We've spent over a decade collaborating with movements, organizations, and technologists across the global south on the challenges that matter: building democratic power, responding to repression, protecting rights online, and making change feel possible.

Cross-Regional Networks & Solidarity

Building infrastructure for movements across borders to learn from each other, share tactics, and coordinate action on urgent democratic challenges.

Through ongoing peer learning networks, intensive fellowships, and creative campaigns, we connect organizers, technologists, and cultural producers working on everything from internet freedom to youth mobilization to climate justice.

What we've built:

• International solidarity programs with 900+ participants from 70+ countries

• Facilitated exchanges between movements facing similar repression across Africa, Latin America, and Asia

• Created spaces where the innovation happening in the global south becomes visible and spreads

• Developed open-source methodologies for cross-border organizing and peer learning

Current focus areas: Digital organizing, youth-led democracy models, responses to online repression, climate and democracy intersections

UPROAR: Pan-African Organizing Network

The UPROAR project (Universal Periodic Review Organizing & Advocacy Resource) explores digital rights and supports internet freedom across 34 countries in Africa, MENA, and Central Asia. The project uses the Universal Periodic Review, a mechanism of the UN Human Rights Council where member states review each other's human rights records, as a tool for advocacy and accountability.

UPROAR works with local civil society organizations to document urgent internet freedom challenges experienced by citizens, activists, and journalists, and submits this research at the UPR. The project helps these organizations develop long-term advocacy plans, engage with the UPR process strategically, and communicate their findings in visually innovative ways.

Core activities:

• Supporting local organizations to research and document digital rights violations

• Building capacity for effective UPR engagement and advocacy

• Facilitating dialogue between civil society and governments on internet freedom issues

• Developing tools and resources for UPR advocacy

• Creating connections between digital rights defenders across regions

The project has built a network of organizations across the continent capable of coordinated research, advocacy, and peer learning on internet freedom challenges.

Learn more at uproar.fyi →

The Big Hope Project

When authoritarianism rises, communities that have faced it longest have the most to teach. The Big Hope Project builds hope through international solidarity—learning from resistance movements across the global south, connecting people across borders, and creating the communities we need to sustain long-term struggle.

This isn't about passive learning or processing anxiety. It's about what active civic engagement actually requires: showing up consistently, building relationships with neighbors, developing practical skills for mutual aid and emergency response, understanding organizing tactics that work in repressive contexts, and staying connected to joy and creativity so we don't burn out. Real civic participation means more than voting or signing petitions—it's the daily work of building the communities and networks that make democracy possible even when institutions fail.

Through five year-long learning communities, we bring people together to learn from global resistance movements, build mutual aid and emergency preparedness networks, explore joy and creativity as forms of resistance, develop strategies for raising resilient children, and support each other through career transitions. Some groups meet in person in Washington DC, others are virtual and global.

Learn more about The Big Hope →

Elections Preparations & Internet Shutdown Response

Multi-year program developing community capacity to prepare for, respond to, and resist digital repression during elections and political crises across Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

We work with civil society organizations to build readiness for the full spectrum of threats movements face during high-risk political moments: internet shutdowns, coordinated disinformation campaigns, targeted arrests of organizers, restrictions on civic space, and surveillance of activists. Our approach combines threat assessment, strategic planning, technical skill-building, and coordination mechanisms so that organizations can respond quickly and effectively when crises hit.

We design community-led research and strategic planning in countries facing these threats to assess risks, build response capacity, and develop locally-driven action plans. This includes creating networks capable of monitoring shutdowns and censorship, using circumvention tools, coordinating rapid response across organizations, maintaining communication when infrastructure is restricted, and pivoting advocacy strategies during crises. Our approach combines needs assessments providing baseline data on community readiness, collaborative development of strategic action plans, and training networks of responders who can act quickly when threats emerge.

Our approaches to elections preparation and crisis response:

• Community needs assessments and risk analysis for countries facing digital repression threats

• Strategic action planning developed collaboratively with local organizations preparing for elections or political transitions

• Crisis response training on network measurement, circumvention tools, secure communications, and coordination strategies during shutdowns

• Cross-regional learning programs connecting organizations that have navigated similar crises

• Curriculum and mentorship programs providing ongoing support for implementation

• Documentation of best practices and rapid response playbooks for adaptation in other contexts

We've worked with civil society in Senegal, Tanzania, Zambia, India, and Bangladesh, and developed curriculum and mentorship programs reaching 700+ participants globally. Through the Internet Shutdown Academy & Fellowship, fellows engaged in a 8-week course, engaged with regular mentorship meetings from experts, and applied to receive funding to implement projects. These projects ranged from building technical monitoring infrastructure to training journalists to coordinating rapid response. The open-source training modules we created are now used by hundreds of organizations worldwide, covering technical monitoring, circumvention tool use, coordination strategies, and advocacy approaches.

Explore the Internet Shutdown Academy curriculum →

Check out our course, Developing An Action Plan for Internet Shutdowns →

Democracy + Culture: Creative Campaigns

We pair cultural producers with human rights defenders, technologists, and lawyers to make democracy movements compelling and accessible to broader publics.

The Internet I Carry Installation (Namibia)

Storytelling confessional, art exhibition and spoken word performances exploring our collective experience of how the internet enables or disables community building, civic engagement, and empowerment. Highlighting the outcomes from the UPRoar project. Featured art created by Namibian and Zimbabwean artists.

Cultura Contra Censura (Costa Rica)

Gallery exhibition at RightsCon 2023 featuring commissioned work from artists collaborating with civil society from countries facing internet shutdowns. Paintings, music videos, performances, sculptures, and illustrations translated research findings into culturally resonant art.

Displayed both at the conference venue and in community spaces in San Jose, reaching conference attendees and local publics. Artists and civil society partners promoted the work through street performances, social media, and integration into digital security trainings.

Hip Hop & Resistance

Collaboration with Tanzanian and Senegalese musicians to create work about censorship, digital security, and civic space restrictions that reached youth audiences through music and social media campaigns.

Senegal Street Theater

Partnership with theater collective performing in multiple districts of Dakar during election period, dramatizing internet shutdown risks and demonstrating how communities can stay connected and safe when authorities restrict access. Performances reached thousands of people in public spaces, driving them to resources and trainings.

Bangladesh Guerrilla Campaigns

Creative public interventions making internet shutdown threats visible through unexpected formats and locations. Campaigns used guerrilla marketing tactics to drive people to information about circumvention, digital security, and organizing during restrictions.

Privacy, Surveillance, Data Protection, & Emerging Technologies

ADAPT (Accountability in Data Protection & Privacy Technologies) Cross-regional program connecting activists, researchers, and policymakers in Latin America and Africa working on data protection, privacy rights, and AI governance. Facilitated knowledge exchange between movements pushing for stronger regulations, supported grassroots campaigns on surveillance and data rights, and documented what effective advocacy looks like in contexts where tech companies operate with minimal oversight. The program brought together legal experts, technologists, community organizers, and policymakers to share strategies, develop campaigns, and coordinate on regional advocacy.

We've also consulted with organizations and funders on emerging challenges around AI deployment in the global south, examining questions of algorithmic accountability, data governance frameworks, and the implications of AI systems developed without input from the communities most affected by them. This work focuses on ensuring AI policy conversations center voices and contexts from regions where regulatory frameworks are still developing.

Targeted Surveillance Research & Coordination Conducted comprehensive needs assessment and strategic planning with organizations across Latin America, Asia, and the Middle East working to detect and respond to targeted digital surveillance and spyware. Research examined civil society's capacities for forensic investigation, strategic litigation, journalist engagement, and advocacy against the unregulated spyware industry. Facilitated collaboration between technical forensic organizations, advocacy groups, legal experts, and media support organizations to build more effective responses to surveillance threats.

Developed training and resources for organizations working on detection methodologies, freedom of information requests, open source intelligence tools, and risk mitigation strategies. Convened advocacy workshop in Bogota, Colombia bringing together organizations to share best practices on working with journalists, pursuing legal strategies, engaging with multinational technology companies, and developing narratives that counter national security justifications for surveillance. The work emphasized building capacity for organizations in high-risk contexts to conduct this sensitive work safely while supporting victims of targeting.