Deadline: 14-Jun-21
The U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL) announces an open competition for organizations interested in submitting applications for a project that promotes transitional justice and accountability processes related to the Syrian conflict that are inclusive of the experiences and perspectives of Syrian women and girls, in line with the U.S. Strategy on Women, Peace, and Security.
DRL’s goal is to ensure truth, justice and accountability processes addressing gross and systematic human rights violations committed in Syria account for and address the gendered dimensions of the Syrian conflict and gendered experiences and impacts of human rights violations, especially those committed against women and girls.
Objectives
DRL’s objectives are to:
- Advance Syrian women’s meaningful engagement in and leadership of efforts to pursue truth, justice, and accountability for human rights violations and abuses committed in Syria;
- Amplify and integrate the voices, perspectives and experiences of human rights violations of Syrian women in current and future, formal and informal truth, justice and accountability efforts and the political process;
- Improve collaboration, coordination, and cooperation amongst women and women-led organizations pursuing truth, justice, and accountability, as well as between women’s-based networks and broader justice and accountability efforts; and
- Strengthen institutional capacity of women-led organizations engaged in the pursuit of truth, justice and accountability, including learning through comparative lessons and sharing of experiences through peer-to-peer dialogue.
Programs should seek to include groups that can bring perspectives based on their religion, gender, disability, race, ethnicity, and/or sexual orientation and gender identity. Programs should be demand-driven and locally led to the extent possible.
Funding Information
- Funding Floor: $500,000
- Funding Ceiling: $987,654
- Anticipated Number of Awards: 1-2
- Type of Award: Grant or Cooperative Agreement
- Period of Performance: 18-36 months
- Anticipated Time to Award, Pending Availability of Funds: 3-5 months
The total duration of any award, including potential non-competitive continuation amendments, shall not exceed 60 months, or five years. Any non-competitive continuation is contingent on performance and pending availability of funds.
Outcomes
DRL’s expected outcomes are that:
- Women activists and women-led initiatives are strengthened, more directly engaged in and inform the design and implementation of current and future truth, justice and accountability initiatives for human rights violations committed in Syria, including but not limited to investigations and prosecutions of atrocity crimes, as well as the political process;
- Syrians and the international community recognize broader and diverse patterns of harms for redress and their gendered impacts, including those that disproportionately affect women and girls directly and indirectly such as socio-economic violations;
- Syrians and the international community are more equipped to identify and respond to the underlying factors that enabled these violations to occur and gendered interpretations of justice specific to the Syrian context;
- Women and girls’ experiences and stories of the conflict are preserved and acknowledged alongside more dominant narratives of the conflict; and
- Effective use of innovative and creative, gender-sensitive and trauma-informed approaches to a range of formal and informal transitional justice measures.
Eligible Applicants
- DRL welcomes applications from U.S.-based and foreign-based non-profit organizations/nongovernment organizations (NGO) and public international organizations; private, public, or state institutions of higher education; and for-profit organizations or businesses. DRL’s preference is to work with non-profit entities; however, there may be some occasions when a for-profit entity is best suited.
- Applications submitted by for-profit entities may be subject to additional review following the panel selection process. Additionally, the Department of State prohibits profit to for-profit or commercial organizations under its assistance awards. Profit is defined as any amount in excess of allowable direct and indirect costs. The allowability of costs incurred by commercial organizations is determined in accordance with the provisions of the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) at 48 CFR 30, Cost Accounting Standards Administration, and 48 CFR 31 Contract Cost Principles and Procedures.
- Applicants should have existing, or the capacity to develop, active partnerships with thematic or in-country partners, entities, and relevant stakeholders, including private sector partners and NGOs, and have demonstrable experience in administering successful and preferably similar projects. DRL encourages applications from foreign-based NGOs headquartered in the geographic regions/countries relevant to this NOFO. Applicants may form consortia in order to bring together organizations with varied expertise to propose a comprehensive program in one proposal.
Note- DRL is committed to an anti-discrimination policy in all of its projects and activities. DRL welcomes applications irrespective of race, ethnicity, color, creed, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, or other status.
For more information, visit https://www.grants.gov/web/grants/view-opportunity.html?oppId=332871