Applications are accepted on a rolling basis throughout the year
The MacArthur Foundation is seeking applicants for its Human Rights Grant Program in order to strengthen human rights protections, advance government accountability, and improve the reach and quality of justice. The foundation’s grant making aims to defend free expression and enhance criminal justice globally, and in select countries.
Thematic Areas
- Increasing threats to freedom of speech and association, ranging from intensified attacks on frontline human rights defenders to the rise of national laws that restrict the ability for civil society to operate.
- Assertive citizen movements calling for greater government accountability and demanding more protection of basic rights.
- Growing demands for localizing accountability for atrocity crimes and expanding access to justice.
- Rapid advancement in digital technology that is altering the way human rights advocates monitor violations, collect, manage, and protect data, and analyze findings.
MacArthur Funds
- Defending free expression includes attention to: responding to government pushback against human rights advocates; promoting political accountability; advancing Internet opennes.
- Enhancing criminal justice focuses on: expanding national-level accountability for mass atrocities; and advancing criminal justice reform in selected countries.
Geographical Focus
- The foundation engages with a consortium of funders to improve national laws related to atrocity crimes in countries across Africa, with a particular MacArthur focus on Uganda.
- In Mexico it supports efforts to improve investigation of human rights violations under the new criminal justice system.
How to Apply
Applicants can submit their Letter of interest via given website.
Eligible Countries:
Algeria, Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cabo Verde, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Congo, Republic of the Congo, Democratic Republic of the, Cote d’Ivorie, Djibouti, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe.
For more information, please visit MacArthur Foundation’s Human Rights Program.