PeaceNexus Foundation: 2023 Call for Applications for the Western Balkans

Deadline: 11-Jun-23

The PeaceNexus Foundation welcomes applications from local, national and regional organisations and initiatives that are contributing to social cohesion or reconciliation, and which are interested in investing in their internal development.

Support Area

• Support Area 1 – Conflict Sensitivty: Helping organisations adapt to their context and contribute to social cohesion
  • Type of Support
    • The support is provided through a facilitated process of organisational change focused on helping you to adapt to your context, including in terms of your organisational functioning.
    • The list that follows is not exhaustive but conflict sensitivity support can be about:
      • Developing a conflict-sensitive organisational strategy
      • Developing tools and capacities for regular context analysis developing stronger outreach and engagement with external stakeholders
      • Updating grant-making tools and approaches so the resulting portfolio of projects/partnerships takes into account the conflicting issues in the region and contribute to social cohesion.
      • Ensuring diversity and inclusion in your human resources management
      • Developing new programmes with explicit social cohesion ambitions.
• Support Area 2 – Organisational Development: Helping organisations focused on reconciliation become more effective
  • Type of Support
    • The support takes the shape of a facilitated process of organisational strengthening, for example to help your organisation clarify its identity and positioning; improve its ability to assess results and strengthen organisational learning; improve its governance mechanisms and practice. Frequent areas of support include:
      • Strategy development
      • Restructuring
      • Board development
      • Development of an organisational MEL framework

What are they offering?

• Selected applicants will be supported through a tailored process of internal strengthening focusing either on conflict sensitivity (support area 1) or organisational development (support area 2).
• PeaceNexus (PN) support will take the form of a small grant of up to 40’000 CHF (average 25’000 CHF) to cover external expertise and process costs (for example for meeting costs, fees of specialised consultants, capacity development investments). In addition, two PN staff members will provide accompaniment to selected organisations throughout the partnership, including by providing advice, feedback or brainstorming about solutions.
• Once you are a PN partner, you will also be invited to regional peer-learning events with other PN partners and will be able to request external coaching if you need it. A phase of PN support lasts approximately 1 year and the majority of PN partners are supported for several years. They do not offer project nor core funding.

Eligibility Criteria

• In order to be eligible, the applicant needs to fulfil ALL of the following criteria:
  • Be working in one of the following countries: Albania, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, and
  • Be a civil society organisation, or a grassroots initiative or organisation from one of the following categories
  • A local or regional public entity
  • A foundation
  • A multilateral organisation
  • A network
  • Be directly responsible for the preparation of the application and management of the process if selected
  • Confirm that their activities will not violate the USA PATRIOT Act.

Who can apply?

Support Area 1 – Conflict Sensitivty

• They welcome applications from organisations and initiatives that want to maximise the positive impact of their work by better adapting to their context. They’re particularly keen to support:
  • Actors that work regionally and/or connect diverse stakeholders within and across divided communities at the local level
  • Grant-making organisations and foundations aiming to develop conflictsensitive funding & partnership practices
  • Organizations that are effective at protecting essential liberties and activists under threat.
  • Media organisations that want to ensure conflict-sensitive reporting and/or counter polarisation.

Support Area 2 – Organisational Development

• They welcome applications from organisations that want to address internal challenges to maximise their impact on reconciliation and dealing with the past. They seek out change-makers with a demonstrated potential to challenge the status quo in their environment. They’re particularly keen to support:
  • Actors that work on reconciliation regionally and/or connect diverse stakeholders within and across divided communities at the local level.
  • Transitional justice and Dealing with the Past organisations which engage in memory activism, build young people’s knowledge about the 90s and advocate for a responsible and principled approach to the legacy of the past.
  • Organisations and initiatives that protect the rights of minorities as well as their socio-political inclusion.

Selection Process

Their calls for proposals are very competitive. They have put systems in place to ensure their review is rigorous and impartial, and all eligible applications will be assessed the following selection criteria:

• Support area 1: Conflict sensitivity (CS)
  • Relevance of the applicant and potential to positively contribute to social cohesion
  • They need to understand through concrete examples what you are working on and how your work positively influences your environment. It is also important for them to understand how you are impacted by underlying lines of tension in your context and where you see opportunities for you to counter polarisation and contribute to social cohesion.
  • Readiness to take up conflict sensitivity at an organisational level
  • They want to understand the challenges that you face in adapting to your context and why you want to invest your time and energy in this internal strengthening process. Thy’re particularly keen to know what makes you think that greater conflict sensitivity would make a positive difference for inside your organisation and on your impact on the ground.
• Support Area 2: Organisational Development (OD)
  • Relevance of the applicant and ability to contribute to reconciliation
  • They need to understand what difference your work makes and to whom. It is important for them to understand where you have already a track record that contributes to conflict prevention, dealing with the past or reconciliation and where you see more potential for even more impact.
  • Readiness to engage in an organisational development process
  • The content of your application is of course confidential and they encourage you to be self-reflective and upfront in the articulation of your internal challenges. They also want to understand what ‘success’ would look like and how you expect the OD process to contribute to your effectiveness and impact.

For more information, visit PeaceNexus Foundation.