News and updates from BCSDN and the region
The annual Global Perspectives conference brings together CEOs from key national and leading international CSOs with high level representatives from politics, the corporate sector and academia. The conference provides a platform for up to 150 participants to address some of the world’s most pressing challenges. In a highly interactive format, participants devise common strategies to
Read more →CEP is a five year USAID-funded program that contributes to achieve two objectives: (1) strengthened influence of CSOs on policies and programs related to priority issues of citizen concern; and (2) increased and sustained youth engagement in public life in Macedonia. The Strategic Support Grants aim to support CSOs, including think tanks that work in
Read more →The specific objectives of this Call are: 1) to support media organizations and journalist’s professional association’s capacities to strengthen professional standards, ethics and promote and protect the right to freedom of expression; and 2) to support CSOs initiatives to advocate for improved labour standards and promote laws, international standards, practices that protect freedom of opinion
Read more →Embassy of the USA to Montenegro published the third funding opportunity for NGOs in Montenegro through Criminal Justice Civil Society Program. The main goal of the program is to help Montenegro transition to a more effective and transparent criminal justice system by engaging citizens in the process through watchdog and monitoring activities, advocacy and policy-making,
Read more →The Council of Europe’s new Guidelines for civil participation in political decision-making were adopted by the body’s Committee of Ministers on 27 September 2017. The guidelines – which are based on practices and standards in Council of Europe member states, international standards and input received during public consultations – outline key principles for promoting dialogue,
Read more →A test version of the new Legislationline.org, OSCE/ODIHR legislative database, has been launched and is available under the link http://beta.legislationline.org/. The online legislative database is free-of-charge and was created to assist OSCE participating States in bringing their legislation into line with relevant international human-rights standards. It is designed as a drafting tool for lawmakers, where
Read more →In 2014, the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC) first commissioned a comprehensive perception survey, the Balkan Barometer, targeting the region’s population and its business community. The primary purpose of the survey was to assess the perceptions of regional trends and processes as part of the monitoring and reporting mechanism for the SEE 2020 Strategy, an ambitious
Read more →The Global Standard includes 12 Commitments with associated Key Actions that can help your organisation to strengthen your accountability. The Global Standard promotes a dynamic understanding of accountability, based on interactive stakeholder dialogue. This means that feedback from our stakeholders informs our decisions so that we can both continuously improve our performance and build trusted
Read more →The CIVICUS Monitor is a research tool that provides close to real-time data on the state of civil society and civic freedoms in 195 countries. The data is generated through a collaboration with more than 20 civil society research partners, and input from a number of independent human rights evaluations. The latest ratings provide further
Read more →Over the past year, Turkish authorities have grown increasingly suspicious of foreign nongovernmental organizations operating on their soil and have begun enforcing long-ignored regulations. A series of detentions and the expulsion of Mercy Corps earlier this year have rattled the aid community in Turkey. At the same time, mounting bureaucratic obstacles are threatening NGOs’ ability
Read more →With a sharp increase in protest around the world over the past decade, international and domestic standards for state protection and management of assemblies must be pursued. The acceptance that the state should facilitate demonstrations, instead of using restraint, is far from universal. In many cases excessive force is still used: organisers are targeted before
Read more →Last year, the Social Sector Accelerator and CIVICUS reviewed 50 different donors and platforms undertaking ‘partner qualification’ – the process by which they determine whether a nonprofit makes a sound partner. Every platform or donor reviewed relied on one of three things to aid them in basic qualification – an external database or registry, an
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