Neighborhood Funders Group Launches FundersforJustice.org

Dear Friends, We are grieved and outraged to see, in just a week’s time, two grand juries fail to indict police officers who killed unarmed black men: Michael Brown in Ferguson, MO, and Eric Garner in Staten Island, NY. In just the past few weeks alone, more black men and children have been killed or harmed…

Do not kill or hijack…

Over twenty years of working in this field of social justice philanthropy in Nepal, I continue to be struck by the resilience of the local communities, their home-grown leaderships, and the way they innovate and improvise to sustain and nurture each other as far as it is possible!  During a recent visit to several districts…

5 Questions for…Moukhtar Kocache, author, ‘Framing the Discourse, Advancing the Work: Philanthropy at the Nexus of Peace & SJ’

Earlier this year, the Working Group on Philanthropy for Social Justice and Peace issued a report, Framing the Discourse, Advancing the Work: Philanthropy at the Nexus of Peace and Social Justice and Arts and Culture, that highlighted the synergy between the arts and social movements around the globe — and the general reluctance among funders to fund arts…

Latin America and the Caribbean: New Report on Philanthropy for Social Justice and Peace

 US peacebuilding theorist John Paul Lederach talks about achieving “critical yeast” in difficult circumstances, with this arguably being of greater importance than “critical mass.” If the recently circulated report on philanthropy for social justice and peace in Latin America and the Caribbean is to be believed that is exactly what exists: critical yeast. The 32…

Rant on Humanitarianism

It is 3am and my left index finger taps involuntarily on the laminate desk because I’ve been told by someone I respect that I am wrong or just crazy (but oh so politely) to find it very strange that the distinction between what is “humanitarian” and what is “developmental” in terms of aid is so…

An Act of Altruism Expands Beyond the Expected

The story is borrowed from Sagar Prasain’s facebook and is located in Kathmandu. After settling into a taxi, Sagar inquired if people on wheel chair rode his taxi.  The driver then enthusiastically shared his recent story:  three college students approached him yesterday, with an elderly man on wheel chair.  Inquiring how much it would cost…

Tribute to Sithie Tiruchelvam

On March 22, 2014, at the age of 69, we lost our friend and colleague, and an unrelenting crusader for social justice and human rights, Sithie Tiruchelvam. We wanted to share with you a moving tribute to Sithie from the website of the Neelan Tiruchelvam Trust (which Sithie founded in memory of her husband, Neelan Tiruchelvam). The…