Democratic Practice Grant Program

The Democratic Practice Grant Program, funded by The Rockefeller Brothers Fund, aims to enhance democracy in the U.S. and globally by fostering citizen engagement and supporting inclusive governance. It addresses critical challenges such as political polarization, voting rights, and economic disparities, promoting innovative strategies that empower marginalized voices. The program encourages systemic reform, transparency, and accountability in democratic institutions, ensuring that citizens play an active role in shaping their governance. By leveraging grassroots activism and digital tools, it seeks to revitalize democracy for all.

Note: Staff members actively identify organizations that are well-positioned to meet programmatic goals. While we remain open to unsolicited requests, applicants should be aware that the likelihood of an unsolicited request becoming a grant is low.
The Democratic Practice program seeks to strengthen the vitality of democracy in the United States and in global governance. The program’s core ideas—that for democracy to flourish and deliver on its promises, its citizens must be engaged, empowered, and assertive, and institutions of governance must be inclusive, transparent, accountable, and responsive—provide a frame for the Fund’s Democratic Practice work in the United States and on global challenges.
Democracy in the United States
Democracy in the United States is facing myriad challenges as persistent and deep divisions continue to undermine the nation’s social, economic, and political vitality. The current U.S. political system suffers from outsized influence of money in politics, extreme partisanship, retrenchment of voting rights, issues with outdated and inefficient election administration, and concentrations of power in narrow segments of society not reflective of the larger population. Alternatively, new opportunities for systemic reform are developing and gaining traction. The nation is seeing a resurgence of grassroots political activism, protest, and a democratization of both traditional and social media. Digital resources are fueling different kinds of engagement and activism that are reaching people in entirely new ways. Further, the ability to leverage creative investigative and solution-based journalism and broadly available government and election data to improve both democratic systems and grassroots civic engagement provides exciting opportunities to build a vital and inclusive 21st-century democracy.
The Fund recognizes that the gaps between rich and poor, and white and non-white, are widening, while the diversity of elected officials remains misaligned with the electorate, fundamentally undermining the quality of representative democracy. Exorbitant amounts of private money spent on political campaigns and lobbying by a very small percentage of the electorate profoundly distort the political system. Others without the financial resources to influence public policy are further marginalized, undermining the ability of voters and constituents to hold elected officials accountable and fostering public cynicism and distrust of elected officials and public institutions.
Consequently, there are fewer and fewer examples of true bipartisanship and constructive compromise in state and federal legislatures. Additionally, partisan actors, with a goal of achieving partisan supremacy rather than ensuring democratic fairness, exert disproportionate control over voting rights, poll access, and redistricting. Participation in national elections remains below that of most advanced democracies, and turnout for local elections is persistently low. Moreover, fair, efficient, and effective election administration is undermined by inaccurate voter rolls and outdated processes and technology. In addition, eligible voters have been kept from the polls by restrictive voting laws, or worse, by overt voter-suppression efforts.
Meaningful and informed public participation in all phases of democracy in the United States provides the foundation for a truly vibrant democracy. The Fund believes that innovation in traditional grassroots organizing strategies, development of opportunities for underrepresented populations in civic leadership, and effective integration of digital media and communications into civic life are promising ways to improve public participation in governance.
Goal: Advance a Vital and Inclusive Democracy in the United States
In the United States, the Fund supports innovative strategies to strengthen and broaden participation in the practices and institutions of democratic governance, foster greater transparency, accountability, and responsiveness of government institutions, and promote social, economic, and racial justice in our democratic systems.
Strategies:
Supporting innovations in systems and practices to strengthen equality of representation and disrupt corruptive influences, including money and privileged relationships.Increasing opportunities for meaningful citizen participation in democratic systems through election and voting reforms, including improvements in voting rights, election laws, redistricting processes, and election administration.Supporting movement-building strategies for systemic reform of democratic institutions to advance economic and racial justice.
The Democratic Practice–U.S. program works to enhance the quality of American democracy through support for high leverage opportunities at the federal, state, and local levels (including New York City as the Fund’s home).
Global Challenges
The dramatic increase in cross-border flows of capital, goods, and people and their values and ideas—“globalization”—is producing deep interdependencies and changes in power relations. It is a defining process of the 21st century, offering both challenges and opportunities.
Public engagement in decision making across all levels of governance must contend nowadays with powerful global actors, forces, and institutions, presenting profound challenges to democracy. Economic interests have largely overshadowed democratic practices, social equity, and environmental concerns in the evolution of global institutions. Powerful international trade and financial institutions remain opaque and exclusive, and the power and reach of multinational corporations often escape public scrutiny or effective regulation. Thus, although the impact of global forces on peoples’ lives is growing, they face enormous impediments to both defend their existing rights and engage to meet new global challenges.
At the same time, globalization has opened up new opportunities for building cross-border, citizen-based coalitions, which are finding innovative ways to frame, address, and resolve global problems. Evolving understandings of planetary limits and the drivers of climate change have given rise to citizen groups pressing for economic and environmental rights. Common experiences of inequality and the erosion of democracy have led to demands for changes in how rules of the global economy are written—and in whose interest. New technologies and ways of organizing undergird citizen networks working across languages, geographies, and cultures. These novel combinations of grassroots, professional, public, private, intergovernmental, and nongovernmental organizations are analyzing global processes, articulating alternatives, and advancing in democratic practice and accountability to address global challenges.

Eligibility

To be eligible for a grant, organizations should be tax-exempt or seeking support for a project that would qualify as educational or charitableThe Democratic Practice–U.S. program works to enhance the quality of American democracy through support for high leverage opportunities at the federal, state, and local levels (including New York City as the Fund’s home).

Ineligibility

We Do Not FundSupport to individuals for any purpose, including education, health care, travel, or attendance at conferences.Meetings, publications, or films, including documentaries, unless directly related to a Fund-supported project. (If you're interested in hosting a meeting at The Pocantico Center, you can learn more here.)Youth activities, including sports, afterschool, and exchange programs.Capital expenses, including the construction and renovation of buildings.Lobbying, as well as the planning or organizing of lobbying activities.Tickets or tables at galas and other fundraising events.