BCSDN’s has just released its latest research, Donor Support, Civic Space, and the Future of Civil Society in the Western Balkans, which finds the region’s civil society at a pivotal point. While international assistance remains the sector’s lifeline, shifting donor practices risk entrenching a fragile, donor-driven model. The abrupt USAID withdrawal in 2025 was a turning point, exposing the fragility of single-donor reliance and providing governments with ammunition to delegitimize CSOs as “foreign agents”. The report notes that the dominant EU support is heavily projectized and ill-suited to provide the core, flexible support CSOs need, even as bilateral donors retrench. It recommends reforming modalities toward institutional and multi-annual funding, entrusting re-granting to local intermediaries, and integrating emergency mechanisms to build a sustainable, citizen-rooted sector. Read more here.
Source: BCSDN