IMP Matrix Rating: C6
What: The Guerrilla Foundation provides grants to underfunded activists and grassroots activist groups in Europe. It does not have an explicit thematic focus, but concentrates its grant-making on actions that have the potential for system change, are highly catalytic and creative, and ideally incorporate elements of participation in the allocation of resources. Most grants since its founding have focused on the fossil free movement, action against climate change, social justice on areas such as LGBTQI+ and gender discrimination, combating gentrification, animal welfare and sustainable food production, protecting human rights and in particular the right to assembly and protest, and ending the production of weapons of mass destruction.
Who: The most vulnerable people in Europe, whether because of their socio-economic status, sexual identity, or exploitation from companies, or the degradation of the environment. The environment is also a key beneficiary.
How Much Impact: The potential for systemic change created by protests and social movements is extremely hard to measure. Most often, this can be done only by storytelling and mapping out a plausible path of cause/effect following Guerrilla sponsored-projects. For example, when Guerrilla helped to seed Extinction Rebellion, little did it know that it would turn into a massive transnational movement leading the UK and other governments to declare an official climate emergency and set emissions reductions targets.
Our Contribution: Paolo was on the board of the Foundation for two years in 2018-2020. Since 2022 he is part of the Funders Circle of the Foundation, which is engaged in a pioneering effort to have funders be exclusively providers of capital, with all decision-making power with respect to grants transferred to a council of activists with more direct lived experience of the issues the Foundation is trying to tackle.
Impact Risk: Risks to impact include most often the unpredictability of grassroots organizing, where poor planning or lack of leadership can result in actions not achieving their fullest impact potential. That is why Guerrilla places as much importance on funding direct actions as it does on supporting the “backbone”, i.e. movement-building and activist formation themselves.
Sample Investment: Extinction Rebellion, a decentralised, international and politically non-partisan movement using non-violent direct action and civil disobedience to persuade governments to act justly on the Climate and Ecological Emergency. Guerrilla was among the very first seed funders back in 2018.