Even though it is already European summer, we are happy to announce our spring closed call grantees & copilots for 2019 & beyond, and yes, we’re seriously excited to get the chance to work alongside them. As usual, choosing a final list was extremely challenging, as we were left with deciding between brilliant & badass activist initiatives. We had 10 grantee choices in total, however one activist collective did not have a legal entity and they couldn’t find a fiscal sponsor, so our Founder Toni channeled funds to them directly, cos we can do that, and it’s pretty terrific – ‘no-excuses-to-not-fund‘. So now we’re technically left with 9 grantees and they’re all doing very inspiring stuff.
We really do encourage you to visit the websites of these initiatives & follow their social media pages to get a full taste of their activism-awesomeness. We’ll be posting ‘feature’ posts for each of our grantees in the coming weeks, with greater details on what we’re resourcing for each one, but for those looking for a quick overview, the synopses follow in no particular order:
Fossil Free Culture NL, Amsterdam
A collective of artists and activists creating disobedient art to end oil and gas sponsorship of cultural institutions in the Netherlands with the end goal of terminally eroding the fossil fuel industry’s legitimacy.
Generation 2.0 for Rights, Equality and Citizenship & Solomon, Athens
An initiative by Athenians from diverse backgrounds, representing the change they want to bring in society, proactively advocating for a diverse Greece in both theory and in practice.
Solomon works on social inclusion by giving voice to the voiceless through journalistic content production, community training in media field & by offering employability opportunities in Media and Creative fields.
Ministry of Space, Belgrade
Ministry of Space is a collective that fights for spatial justice in Serbia by employing a big, big, big array of creative tactics.
2020:Rebelión por el Clima, Barcelona
A brand new coalition of diverse eco-social movements from across the Iberian Peninsula that are beginning to organise around a shared theory of change that understands the global climate emergency as an urgent and strategic point intersectional struggle, and the need for mass non-violent disobedience to confront it.
Red Line Campaign, Lisbon
A national awareness campaign with the final aim of stopping oil drilling and fracking in Portugal while fighting for climate justice!
Limity jsme my, Prague
A Czech climate justice movement working to address the root causes of the climate crisis by striving to keep fossil fuels in the ground.
Stay Grounded, Vienna
An international network which aims to tackle the root causes of aviation growth and climate heating. The network supports activists in resisting airport projects, and strives towards an ecologically sustainable and just form of mobility.
PlanB.Earth, London
A collective of diverse types of activists focusing on mobilisation & litigation to hold power to account for #ClimateBreakdown
Minim, Barcelona*
A team of writers seeking to amplify the voice of municipalism by sharing practical and theoretical knowledge with the support of a community of activists, scholars, journalists, and public officials.
If you got to the end of the list then chances are you’re one of the more interested grantmaking/activism nerds, so we’ll let you know some more stuff that’s nerd-only content. We really do understand the importance of long-term support so we tried to really practice what we preach this year. Out of the 9 grantees, 5 are second grants, as we want to demonstrate that societal transformation is a process that takes its sweet time, and despite the frequent urgency of activism and radical change convictions, we cannot expect such changes overnight. So several years of support means that, that which was seeded can stand on its feet with greater chances of success, given a couple of years of resourcing. The Red Line Campaign in Portugal, Stay Grounded in Austria and The Ministry of Space in Belgrade are classic regrants. Limitry jsme my in Czech Republic have received two small grants from our Reflex Fund, and now for instance will be getting a larger €15,000 grant. Plan B in the UK is a regrant but for a very different project, a mock theatre performance on Climate Justice at the Tate Modern, while the initial grant was for core support to their litigation process against the UK which they were suing for climate unjust politics. So the bottom line is, resourcing activists and movements over extended periods of time gives them some more stability in a deeply precarious financial conditions they’re normally operating and living in.
If you read this far, thank you, we think this stuff is really important, so if you do too (and you clearly do, to be still reading), please share these ideas and spark conversations with people who can make such changes in their institutions.
*Minim doesn’t yet have an online presence as the collective is in the process of getting registered and setting up all the admin work.
