Deadline: 14-Mar-21
The Justice for Journalists Foundation (JFJ) has announced a call for proposals for its 2021 Investigative Grant Programme.
Subject Areas
This year, JFJ will accept grant applications in the following three subject areas:
- An investigation into the following crimes against journalists committed in 2020-2021:
- State orchestrated abuse and harassment of journalists inciting them to suicide (ex. Irina Slavina, Russia);
- Physical violence against journalists covering civil protests in the former Soviet countries (ex: Belarus: protests against elections results; Russia: protests in support of Alexei Navalny; Kyrgyzstan: civil unrest surrounding presidential elections, etc.);
- Gender as a target: violent attacks on female media workers (ex. Tajikistan, Northern Caucasus, and Afghanistan);
- Murders of investigative journalists looking into cases of local corruption, misuse of public funds and activities of organised crime (ex. Julio Valdivia Rodriquez and Victor Fernando Alvarez Chavez in Mexico; Rakesh “Nirbhik” Singh and Isravel Moses cases in India);
- Hiding behind the masks: police brutality against journalists during the BLM protests, anti-lockdown demonstrations, and other civil unrest in the USA and Europe.
- An investigation into the following issues involving violent crimes against journalists:
- Violent crimes against journalists covering migration;
- Abduction, kidnapping, prosecution and harassment campaigns against independent journalists and bloggers;
- ‘Heavy hand’ of the security services: assassinations, beatings, arrests, harassment of media workers, including those in exile;
- Neglected and forgotten: unsolved murders of journalists in South Sudan, Philippines, Somalia, Syria and Iraq;
- Who is behind the deadly attacks on environmental journalists? (ex. South America and Africa).
- An investigation into crimes against journalists in the following categories:
- How to get away with murder: impunity for the death of journalists in the twenty-first century (ex. Turkey lack of investigation or state policy);
- SLAPPed and scared in Africa and Asia: journalists vis-a-vis corporations;
- Online harassment turned into offline attacks – virtual threats or real danger to journalists (ex. deanon, doxxing, online harassment, deepfakes, etc.).
Funding Information
- Therefore this year the maximum amount offered for each individual grant is USD 50’000.
Eligibility Criteria
- Grants are available to investigative journalists, both professional and non-professional (bloggers, social activists), both in wartime and peacetime.
- JFJ supported 24 applications for journalistic investigations into violent crimes against media workers.
- The investigation of crimes committed in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, Brazil, Central African Republic, Colombia, Kyrgyzstan, Malta, Mexico, Nicaragua, Russia, Somalia, South Sudan, Syria, Ukraine, UK and Vietnam.
Grant Criteria
- If your proposal involves reporting in a hostile or dangerous environment, they require that you and your potential outlets adhere strictly to the ACOS Alliance principles.
- If your proposal involves reporting in a hostile or dangerous environment, they require that you obtain safety equipment (including, but not limited to helmets, bulletproof vests and GPS personal locator beacons).
- The cost of leasing or purchasing such equipment should be included in your project budget.
- Staff journalists who plan to report from conflict zones or hostile environments must have a firm assignment from a news organisation that will assume full responsibility for his/her well-being. Alternatively, freelancers and bloggers who do not have backing from a news organisation must include appropriate insurance in your project budget. That should cover illness, repatriation, disability and loss of life.
- They require that their grant recipients who plan to report from conflict zones or hostile environments undergo First Aid and Safety, as well as Hostile Environment Training, where appropriate. JFJ is committed to covering the cost of such training conducted by accredited organisations.
For more information, visit https://jfj.fund/grantapplication/