Tides Center

The Open Contracting Partnership engages governments and nongovernmental groups to establish and implement new global standards for transparency and broad participation in public contracting. The new standards will require that governments and companies disclose more contracts, that the information in the contracts is easily accessible and presented in user-friendly formats, and that citizens have opportunities to monitor contract award and execution processes. In addition to encouraging others to create and adopt these new norms, with this grant the Partnership would support country-level application of the principles and would facilitate learning among countries to ensure greater effectiveness in the use of public resources.

A grant to Tides for the ReThink Media project would bolster ReThink’s ability to provide media consulting, training, and assistance to organizations working on U.S. nuclear policy. We recognize the critical importance of sophisticated media strategy in meaningfully reaching policymakers, reporters, and the public and ReThink’s expertise in national security policy makes it the only such organization working with grantees to develop such a strategy.

The U.S. foreign policy community includes a variety of actors: policymakers navigating a complex, interconnected foreign policy landscape; NGOs competing for the policymakers’ time and attention; and foundations supporting projects to advance their vision of a better world. Since 2003, the Hewlett Foundation has supported the Connect U.S. Fund, a project of the Tides Foundation that builds relationships among these diverse players. The Fund has become increasingly recognized as a key convener and driver of high-level policy advocacy in five important issue areas: nonproliferation, climate change, reform of international financial institutions, support for U.S. civilian agencies engaged in development, and human rights. Not only do NGOs turn to the Fund for assistance, but policymakers ask it to facilitate conversations with NGOs on major policy issues. The Fund is among the few organizations that can respond to requests for rapid funding and therefore react nimbly to unforeseen events, thus multiplying its impact. In addition, the Fund provides grants to organizations that facilitate collaboration across issue areas. This renewal grant is a collaboration between the Global Development and Special Projects programs, in recognition of the fact that the Fund has broadened its issue areas far beyond those solely of interest to Global Development.