will receive a grant of 1 million US dollars to develop and use machine learning methods to extract, explore and connect relevant information in laws, jurisprudence, victim testimonies, and resolutions. Thanks to these, the NGO will work with partners to make documents better and freely accessible. This will benefit anyone interested in using human rights precedents and laws, for example to lawyers representing victims of human rights violations or students researching non-discrimination.

The machine learning work to liberate information from documents is grounded in more than a decade of work that HURIDOCS has done to provide free access to information. Through pioneering partnerships with the Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa (IHRDA) and the Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL), HURIDOCS has co-created some of the most used public human rights databases. A key challenge in creating these databases has been the time-consuming and error-prone manual adding of information – a challenge the machine learning techniques will be used to overcome.

“We have been experimenting with machine learning techniques for more than two years”, said Natalie Widmann, Artificial Intelligence Specialist at HURIDOCS. “We have changed our approach countless times, but we see a clear path to how they can be leveraged in groundbreaking ways to democratise access to information.” HURIDOCS will use the grant from Google to work with partners to co-create the solutions, carefully weighing ethical concerns of automation and focusing on social impact. All the work will be done in the open, including all code being released publicly.

“We are truly excited by the opportunity to use these technologies to address a problem that has been holding the human rights movement back”, said Friedhelm Weinberg, Executive Director of HURIDOCS. “We are thankful to Google for the support and look forward to be working with their experts and what will be a fantastic cohort of co-grantees.”

“We received thousands of applications to the Google AI Impact Challenge and are excited that HURIDOCS was selected to receive funding and expertise from Google. AI is at a nascent stage when it comes to the value it can have for the social impact sector, and we look forward to seeing the outcomes of this work and considering where there is potential for use to do even more.” – Jacquelline Fuller, President of Google.org

Next week, the HURIDOCS team will travel to San Francisco to work with the other grantees, Google AI experts, Project Managers and the startup specialists from Google’s Launchpad Accelerator for a program that will last six months, from May to November 2019. Each organization will be paired a Google expert who will meet with them regularly for coaching sessions, and will also have access to other Google resources and expert mentorship.

Download the press release in English, Spanish. Learn more about the other Google AI Impact grantees at Google’s blog.

Fo more on HURIDOCS history: https://www.huridocs.org/tag/history-of-huridocs/ and for some of my other posts: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/tag/huridocs/

HURIDOCS NEWS

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