Authored by ICNL consultant Kirana Anjani, this briefer dives deep into the challenges faced by civil society in Southeast Asia as a result of authoritarian COVID-19 policies adopted by many governments in the region, to the detriment of civic space and effective COVID-19 response. Drawing from data in the ICNL-ECNL Covid-19 Civic Freedoms Tracker, the briefer examines examples of rampant digital surveillance by governments, lack of transparency and access with respect to critical public health information, and attacks on both community COVID-19 initiatives and medical frontline workers.

This working paper, by Ingrid Srinath, the Director of the Centre for Social Impact and Philanthropy at Ashoka University, examines the origins and growing strength of forces ranged against civil society in India, and points toward the actions necessary to confront them – including reforming regulatory frameworks, anachronistic laws, and improving participatory governance.

On April 5, 2022, the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary’s subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties held a hearing on enhancing the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938. ICNL Senior Legal Advisor Nick Robinson testified, highlighting these issues and outlining recommendations.

Throughout the COVID pandemic, India’s nonprofit sector filled crucial gaps by providing essential social services and humanitarian relief. And yet, the sector has been targeted by the government with onerous requirements at every turn, greatly hampering their work.

To empower parliamentarians (MPs) to advocate for internet freedoms, APHR & ICNL presents this Toolkit for Parliamentarians: Promoting Internet Freedoms in Southeast Asia.

This guide, created by ECNL, explores the key standards that protect climate activists’ civic freedoms.  It maps out the standards that protect their rights to association, peaceful assembly, expression, and participation; the types of restrictions that impact environmental defenders; and the mechanisms that can enforce their rights and freedoms.

On January 4, 2022, the Thai Cabinet approved a revised draft non-profit organization (NPO) bill drafted by the Office of the Council of State, which replaced a prior version of the Bill approved by the Cabinet in February 2021. Here are four things you need to know about the revised law.

These comments, written by ICNL’s U.S. Program team, are in response to the Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) from the Justice Department’s National Security Division to solicit suggestions for potential amendments to implementing regulations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA).

Armed individuals intimidate and discourage people from exercising their rights to speech and assembly, and they have interfered with basic democratic processes like voting and lawmaking. They also pose a very real threat to public safety. This briefer discusses reasonable and constitutionally-sound regulatory options at the federal, state, and local level to keep guns away from protests.

Bantay Kita, an organization in the Philippines, has been a leader in developing inputs on civic space for submission as part of EITI validation. In this report, provided to the EITI Secretariat during the Philippines’ 2020 validation, Bantay Kita draws on EITI guidance and extensive field research to describe how restrictions on civic freedoms have undermined civil society engagement in the EITI process.