This year, for the second time, I took part with great interest in the competition panel that selects applications for government NGO grants for the State Club foundation. The foundation received a total of just under 800 applications from all the federal districts of our huge country. Virtually every region was represented, with just a few exceptions. I was pleased to see a full 16 applications from the Republic of Tatarstan, 2 of which were given grants by the State Club.

The experience of taking part in the State Club competition panel is exceptionally important for me for many reasons. First, it’s an opportunity to keep up with developments in the nonprofit sector – civil society, with the initiatives they are putting forward and the responsibilities they are willing to take on. Second, as you probably know, the competition is about identifying projects in support of youth initiatives and projects, so that makes it doubly interesting for me as the Deputy Chairman of the State Duma’s Youth Affairs Committee.

I sat down to read the applications with such enthusiasm, and yet I’m now writing this post with such disappointment. It seems to me that the main problem is that our society is not trying (I don’t know whether it’s a case of “can’t” or “won’t”) to think about systemic solutions to youth problems, about systematic ways of developing young people in our country, but instead concentrating on purely one-off projects that don’t address the profound issues facing young people. I would describe all this in a single word as superficiality, multiplied by short-termism. On realizing that money is being handed out for youth projects many organizations have decided to get into youth projects, despite having no experience or competence in this area. And in addition to that, most NGOs can’t even fill out an application properly or put together a budget for their project and explain how they intend to implement what they are proposing.

Last year’s problem of inflated budgets still persists: many of the projects have unbelievable budgets with little justification for the expenditure. And often the lion’s share of the money is spent on funding the organization’s own needs: buying computers, printers, video cameras, office supplies and so on, and also on buying equipment for a one-off campaign, a single event.

Another observation is that the projects sent in tend to be very polarized: they’re either about supporting talented young people and identifying leaders, or else supporting and socializing difficult youngsters. These are very important subjects, of course, and there are some good projects in these areas, I’m pleased to say. But by no means all our young people fall into one of those two categories. So what we need are projects and initiatives for developing the rest of our young people, and we should be doing all we can to get these people and youth organizations involved in our competition.

I’ve studied quite a few projects over these two years, and I think it would be sensible to make some changes to the competition application form. So I’ve sent my suggestions to the organizing committee and hope they’ll agree with them.

Some of the projects were excellent, of course, but they were few and far between. I would really like to see Russian youth wake up and come alive, because we have so many talented and creative people! Guys, the government is ready to fund your projects. All you need to do is get together, think up a topical and interesting project and fill out a proper application form. Don’t just wait for somebody to do it for you!

In mid-September, I was involved in the allocation of government grants for nonprofit organizations as a member of Competition Commission of the “State Club” Leaders of the Future Foundation. The Foundation’s main aim is to promote the development of education and research projects in Russia’s universities and colleges. But it also takes part in the government’s programme of support for civil society as one of the grant operators (distributes government grants to nonprofit organizations).

Altogether there are five grant operators:

• the National Charity Foundation
• the Institute of Problems of Civil Society
• the Institute of Public Planning
• the human rights organization “Soprotivlenie”
• the “State Club” fund for future leaders development.

Each operator has its own specialization. The State Club supports projects in the field of youth initiatives and movements.

I was invited to join the Competition Commission as someone who is closely involved with youth issues and as a member of the State Duma’s Youth Affairs Committee. I’m also interested in the development of civil society and run my own nonprofit organization - a charity foundation. Last year I took part in an international conference on NGO legislation and also drafted some proposals of my own for the Law on Nonprofit Organizations. So I agreed to join the State Club Competition Commission, but it was a matter of principle for me that I don’t just sit on the Commission, but actually take part in selecting the projects, point out the problem areas and ask questions – and perhaps not always easy ones.

This year, the State Club received around 1,000 applications. I managed to study the major portion of them, though there was very little time to do this - just 2-3 weeks. It’s a good thing I was on leave and was able to devote some time to it. But I have to say that it wasn’t an easy job. Many of the applications contained good ideas, but were seriously flawed. It was often unclear, for example, how the applicants intended to put their ideas in practice, or there was no detailed plan of action, or the projects included crazy expenditure on staff or office equipment, and so on and so forth. In the end, I recommended that funding should be given to just 20 projects, which was a sad result.

I was really surprised by how superficial some of the organizations’ applications were. There were some cases where the NGOs had been set up at short notice, just a couple of days before submitting their application - and they actually thought they could get away with that! And as I mentioned earlier, some of the projects were worth considering, but they hadn’t thought properly about how to implement them. For example, there was one project that was supposed to involve several regions, but had just two (!) people running it and no accountant (!!!).

I don’t mean to say that the NGOs should work for nothing, but by definition a nonprofit organization cannot be a source of massive profits. The salary part of the project cannot be several times (and I’m not exaggerating - several times!) bigger than the cost of the project itself. If any organization thinks otherwise, well that’s up to them, but perhaps they should start thinking about changing their legal status.

I spoke in detail about all these things at a press conference in the “Izvestiya” media centre, where representatives of the grant operators announced the results of the grants competition.

Some NGO representatives even took offence at what I said, but they shouldn’t have! Let me just say to the NGOs that yes, of course, we have some very efficient organizations that have been operating successfully for a long time. But unfortunately, we also have experience of a different kind: there are organizations (and they’re in the majority) that serve their own interests rather than society’s. And this is a dangerous trend…

It’s time to stop complaining about the absence of civil society; you have to solve this problem by starting with yourself. And there’s absolutely no need to tackle global issues: a small project with a clearly defined aim can produce much better results.

This year the government provided substantial funds to support NGOs involved in developing the institutions of a civil society. By decision of the Russian President, the grant pool was set at 1 bn roubles! And I’d really urge young people to think about this: perhaps you could solve some of your problems yourselves, rather than waiting for somebody else to do it for you. Don’t be afraid to fill in an application form; don’t be afraid to take part in the competitions! If you come up with something of value to society and take a responsible approach to it, you’ll definitely get support.

In late April I was invited to take part in an international conference to discuss the development of the nonprofit sector in Russia, with a particular focus on NGO law. It was the first time in Russia that such prominent experts on NGO law had got together – including Ella Panfilova, Boris Shpigel, Jean-Marie Heydt, Annelise Oeschger and many other no less well-known and important figures. And I found it very interesting, of course, to find out what those Russian and international experts think of the issues facing the nonprofit sector, and which issues, in their view, are the most problematic and what solutions they see for them.
I was there as a representative of the State Duma, but the conference topic interested me both as a lawmaker and as the head of a charitable foundation and the National Media Group’s public council. I found many of the speeches interesting – they discussed the interplay between civil society and government, the need to introduce a new discipline – NGO law – in higher education, and the shortcomings of the existing NGO legislation. In my speech at the opening of the conference I said that if the participants could work out some consolidated, constructive and well-argued proposals on improving the NGO legislation I would be willing to provide real help. And if necessary, I would initiate the appropriate amendments to the current laws.
I’m glad I had the opportunity to take part in that conference and am now awaiting proposals on improving the NGO legislation from experts and lawyers in the nonprofit sector.





Jean-Marie Heydt, President of the Conference of International
Non-Governmental Organisations (INGO) Council of Europe




Annelise Oeschger, Honorary President of the Conference of
International Non-Governmental Organisations (INGO) Council of Europe