News and updates from BCSDN and the region
Major online platforms, emerging and specialized platforms, players in the advertising industry, fact-checkers, research, and civil society organizations delivered a strengthened Code of Practice on Disinformation following the Commission’s Guidance of May 2021. The Code is a first-of-its-kind tool through which relevant players in the industry agreed – for the first time in 2018 –
Read more →The Minister of Justice of North Macedonia initiated the proposal for establishing an expert body that will define the criteria for registering CSOs at a government session after the storm of reactions in public about the established associations in the country that bear disputed historical names, including Hitler’s collaborators. According to the minister, the expert
Read more →War, emergencies, the pandemic, and political turbulence significantly affected the environment for CSOs in the Eastern Partnership (EaP) region in 2021. Their space to operate and possibilities for activism faced restrictions, both in law and in practice. The report analyses 11 key areas of civil society operation, such as freedom of association, participation, or access
Read more →The Regional Anti-corruption Initiative (RAI) has published a few user-friendly documents produced for the Higher Education sector and the Public Enterprises sector, intending to outline the sector-specific risks with selected examples of how the most prevalent risks can be successfully targeted and equip beneficiaries with the right tools and building their capacities on using them. The documents
Read more →In 2021, the European Commission tabled a proposal for a regulation on the transparency and targeting of political advertising, while some EU member states also try to incorporate their solutions into ongoing reforms of national electoral laws. In the proposed EU regulation, “political advertising” is defined to encompass electoral advertising or advertising coming from political
Read more →The report produced by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), in cooperation with the Ministry of Information Society and the Administration of North Macedonia, determines the current situation with digital skills in the country. The report aims to assess the current supply and demand of digital skills in the country and develop a digital skills strategy
Read more →The Parliamentary Assembly of BiH missed the opportunity, especially with the obstruction of representatives/delegates from the Croatian National Assembly and Alliance of Independent Social Democrats to pass amendments to the Election Law on improving the integrity of the election process, as stated in the public address of the Declaration for the Constitutional Change of BiH.
Read more →North Macedonia’s Justice Ministry is proposing to criminalize the violation of freedom of opinion and expression as part of planned changes to the country’s criminal code. The proposed changes have been part of the new version of the criminal code, published on the National Electronic Register of Regulations, and now subjected to public consultation. For
Read more →The National Resource Centre for CSOs in Albania has raised the concerns of the CSO community after attending the meeting of the National Council for Civil Society (NCCS) during which the monitoring of the roadmap for the government’s policy “On the creation of an enabling environment for civil society 2019-2023” has been presented. The elaborate
Read more →The report results from a desk-research exercise carried out by the CIVICUS Youth Action Team to bring to light the current trends of youth engagement in civic spaces. It analyses the physical and digital developments, the strategies used in countries worldwide, and emerging practices used by young activists. The findings highlight possible areas to strengthen
Read more →ECNL and PILnet have launched a series of overviews of banking conditions in European countries. These overviews aim to support CSOs that willing to open a bank account in the selected countries or compare conditions between the countries. The overviews also aim to help CSOs navigate through the organizational banking requirements which are becoming increasingly
Read more →The recent Liberties Podcast reflects how the internet is changing – for the better. MEP Alexandra Geese and Eliska Pirkova of Access Now discussed how the EU passed the Digital Services Act (DSA), landmark legislation to restore users’ rights and rein in the dangerous business practices of Big Tech. They highlighted how new rules will
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