Note: This article was first published on the blog of the Guerrilla Foundation.
At the start of this year, during one of our Guerrilla team get-togethers, we thought, “we have the capacity to fund way more activists & movements, our only limit right now is our budget”. In other words, we’re connected to way more worthy collectives than we’re able to give grants to and we have the internal infrastructure to research, evaluate & process more grants than we’re processing currently. So we decided to do something about it, and that’s how our ‘Rad Donors‘ initiative was born.
Rad Donors is short for Radical Donors. Radical, as in: 1. adj. ‘arising from or going to a root or source’ & 2. slang. ‘fine; wonderful; cool’. These are two hallmarks of activist philanthropy as we see it, philanthropy that adopts a systems thinking perspective, tackling societal problems from a root-cause, bottom-up approach & uses fresh, creative tactics to do so.
We want to invite new funders to join us on this mission, because we need many more bold funders to take action – today – more than ever. If you are not much of a reader, we made a video just for you:
We have identified and supported more than 53 activist collectives & grassroots movements that are shaking up the status quo and transforming our society from our current system of extraction & oppression to one that puts people and planet over profit.
We do not shy away from public protest, civil disobedience and direct actions that might cause public controversy.
This year we want to grow our ‘Reflex Fund’. This is a pot of money for activists doing important work across Europe. Our team reviews and approves grants very quickly, with funding released up to 2 weeks or less (with a record response time of 48hrs!). The Reflex Fund is intended for activists & collectives that have very little or no financial support, and often doing work that is edgy, experimental and provocative.
We have the staff, the vetting procedures, the networks, the infrastructure for giving grants all in place, so 100% of the money you give will simply go directly to into action.
We are looking for radical donors who want to donate money to rad ideas & actions.
Our fundraising target for the next year is €50,000, the question is simple, do you want to be one of our Rad Donors?
If what you’ve heard so far is getting you excited you can drop us a line at hello@guerrillafoundation.org or via our facebook page to find out how you can join our activist family.
If you want to check out a bit more what we’re doing and who we’re supporting you can check out our new annual report.
If you also just want to give us feedback regarding anything mentioned thus far, or want to get to know us a bit better we’re keen to hear from you and again just say hello at: hello@guerrillafoundation.org
Left to right: Ivan, Romy, Toni, Julia, Paolo, Steph from a rooftop in Barcelona, the heart of new wave radical municipalism in Europe looking to expand the Guerrilla gang.