The Greater Internet Freedom Project (GIF) is a three-year, consortium-based, global program operating across 40 countries. Managed by Internews and funded by the United States Agency  for International Development (USAID), GIF centers four international partners, seven regional partners and more than 40 local organizations and beneficiaries. This consortium of partners are all fighting to preserve an open, secure, accessible, reliable, and interoperable internet—and by extension, protect the human rights enabled by access to the internet. Civil society, journalists, human rights defenders, activists, LGBTQI+, vulnerable and marginalized groups rely on an open and accessible internet to fight and realize fundamental freedoms. The GIF Project plans to undertake a research study to further expand the digital rights and digital safety ecosystem.

This call for expressions of interest aims to contract a competent organization to undertake participatory research on behalf of the GIF consortium. The organization will conduct an inventory of the digital rights and digital safety ecosystem including organizations, actors, and stakeholders. Among others, the organization will help identify examples of  digital rights and safety actors, policy and advocacy programs, and lessons from successful and unsuccessful digital rights interventions, develop practitioner stories and profiles identifying career paths and skills, blog posts  of interviews and focus group discussions, publish and launch reports with recommendations, short blogs, and scholarly articles (optional). This research is intended to help Internews, the GIF consortium, USAID, and the larger Internet freedom community better leverage opportunities and address challenges. 

If your organization is interested in this opportunity, please consultant the call for expression of interest for the details, application requirements and timelines. Applications will be accepted until 5pm EST on November 12, 2021.