THE SASAKAWA PEACE FOUNDATION

Comprehensive Research on the Strategic Participation of Non-Governmental Organizations in V4 Countries within the National Governance

14,000,000yen [Self-Operated/Commissioned Project]
The Sasakawa Peace Foundation

While V4 or four Vesegrad Group countries in Central Europe have gone through dramatic changes in every aspect of their political, economic and social lives, a number of challenges that respective government alone cannot find solutions still remain. Non-governmental organizations’ active contribution is keen ly expected in such areas as policy-planning in some specific fields and service provision. Yet, after joining the EU, there are heaps of issues including withdrawal of foreign donors and accountability demanded from the outside world. Resultantly, non-governmental organizations find it difficult to clarify for themselves the role they should be playing. As such, this project intends to cast light on non-governmental organizations in V4 to examine the activities so far and to sort out various problems that they currently confront, thereby formulating strategies for them to more effectively contribute to social and economic developments of each country. Furthermore, a third-party evaluation will be conducted on projects that the Fund assisted in the past in the related fields to utilize the outcome for drawing next guideline for the Sasakawa Central Europe Fund and future project development.

Screening of Researchers and Preliminary Coordinating Meeting (April-June 2007) External specialists who are well versed in the situation of non-governmental organizations will be designated as researchers in each of four countries. The researchers and project operator’s team will assemble for a preliminary coordinating meeting in Bratislava to discuss policies regarding a country reports to be developed for each country.
Development of Country Reports (July 2007-February 2008) Taking into accounts findings through interviews and questionnaire surveys, each country researcher will prepare a draft of country report. The draft report will subsequently be shared for possible revisions with non-governmental organizations, governments and aid agencies on the occasion of multiple conferences and seminars to be held in each country.
Regional Strategy Conference (February 2008, Bratislava) Based on the country reports, a regional strategy conference will be organized to assemble about 25-30 representatives from four countries. The objective is to explore possibilities of a regional-level alliance.
Completion and Distribution of Country Reports (March 2008)
Third-Party Evaluation (April-November 2007) Evaluator(s) will be selected who will develop specifications that contain objectives, content as well as indices for evaluation. A third-party assessment will be subsequently implemented according to the specifications.

(A one-year project)