Eurasia Partnership Foundation (EPF) hereby presents its program implementation and general operating plans in Armenia for 2020 - 2023. EPF’s programs seek to promote democracy, development and freedoms in Armenia and in the region by supporting local civil society. EPF’s mission is focused on enabling civil society actors to effect change and to effectively participate in governance of their communities and of the state.
EPF is the legacy institution of Eurasia Foundation (EF) in the South Caucasus. EF was created in 1992 with support from the U.S. government to provide funding for development at the grassroots level in the countries of the former Soviet Union, and is a recognized leader in the field of grants and program administration for civil society. Established in 2007, EPF Armenia is an independent Foundation, registered in Armenia, with close network ties and elements of joint policies, values, Board members and programming with its counterparts: Europe Foundation in Tbilisi, as well as EPF Azerbaijan. EPF is a member of EF network which covers all the states of Eastern Partnership, as well as Central Asia.
Our programs in 2020-2023 seek to continue the work of previous years and to address new issues in advancing the reform agenda in Armenia towards empowering people and communities for positive transformation; promoting civil society and civic participation; community empowerment and democracy; gender and minority rights; youth leadership; freedom of expression, media literacy and critical thinking; transparency; as well as cross-border ties and dialogue between the conflicting societies in the neighborhood.
As three of the USAID-supported 5-year-long projects that EPF is engaged in come to an end in 2019, EPF seeks support or partial support for the implementation of this strategy. EPF’s support plans include continued cooperation with EU, particularly for its cross-border agenda; work with UK; USAID; the Netherlands; SIDA and others as current or prospective donors.
The strategy is presented in the form of chapters which reflect EPF’s programmatic directions and demonstrate, in general lines, what has been done and what are the 2020-2023 plans.
Some of EPF’s impact of previous years is demonstrated within the chapters, related to each programmatic direction; in general, the impact can be characterized as building civic space via addressing specific issues which either are not being addressed sufficiently (such as religious tolerance or addressing the culture of violence) or in which EPF is a recognized leader (such as consortia set up and CSO development; or conflict transformation work).
In addition to having very clear niches in the various areas of Armenia’s development paradigm, EPF’s specific methodologies are reflected in the below chapters, in explanations on the way it works. Many types of work that EPF does are also done by other agencies, local and international. However, EPF’s approach is usually different than that of other agencies. EPF is a local agency which is there to stay, so it can have a longer-term approach than international agents which leave the country after their project is over. Also, EPF has developed a unique culture of creative and enthusiastic work, which it transfers from its employees to partners and beneficiaries and which helps it achieving results where others may not advance sufficiently.
In brief, EPF’s methods include the following know-how:
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Specific and successful means for facilitation and alliance-building with the actors who would not otherwise cooperate.
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Focus on critical thinking.
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Working on the ‘full circle’: from policies to their implementation, from addressing the central government to empowering the grassroots; from reforming institutions and informal education to fixing the changes in attitudes and behaviors of the beneficiaries;
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Combining research and implementation (being a ‘think and do tank’).
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Promoting civil society-government dialogue.
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A focus on anti-corruption as a major value.
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Grant-making as a tool of empowerment and partnership.
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Treating civil society in an enlarged sense, including CSOs and the movements; the media; the academia; socially conscious businesses and social enterprises; the minority groups; etc.
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Engaging beneficiaries for a long term, and building their institutional as well as issue-based project implementation capacities.
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Cross-fertilization of the partners’ and beneficiaries’ capacities via building networks among those who would not otherwise meet.
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Fostering innovation and creativity.
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Teaching via practice: EPF’s tenet is that best professionals in their fields should learn being teachers and trainers as well, and EPF’s training programs and Schools are based on imparting a tightly interwoven mix of knowledge and practical skills.
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Institutional development (management, including financial, governance, administration, including reporting, internal communication and talent management) is fun and creative, rather than a tedious work, and is intimately related to the projects’ having effective and lasting results.
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EPF partners, grantees and beneficiaries should not only implement projects but also develop institutionally.
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Making human rights, gender and minority issues, and international development values in general a core of its operation.
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Cross-fertilization of programmatic directions to increase impact, such as human rights based approach to development; the human rights and conflict transformation nexus; engagement of partner local civil society into the cross-border work; local governance participation and media literacy education for the regional youth; etc.
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The culture of gender equality is mainstreamed throughout all programming of EPF, as well as in some cases and projects is being addressed directly (e.g. rights of minority children, etc.).
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Apply your preaching to yourself: avoid stereotypes in anything; think creatively; introduce innovations in your daily work; pay equal attention to the process and the results; aim at long-term impact; fish out the externalities and unexpected results; capitalize on positive results; rely on partnerships, networks and collaborations for a multiplier effect and to achieve results similar to the economies of scale; reflect, monitor and evaluate; change as needed.
