Supporting social justice organisations in the face of far-right threats

The past year has seen a deeply troubling surge in organised racist violence and political attacks on civic space. Physical assaults and online hate against refugees and people seeking asylum, and the organisations which support them, are now the reality for our grant partners at LEF and Justice Together. Far-right rhetoric continues to shape political debate, aiming to intimidate and discredit the sector and silence expressions of solidarity.

Although our partners are used to working in a difficult and politicised context, the scale and intensity of this aggression is unprecedented. Grant partners have experienced threats to life, harassment, and their offices vandalised and windows smashed. Staff and volunteers from one organisation were racially abused as they covered up a St George’s flag that had been painted onto their building. Others have been targeted by far-right media or faced malicious defamatory claims against them. These incidents demand a new way of responding from funders, giving organisations the responsive and proactive support they need to continue to advance their missions in this environment.

When racist violence flared up in summer 2024, our starting point was to remind our grant partners that our funding can be spent flexibly. We also relaxed monitoring requirements and amended deadlines so partners could focus on immediate crisis response. 

The bigger challenge came when grant partners asked us about additional support for security and staff wellbeing. We did not have a budget for this and issuing emergency funding fell outside of our funding rounds, but the need was urgent. Prioritising resources from our grants budget, working with our board and making use of delegated authority to release funds speedily without additional hurdles for our grant partners made it possible. We’ve learned that we need to budget for this support, so we now have a flexible crisis and contingency budget for grant partners.

Thanks to the leadership of Civic Power Fund, we were able to pay into a pooled emergency fund which provided organisations with small amounts for immediate emergency relief. We also provided direct uplifts to grant partners for security and wellbeing, reaching over 40 organisations via these two routes.

As the headlines faded, our partners continued to face violence, online hate and threats of renewed action. In this context, organisations focus on keeping staff and communities safe; they cannot and should not also have to prioritise updating funders in real time. Site visits and longer catch-up calls taught us that when grant partners go quiet it can be a sign that we, as a funder, should provide space for them to discuss their experiences and make support easily accessible. 
 
We’re also building our support beyond grant making – without duplicating other funders’ efforts – and want to contribute to work led by the sector. Using their resources and capacity to commission expert advice on sector-wide issues is one of the valuable contributions funders can make.

Considering the present nature of threats against individuals and organisations in the sector, we are prioritising:

• Wellbeing support – tailored psychological support via grant uplifts and commissioned work
• Physical and online security – expert advice and grant uplifts
• Communications – specialist training and one-to-one sessions
• Legal advice on charity law – guidance and one-to-one consultations
• Context insights and analysis – briefings and training sessions

Over the last year, we’ve come to understand that this kind of tailored approach by individual funders is useful, but cannot replace long-term, collective and larger-scale interventions to match the scale of the challenges organisations are grappling with. We want to see more investment in work to strengthen community-led capacity to counter hate and defend rights. Underpinning this is the need for people who are directly impacted by issues to have influence and authority in these efforts. We believe, as ever, that funder collaboration matters and are grateful to peer funders who have already reached out to ensure that our support complements and strengthens theirs.

We’ve identified some key questions during this process that other funders may find useful to consider when thinking about how to provide meaningful support and express solidarity:

• Are our processes flexible enough to support the sector when it really matters?
• How do we share and amplify the evidence partners are providing?
• How do we invest in sector resilience infrastructure, as well as supporting our individual grant partners?
• How do we fulfil our duty of care towards our own staff, whilst also recognising our institutional privilege and not shying away from showing solidarity?

We welcome input from funders and the wider social justice sector on how best to answer these questions.

The courage and commitment of our grant partners in the face of repeated attacks and threats from the far right is inspiring. We continue to build on our efforts to support them, and want to work alongside others in the sector to extend support to all organisations facing the same challenges.