Dear Readers:
TAI enjoyed attending the inaugural Obama Foundation Democracy Forum last week. While there was much reference to the threats to democratic governance, such as disinformation, rising authoritarianism, and lack of independent media, the hope came from young leaders present, such as Doussouba Konaté, head of Accountability Lab Mali. Watch their discussion with former President Obama.
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P.S. Remember, TAI doesn't own the photos. All photos used in this weekly have a link to their source.
WHAT´S NEW?
CALLING ALL INNOVATORS!
USAID is calling for innovators to counter corruption in transition minerals production. The Countering Transnational Corruption Grand Challenge for Development, in partnership with Amazon, BHP Foundation, and TAI-member Chandler Foundation, has released its first activity, the Powering a Just Energy Transition Green Minerals Challenge. You have until January 9th to submit your ideas.
As COP27 wrapped up, Jonathan Glennie calls for us to shift attention beyond how much money is needed for a just transition to who gets to decide how that money is spent. “The first lesson of history is this: Don’t leave voice, governance and mechanism till last. These issues need to be resolved up front.” We could not agree more.
The global stocktake of progress to meeting the Paris Agreement goals is above an “accountability exercise” argues UN Climate Change Executive Secretary Simon Stiell. What happens next? See here.
NEW BLOG: WHERE DID THE MONEY GO?
The COVID-19 pandemic led to unprecedented public spending, but also civil society led efforts to track that spending. What was effective? This blog from Carlos Diaz, Courtney Tolmie, Erin Fletcher and Jorge Florez look at COVID trackers and challenges some of our general assumptions about their use.
FROM OUR MEMBERS
OPEN SOCIETY FOUNDATIONS:
The Open Society Foundations announced the 2022 cohort of Soros Equality Fellows. The diverse group of fellows include documentary filmmakers, professors, archivists, grassroots organizers, policy advocates, journalists, and authors.
SKOLL FOUNDATION:
Dr. Cheryl Dorsey of Echoing Green, a Skoll Foundation board member, made Forbes list of women over 50 who are challenging age and gender stereotypes in every sphere of business, politics, science, and society.
MACARTHUR FOUNDATION:
President John Palfrey highlights the work of OnNigeria grantees Lux Terra Leadership Foundation and Al Habibiyya in promoting interfaith collaboration on International Day for Tolerance.
TOOLS FOR FUNDERS
One of the philanthropic sector’s real weaknesses over the years has been a tendency to go long on strategy and short on execution. Are MacKenzie Scott’s gifts making a change? What impact is she having? New research by the Center for Effective Philanthropy attempts answers.
Bipasha Ray suggests that decisions by Scott grant recipients on how they spend their unrestricted grants will reveal clues about areas of global development that have historically been underfunded.
Want to take risks? Kate Kroeger and Shalini Eddens explore how funders can embrace risks in grantmaking to better resource human rights defenders.
Five trend lines on the state of global philanthropy (caveat - based on data 2015-2019 only) - no surprise that growing restrictions on civil society make the list.
ESSENTIAL WATCHING!
We can only achieve accountability (corporate and state) if we build collective power and have strong human rights movements”. A conversation between Ford Foundation Executive Vice President, Hilary Pennington and Fernanda Hopenhaym, co-executive director of PODER, an advocacy organization in Latin America that fights for corporate transparency and accountability using feminist and human rights organizing strategies.
FOCUSED TOPIC OF THE WEEK
"GOVERNMENTS AND INFORMATION: PERSPECTIVES ON 3 CONTINENTS"
Author Vanja Skoric states that EU Commission and the Parliament needs to remedy the European Union AI Act, and remove the exemption from oversight and controls for national security purposes. “Surveillance has been already causing a chilling effect on the rights to protest and freedom of speech, as well as being harmful to free and open democracies“.
Access to information advocates can take cheer from the fact that Slovenia’s former commissioner for access to public information, Natasa Pirc became Slovenia’s first female president. Pirc, a liberal lawyer and former data privacy commissioner was backed by Slovenia’s center-left government and beat her conservative rival in a runoff vote. She promises to speak up for rule of law, although is not without some controversy given the lucrative network of companies owned by her and her husband and allegations that they had put some of their fortune into tax havens.
“Governments of Sahelian countries have very little capacity to meaningfully engage in information warfare, and Western governments are wary of being pulled into a battle of ideas using similar tactics to those deployed by authoritarian regimes.” So, how to counter disinformation in the Sahel contributing to undermine efforts to support democracy and good governance? Doussouba Konaté lays out what the US can do to help.
In Latin America, the Escazú Agreement has been groundbreaking in securing access to environmental information. Now there is a new training guide for environmental defenders on the Agreement (in Spanish).
CONGRATULATIONS!
In 2020, the “Participatory Grantmaking Community of Practice” was born with 12 people on a Zoom call. This week it hit a 1000 members. This rapid growth is reflective of the interest across the sector in doing philanthropy differently and shifting power to communities, but it’s also an example of how to create strong, engaging online communities of practice.
THE LATEST FROM INFORMATION, CLIMATE AND CORRUPTION
1 of every 4 tax dollars lost to multinational corporations using tax havens can be prevented by publishing government-collected transparency data. In a new report, Tax Justice Network urges the G20 to shift from OECD-led to UN-led solutions for a fairer global tax system.
Gwen Burnyeat and Andrei Gómez-Suárez review the first 100 days of the Petro presidency in Colombia and their discussion of regional 'binding political dialogues' caught our eye - a new participation space crucial to balancing complex political tensions.
Open Society Foundations, Human Rights First, the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights, and REDRESS issued Multilateral Magnitsky Sanctions at Five Years, calling for the more effective use of Magnitsky-style sanctions to address human rights abuses and corruption.
JOBS AT TAI MEMBERS
Job postings at Hewlett Foundation - ONGOING
Job postings at MacArthur Foundation - ONGOING
Job postings at Open Society Foundations - ONGOING
Job postings at Luminate - ONGOING
Job postings at Ford Foundation - ONGOING
Job postings at FCDO - ONGOING
Job postings at Skoll - ONGOING
JOBS LISTINGS
Human Resources Coordinator, Urgent Action Fund for Women’s Human Rights
Consultant: Urgent Action Sister Funds Global Care Research Podcast Producer- Russian & English Speaking, Urgent Action Fund for Women’s Human Rights
Program Officer, Democratic Transformation, Mexico City, Open Society Foundations
Impact Lead for Civic Rights in a Digital Era, Hivos
Research Fellow - International Law Programme, Chatham House
Major grants coordinator, WINGS
Programme Officer - Europe, Democracy Reporting International
Senior Economic Analyst, Natural Resource Governance Institute
Programme Coordinator Latin America and Global Projects, Water Integrity Network
CALLS / OPPORTUNITIES
Fellowship in Climate Change Law. Deadline January 15, 2023
UNESCO Massive Open Online Course: Access to Information Laws and Policies and their Implementation
Powering a Just Energy Transition Green Minerals Challenge. Deadline January 9, 2023.
CALENDAR
November 21-25, 2022, 2022 European Pro Bono Week - PILnet
December 6-10, 2022, “International Anti-Corruption Conference,
December 12-14, 2022, 2022 Effective Development Co-operation Summit, Global Taskforce
December 14, 2022, Racial equity in global development webinar
Michael Jarvis,
TAI's Executive Director