OVERVIEW: Sigrid Rausing Trust prioritizes human rights in all aspects of its grantmaking, and within the human rights space, the scope of its funding interests is expansive and encompasses support for LGBTQ rights, women and girls, immigrants and refugees, environmental conservation, and the arts.
IP TAKE: This funder gives to smaller, newer organizations, and will consider multi-year funding if first-year grants are successful. It works to develop long-term relationships with its grantees, and supports work in countries known for egregious rights violations. This funder is primarily interested in supporting operating costs rather than funding specific projects. Grants are highly competitive.
While the trust is not particularly accessible, it does invite potential grantees to reach out to research@srtrust.org to introduce themselves and describe their organization. According to SRT, program officers review these regularly and will contact groups that pique their interest. It’s responsive and approachable, so don’t hesitate to reach out once you have a polished, thoughtful description of your work.
PROFILE: Billionaire Sigrid Rausing established the Sigrid Rausing Trust (SRT) in 1995 to support and advance human rights work around the world. Based in the United Kingdom, the trust awards grants to rights organizations all over the globe, including the United States. The trust supports several grantmaking programs including Strengthening the Human Rights Field, Detention, Torture and the Death Penalty, Defending Civic Space, Transitional Justice, Women's Rights, LGBTI Rights, Xenophobia and Intolerance, Transparency and Accountability, Arts, Conservation, Miscellaneous Fund, Trustees' Small Grants, and Gifts.
Grants for Security and Human Rights
All of SRT’s Grantmaking Programs support global human rights in some form. However, some are more specialized and targeted than others.
SRT’s Strengthening the Human Rights Field program makes grants to organizations “that collaborate widely, take innovative approaches to human rights work, and bring renewal to the field.“ It also supports “regional and global groups that aim to build the capacity, technical expertise and sustainability of national” organizations.
The Detention, Torture and the Death Penalty program works with groups that focus on detention, torture, and the death penalty. Its grantees seek to call attention to human rights violations around the world, and advocate for victims of torture. The program also funds “legal actions to strengthen the prohibition on torture.”
The trust’s Defending Civic Space program works “to advance the freedoms of association, assembly and expression, with a particular focus on environments where public engagement in civic life is limited by state and non-state actors.” Some of the organizations that have received funding through this program focus on advocacy and litigation, or train and support at-risk journalists and human rights defenders.
The Transitional Justice program is designed to support organizations “which seek accountability and redress for violations of international human rights and humanitarian law, as well as truth and reconciliation initiatives.” The program also funds initiatives to document witness testimonies and the mechanisms for public access to these testimonies, such as exhibitions, museums and memorials.
The Transparency and Accountability program focuses on corruption in governments and the private sector. It also works “to build human rights safeguards into the public and private financing of large development and infrastructure projects, and to develop international mechanisms for corporate accountability.”
The Sigrid Rausing Trust also operates a series of smaller programs that support organizations that may fall outside its purview, including the Miscellaneous Fund, Trustees' Small Grants, and Gifts programs.
For a better idea of the types of organizations the trust supports, grantseekers should look over its searchable Grantee Database.
Grants for LGBTQ
While all of the trust’s grantmaking supports global human rights in some capacity, its LGBTI Rights program focuses on organizations that “[work] to enhance the legal standing and social acceptance of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex people.” Specific areas of funding interest include discriminatory laws, homophobia, and violence. In the United States, the trust typically awards LGBTQ related grants to larger national organizations.
Past LGBTQI grantees include the Transgender Legal Defense Project in Estonia, Aswat – Palestinian Gay Women in Israel, Campaign Against Homophobia in Poland, Transgender Equality Network Ireland in Ireland, and Pembe Hayat in Turkey.
Grants for Gender-based Violence, Women and Girls
The SR Trust’s Women’s Rights program supports organizations “working on the social and cultural oppression of women, particularly in countries characterized by serious and systematic violations of human rights.” The fund is particularly interested in funding organizations combating gender-based violence.
Past grantees in this space include Association Tunisienne des Femmes Démocrates in Tunisia, Mediterranean Women’s Fund in France, Fe-Male in Lebanon, Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa (SIHA) Network in Uganda, and Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq in Iraq.
Grants for Immigrants and Refugees
SRT’s Xenophobia and Intolerance program makes grants to support European, Middle Eastern, and sub-Saharan African organizations “defending the rights of populations who, due to their ethnic identity or their refugee status, are discriminated against, subject to hate speech and demonization or denied access to justice.”
Past grantees include International Refugee Assistance Project in the United States, Safe Passage in the United Kingdom, Migration Policy Institute Europe in Belgium, Greek Council for Refugees in Greece, and Association for Legal Studies on Immigration (ASGI) in Italy.
Grants for the Environment
The trust’s Conservation program seeks to preserve local environments and ecosystems. Specifically, SRT supports groups working “to restore and protect a range of different ecosystems, such as wetlands or grasslands, within [its] regional areas of interest.” The trust prioritizes community-led, long-term projects that have made a demonstrable impact and that acknowledge “the interdependency of people and nature, and that lead to systemic change.”
Past environmental grantees include APB-BirdLife Belarus (APB) in Belarus, Society for the Protection of Nature in Lebanon in Lebanon, Macedonian Ecological Society in North Macedonia, Estonian Fund for Nature (ELF) in Estonia, and Fundația ADEPT Transilvania in Romania.
Grants for Arts and Culture
SRT adheres to the principle that “access to culture is a basic human right and that the arts have a unique role to play in democracy and civil society.” Accordingly, its Arts program supports organizations that operate “at the intersection of arts and human rights, social justice and conservation.”
In the United States, the trust has supported The Dream Unfinished, Centre for Urban Pedagogy, Utah Dine Bikeyah, Vera List Center for Art and Politics, and La Maraña/Las Nietas de Nonó. Past international arts grantees include Fine Acts in Bulgaria, Ghana Think Tank in Ghana, 32° East – Ugandan Arts Trust in Uganda, Action For Hope in Lebanon, and Office for Postartistic Services in Poland. The trust has also helped to fund several documentaries.
Important Grant Details:
The majority of grants range between £50,000 to £250,000. Rather than funding specific projects, the fund prefers to cover operating costs. To learn more about the types of organizations the trust supports, explore its past and current grantees lists.
Sigrid Rausing does not accept unsolicited applications or proposals and instead identifies new potential grantees through networking, recommendations, and fieldwork. However, it does invite potential grantees to reach out to research@srtrust.org to introduce themselves and describe their organization. According to SRT, program officers review these regularly and will contact groups that pique their interest. Additionally, “the trust can only support activities that can be considered as charitable according to the law of England and Wales (Charities Act 2006).”
SRT is non-partisan and will not fund political organizations or groups politically affiliated.
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