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Description
The objective of the project is to support CSOs with necessary skills and know-how to be able to advocate better and more efficiently for public interests, including those of vulnerable groups.
The project shall be implemented through five components:
- Six workshops providing methodological and strategic tailor-made support for advocacy strategy development, each organized on a different thematic area. Open to any interested CSO (participants selected by open calls).
- Individual consultations and mentoring of CSOs acting as PP under the programme, based on identified needs. Participants will be selected by open calls.
- Six networking events connecting experts, CSO representatives, academia, public institutions and private donors. Participants will be selected by open calls.
- Training of up to 15 CSO representatives, selected by the FO, to become advocacy experts
Elaboration of a supporting toolkit on advocacy, to be distributed to CSO representatives, and support of two case studies promoting the sharing of best practice.
Summary of project results
Active and engaged citizens and support of the civil sector as a major force for positive change and public mobilization in public-interest cases are prerequisite for effective functioning of democracy. In order to be able to participate in and influence public policy, the advocacy activities are a core tool employed to achieve systemic change. Though, in the experience of the OSF Prague, advocacy activities are not a standard tool for the majority of CSOs, since they lack the necessary know-how, strategic approach, interconnection, and experience sharing with other advocacy actors.
This project addressed the need to strengthen the ability of CSOs to advocate for public interests. The assessment of the situation is based on a study prepared by Ashoka Czech Republic, where advocacy was identified as one of the needs by respondents (change makers). The OSF Prague got similar results from own survey among 30 CSOs. All but one is involved in advocacy work, all of them view advocacy as a necessary activity to do and 75 % of them would welcome support in planning an implementation of their advocacy activities. These opinions correspond with views of leaders among CSOs that the OSF Prague works with.
Before this project was implemented, there was no accessible support for these organizations that would be able to cover existing needs, because there were no other programs focused directly on advocacy in the Czech Republic. Some programs that were devoted to capacity building (including fundraising and public relations) included parts on advocacy, but they struggled with finding advocacy experts. Advocacy and watchdog activities are among the most under-financed areas of civil society.
At the same time, civil society organisations are put under the greatest level of pressure by politicians and far-right populists. The priority of the Active Citizens Fund is to strategically support projects on advocacy and watchdog activities of CSOs at national, regional and municipal levels so that they can effectively monitor the public environment and contribute to systemic change, but also so that they can improve their transparency towards the public and thus vindicate themselves of the hostile attitude of politician. This project corresponds closely to programme priority by its aim to support capacity of civil society organizations in their advocacy work. This project also filled the funding gaps in the field of advocacy work significantly.
Targeted workshops for CSOs on advocacy work and competences: 6 workshops provided methodological and strategic tailor-made support and consultation on the creation of advocacy strategic plans in order to develop knowledge on principles and methods related to advocacy, fact-based lobbying and awareness raising. Every workshop was devoted to specific issue of advocacy work - advocacy strategy, negotiating, planning, media work. These workshops were open to all CSOs that showed their interest to participate.
Individual consultations and mentoring for CSOs (project promoters): The OSF provided individual consultations and mentoring to those CSOs and independent initiatives, that are engaged in advocacy work and strive for systemic change at the local, regional or state level. The individual consultations were based on thorough diagnostics of needs of CSOs. The result of the consultacy was a significant improvement in CSOs advocacy strategies and implementation of their advocacy actions. There were 4 rounds of calls for project promoters to send their applications, overal there was 1288 hours of consultations for 41 organizations.
Networking events with experts on advocacy: The OSF initiated 7 networking and the exchange of experience in advocacy work between experts and representatives of CSOs, academia and public institutions. The aim of networking was to find possible synergies and to encourage mutual interconnection, but also to discuss relevant topics (such as regulation of lobbying, legislation etc.). The selection of participants was based on open calls and registrations of CSOs.
Training of independent experts on advocacy from CSOs: The aim of this activity was to train experts – representatives of CSOs to become experts in advocacy work. There were two different training groups – „Advocacy Accelerator“ (The target group is junior advocacy workers, a group that already has experience with advocacy work and wants to further deepen their knowledge and skills) and “Master group” (The target group was senior advocacy workers. A group that wants to share their experiences and jointly address selected topics they are not familiar with.).
Toolkit and case studies on advocacy campaigns: A Czech toolkit on advocacy was prepared. The toolkit was used in consultations and workshops and was distributed among representatives of CSOs in the Czech Republic. Also, two case studies on advocacy campaigns was supported to promote cases of best practices.
Strengthening civil society in its advocacy work and strengthening the capacities of individuals and organizations: The project has clearly strengthened civil society organizations and individuals who engage in advocacy work in their work. From the feedback and from the evaluation of the consultations, it emerged that the organizations feel more confident, they have adopted our advocacy work methodology, which describes advocacy work tools such as the problem tree and the map of key players, and they are able to transfer it to their other activities outside of the specific consulted campaign. The interest of organizations in consulting in the field of advocacy work is still growing, the organizations themselves are also able to better plan their resources to cover both consultants and their own advocacy staff. During the implementation of the project, the cooperation with other foundations that are interested in supporting their grantees and partners in advocacy work was established. In the years 2020 - 2022, a two-year Advocacy Academy for 10 patient organizations was implemented. It was supported by the Abakus foundation fund, and now the OSF Prague is leading another advocacy academy for NGOs focused on homesharing as a professional partner (also in cooperation with Abakus). New cooperation was established with the O Foundation and their support of 4 selected organizations that in the past underwent consultations supported within the framework of this project. We continue with them on long-term campaigns as well as on their new topics.
Empowerment of disadvantaged groups: The impact of implemented campaigns, especially in the field of health and social issues, is evident in several successful consulted campaigns. An example is the Assistance organization and an approved grant title that will strengthen finances for personal assistance; a newly created relief service for families of children with disabilities in Prague thanks to the Care without obstacles campaign; the organization Amalthea, which promoted lunches in schools and nurseries for children from socially disadvantaged families in the Chrudim region, or again, thanks to Care without obstacles and other NGOs, the initially insufficient budget for social services was increased. The amount involved was CZK 105 million, which is a great impact of their advocacy work and a demonstration of how important changes can also happen thanks to it.