News and updates from BCSDN and the region
Donor perspectives of the relationship between philanthropic and regional economic activity tend to fall into four broad areas: building the workforce, revitalizing the region as an attractive place to work and live, broadening philanthropic understandings to include strategic impact investing, and catalyzing dense networks of innovators and investors. These categories are identified as mapping on
Read more →Civil society plays a vital role in sustainable development, enabling people to claim their human rights, promoting human rights-based approaches, shaping policies, and providing social services. A substantial part of Swedish aid is therefore implemented in cooperation with civil society: the last few years around 40 per cent of Sida’s budget was channelled to or
Read more →The Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) aims to deploy its funds more effectively and efficiently in the future to help the poorest and most vulnerable communities. In order to ensure a fair and comprehensible distribution of federal government contributions, it has established a transparent system of allocation and set new upper limits. The
Read more →EU leaders must end the political inertia on social and environmental challenges by making sustainable development the EU’s top priority for the next five years, say Europe’s leading coalitions of social, environmental and development networks who have joined forces with 150 organisations. European citizens desire an EU that will deliver social and environmental justice. Scientists,
Read more →2019 is set to be another challenging year for social change and human rights donors. With political polarisation growing in many countries and the far-right organising and making gains across Europe, this is a time for donors to come together and think about how to use their resources and influence. One of the focal points
Read more →The European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) has called on the EU Member States to establish an enabling environment for philanthropy in line with EU freedoms and fundamental rights, and promote it as a recognised and socially responsible form of contributing to the public good or the welfare of others. Unlike commercial companies, philanthropic foundations and private donors cannot enjoy
Read more →In the field of international development, there is a particular form of collaboration whereby international NGOs partner with local civil society organisations to give them funding and technical support. The idea behind it is that local organisations should be getting international donor support, but are unable to manage these funds themselves. International partners are therefore drafted in
Read more →Partners Albania and National Resource Center for Civil Society in Albania present the paper on “Crowdfunding Platforms – An Alternative Source of Funding”, which is one of the most innovative methods of fundraising. This paper aims to encourage the sector for using this alternative source of funding, which helps them to diversify the funding, as
Read more →When donors provide assistance to the media sector, they frequently back projects that aim to strengthen the media’s contribution to good governance in some way or another. This kind of funding is consistent with recent declarations made by the international community on the importance of protecting independent media for the sake of democracy and development.
Read more →Attaining the SDGs is both an economic and ethical imperative. Yet we face a steep uphill climb. The additional spending needs in vital areas such as health, education, and priority infrastructure represent as much as 15 percentage points of GDP on average in low-income developing countries—which is equivalent to about half a trillion US dollars
Read more →As world leaders gathered in Paris to negotiate a new climate agreement in December 2015, more than 600,000 people in 175 countries marched in support of the process. Meanwhile, the French government used emergency powers, originally intended to fight terrorism, to put two dozen environmental advocates under house arrest for the duration of the negotiations.
Read more →Almost before the flames were out, while smoke still rose through the fallen ceiling of Paris’ famed Notre Dame Cathedral, donors began to step forward. In just two days over $1 billion had been raised for the Cathedral’s eventual rebuilding, much of it coming from mega-donors. And, just as quickly, others spoke up to question
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