FACT SHEET: GLOBAL FUND FOR COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT AND RESILIENCE

FROM:  U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT
Co-Chairs' Fact Sheet: Creating a Global Fund for Community Engagement and Resilience
Fact Sheet
Bureau of Public Affairs, Office of the Spokesperson
Washington, DC
February 21, 2014

Creating a Global Community Engagement and Resilience Fund:

On September 27, 2013, at the Ministerial Plenary meeting of the Global Counterterrorism Forum in New York, the intent to establish a Global Community Engagement and Resilience Fund (GCERF) was announced. GCERF will be the first global effort to harness the skills, capabilities and resources of both the public and private sectors to support local, community-based projects on education, vocational training, civic engagement, media, and women’s advocacy aimed at strengthening resilience against violent extremist agendas, which can create significant barriers to political and economic development. It is anticipated that GCERF will raise more than $200 million over the next ten years for this purpose.

THE CHALLENGE: Terrorism is Global but Starts Local

Terrorism is a transnational and global problem frequently driven by local forces. While military, intelligence and law enforcement operations can help address the threat that terrorists pose, to succeed in the long-term, we must reduce their ability to recruit at the community level by addressing local drivers of radicalization to violence.

THE GAP: Lack of Funding Opportunities for Local Organizations

Many local organizations with innovative project ideas have been unable to get off the ground because of the difficulty of attracting the necessary seed funding. Even where they have grown and had impact, they have faced challenges in securing sufficient funding to sustain their work beyond a single six-month or one-year project cycle. Local entities also often have difficulty navigating the application processes that foundations and large donors have in place. Many donors also prefer recipients from larger organizations, often international NGOs, with proven track records, and lack the broad networks and contacts to find trusted community-based partners in priority locations. As a result, small local organizations, which could have the greatest impact at the community level, struggle to find funding.

THE SOLUTION: A Global Partnership to Bolster Community-Based Efforts

GCERF will be a public-private global partnership offering a unique and practical model to enable the international community to bolster grass-roots efforts where radicalization and recruitment are occurring. It will be an independent institution governed by a mix of government and non-government stakeholders that will fund locally driven projects and thus help close the gap between the needs of local organizations (whether civil society, NGO or local government) and the resources available to support their work. GCERF will include a robust vetting process and monitoring and evaluation mechanism, providing donors with confidence that the projects supported advance the goals that led them to contribute to this fund.

Why is GCERF Different?

What distinguishes GCERF’s objectives from broader development efforts is its emphasis on youth engagement, education, vocational training, and women’s advocacy to promote resilience among at-risk populations. Such initiatives can contribute to economic growth and development in countries where international businesses are active, and provide opportunities to those susceptible to violent extremists’ messages.

Where does the Private Sector Fit In?

Terrorism, and the violent extremism that underpins it, not only destroys innocent lives around the world, it also affects businesses globally. Terrorism disrupts the markets where businesses work, the supply chains that businesses depend on, and the communities that comprise the local labor market. GCERF represents an opportunity for both private sector and government entities to jointly advance the political and economic stability of many of these local, at-risk communities by promoting resilience through positive programs that provide an alternative to violent extremism. GCERF also offers an opportunity to encourage social entrepreneurship and other innovative approaches to local investment.

GCERF Framework

Partners involved in developing GCERF will continue to refine the following principles, scope, and approach over the next several months until GCERF is operational in mid-2014.

• Principles: GCERF would be guided by a series of principles and activities which might include:

Serving as mechanism to raise, disburse, and monitor funds for valuable CVE projects
Ensuring that projects have the requisite political support from national governments as well as contribute to the implementation of the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy
Evaluating proposals through an independent and transparent review process
Complementing and advancing ongoing national, regional, and international efforts
Performing evaluations of projects to ensure funds are being spent effectively and wisely
Encouraging social entrepreneurship and other innovative approaches to investment in grassroots programming
Operating with transparency and accountability
Emphasizing country-led, bottom-up approaches to programming and activities
Supporting projects – particularly at the sub-national level – that offer positive alternative to violent extremism
• Scope: Support from GCERF would complement ongoing efforts of governments and community-based organizations to address violent extremism and build resilience to violent extremist agendas. GCERF will emphasize multi-sectoral participation and results-driven approach to develop solutions to the local drivers of radicalization and recruitment to terrorism. It will allow non-government and municipal government organizations to apply for grants in a range of areas depending upon local requirements/needs. These might include:

Providing life-skills, vocational training, and other alternatives to youth at risk of recruitment and radicalization to extremist violence
Supporting victims and survivors of terrorism, highlighting terrorism’s impact on families, communities, and countries
Providing platforms for community leaders and activities to promote and provide positive alternatives to violent extremism.
Designing education campaigns around messages of pluralism, diversity, and tolerance
Designing and implementing mentorship programs and exchange programs for at-risk youth

• Approach: GCERF will be established as a non-profit foundation in Geneva, Swtizerland. It would be composed of a Secretariat with oversight from a multi-stakeholder governing board that includes a geographically diverse group with representatives of governments, the private sector, foundations, and non-government organizations. The GCERF will engage locally through Country Committee Mechanisms composed of public and private representatives, to help better direct funds to local priorities coordinate transparent proposal reviews.

Support for the GCERF

Meetings on GCERF’s mandate, structure, and legal foundation took place in Lucerne and Geneva, Switzerland in late 2013 and culminated with a final Steering Group meeting in Washington, DC, on February 20, 2014. Carol Bellamy, former UNICEF Executive Director and former Chair of the Global Education Partnership, facilitated the process. In this final meeting, over 35 governments, the United Nations, the World Bank, NGOs, the private sector, and foundation representatives reviewed and refined the mandate and organizational architecture of the GCERF which will be established in Geneva, Switzerland by mid-2014.

Several countries already pledged financial contributions, and a number of others have expressed strong support with contributions expected to follow. Several recipient countries have also indicated an interest in serving as GCERF “pilot” countries whereby local organizations in their countries would benefit from GCERF grants. In addition, several multinational companies and foundations have shown strong interest in contributing expertise and resources to the GCERF.

COMMANDER OF U.S. PACIFIC COMMAND SAYS U.S. AND CHINA CONFLICT IS NOT INEVITABLE

FROM: U.S. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
Pacific Commander: U.S., China Can Build on Common Ground
By Donna Miles
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, May 22, 2013 - The United States and China, by increasing their dialogue and engagement, can build a foundation of trust while fostering regional security and prosperity, the top U.S. commander in the region said yesterday.

"While competition between the United States and China is inevitable, conflict is not," Navy Adm. Samuel J. Locklear III, commander of U.S. Pacific Command, told members of the National Committee for U.S. China Relations in New York.

"This means identifying strategic areas where our two countries can cooperate, while recognizing frankly and openly the areas where we will continue to differ, and to manage those," he said. "Our approach is to manage the friction and disruptive competition and increase areas of congruence and cooperation between our two nations."

Locklear encouraged the China experts to envision a future in which "the U.S. and China collaborate to build upon an existing Indo-Asia-Pacific community of peace and prosperity."

Reaching that goal, he said, requires recognizing, understanding and managing areas of divergence that could disrupt the security environment. These range from China's concerns that the U.S. strategic pivot to the Asia-Pacific region is designed to contain China's rise to differences in how the two countries view the maritime global commons and the lack of common ground on behavior in cyberspace.

Locklear emphasized that the rebalance is a whole-of-government strategy, recognizing that "the United States' success in the 21st century will, to a large extent, depend on what happens in this critically important region of the world."

Based on a strategy of collaboration and cooperation, the rebalance acknowledges the reality that the United States' future is "inextricably linked" to Asia's, he said. And one of the fundamental goals in implementing it is to build a "stable, productive and constructive relationship with China," he added.

Despite many areas of divergence between the two countries, Locklear said, he believes they're outweighed by areas where the United States and China share common interests.

"First, it is my belief that neither of our two nations desire conflict, especially armed conflict," he said.

But both countries must also recognize the major roles they both play in the region, he said. "The Pacific is big enough for all of us," Locklear told the group, borrowing a quote from both former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the United States' and China's economic relationship -- one that Locklear said draws them together and positively affects the entire region.

The admiral noted other promising developments that are solidifying this foundation: China's growing participation in the international community, its commitment to a denuclearized Korean Peninsula and its efforts to address HIV/AIDS and pandemic diseases, among them.

Meanwhile, China is demonstrating "a real appetite to deepen the military-to-military dialogue and build on those areas on which we converge," Locklear said. The goal, he said, is to continually improve the channels of communication and to demonstrate practical cooperation on issues that matter to both sides.

Gen. Fang Fenghu, China's top military officer, identified counterterrorism, antipiracy, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, logistics and military medicine as potential areas of cooperation during a visit to Beijing by Army Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Looking to the future, Locklear said, it's vital that both China and the United States recognize their responsibilities as regional and global leaders.

"We must move beyond our individual differences to bring consensus to issues that threaten regional stability and future prosperity," he said. That includes partnering with other nations to address regional security challenges such as piracy, terrorism, proliferation and pandemic disease.

Secondly, he said, the two countries must work together and with the international community to ensure access to the shared domains through universally accepted standards. This extends from the maritime domain -- and territorial disputes in the South China and East China Seas -- to the cyber and space domains, where they can play a role in helping to establish worldwide standards and practices, he said.

Also key, Locklear said, is China's increasing participation in regional military-to-military engagements. He cited progress in the Military Maritime Consultative Meeting and other forums, and China's agreement to take part in the next Rim of the Pacific international maritime exercise.

These engagements help to build trust and mutual understanding and, ultimately, reduce the likelihood of miscommunication and miscalculation that could derail forward progress, Locklear said.

"I believe the best hope for sustained bilateral cooperation will come from strategically identifying those areas where our interests overlap and building, over time, greater understanding and trust between our two armed forces," the admiral said.