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Call key data
Protecting EU values and rights by combating hate speech and hate crime
Funding Program
Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values programme
Call number
CERV-2024-CHAR-LITI-SPEECH
deadlines
Opening
23.04.2024
Deadline
18.09.2024 17:00
Funding rate
90%
Call budget
€ 5,500,000.00
Estimated EU contribution per project
min. € 75,000.00
Link to the call
Link to the submission
Call content
short description
This call for proposals will promote rights and values by building primarily civil society organisations capacity and awareness on the Charter and by carrying out activities to ensure that the Charter is upheld. It focusses on protecting EU values and rights by combating hate speech and hate crime.
Call objectives
All forms and manifestations of hatred are incompatible with the EU values and the fundamental rights enshrined in Article 2 of the Treaty and the Charter. Hatred affects the individual victims and the groups they belong to, generates societal polarisation and silences wide sectors of the population, weakening pluralism and undermining respectful public democratic debates. The online world has amplified the negative effects of hate speech. Hate crimes are a direct violation of the victims’ fundamental right to dignity, to equality and non-discrimination. Combating hate speech and hate crime is therefore a key part of the Commission’s action to promote EU values and to ensure that the Charter is upheld.
At EU level, the 2008 Council Framework Decision requires the criminalisation of certain forms of hate speech and hate crimes. Also, the Commission adopted a Communication in December 2021 inviting the Council of the European Union to extend the legal basis for EU-level criminalisation to other forms of hate speech and hate crime beyond the racist and xenophobic grounds already covered by the Framework Decision.
Recently, the EU is experiencing an alarming increase in hate speech and hate crime, including physical and online attacks targeting in particular the Jewish and Muslim communities in Europe. The Joint Communication on “No Place for Hate” confirms a strong commitment to step up EU efforts to fight hatred in all its forms, by reinforcing action across a variety of policies.
As recognised by the Communication, civil society organisations play a crucial role in combating hate speech and hate crime, thereby safeguarding and promoting fundamental rights. Projects under this priority should aim to enable civil society organisations to establish mechanisms of cooperation with public authorities in particular to support the reporting and recording of episodes of hate crime and hate speech; to ensure support to victims of hate speech and hate crime; and to support law enforcement, including through training or data collection methodologies and tools. Projects should also focus on activities to tackle hate speech online, including reporting content to IT companies, designing countering narrative and awareness raising campaigns, and educational activities to address the societal challenges of hate speech online.
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Expected effects and impacts
- Increased awareness about the societal effects of hate speech and hate crime, including more effective outreach to individuals and groups at risk of hate victimisation, thereby raising awareness of their rights, including through schools and educational activities;
- Increased knowledge of EU and national hate crime and hate speech legislation;
- Strengthened national or local actions to enhance the capacity of authorities, in particular law enforcement agencies to detect bias indicators and to effectively investigate and prosecute offences, including through multi-stakeholder cooperation;
- Enhanced hate crime recording and data collection methodologies;
- More effective mechanisms to report hate speech and hate crimes and to empower victims and witnesses to come forward;
- Enhanced assistance to victims to access specialist support, providing both victims and witnesses with emotional support, practical help and information;
- Increased knowledge on the prevalence and “ecosystems” of hatred on the different online platforms, in the various national and linguistic contexts;
- Increased effectiveness of notice and action mechanisms by online platforms to enable a prompt assessment and removal of hate speech content;
- Increased awareness among the general population about hate speech and its negative effects on democracy and pluralism;
- Enhanced resilience of civil society organisations to carry out their work against hateful groups and greater capacity to respond to attacks.
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Expected results
- Activities to increase the general awareness of the societal consequences of hatred and polarisation, and to address their root causes, particularly in the fields of teaching and education;
- Activities to enable civil society organisations to work in synergy with competent authorities to support the reporting and recording of episodes of hate, including with a focus on specific grounds, and to contribute to the creation of data collection methodologies and mechanisms;
- Activities to ensure support to victims of hate speech and hate crime, encouraging reporting, providing practical help in seeking redress and gender-sensitive and psycho-social support;
- Activities to support the enforcement of existing legislation prohibiting hate speech and hate crime, including through training for law enforcement and justice professionals;
- Activities to elaborate national or local coalitions or action plans against hate speech and hate crime, and to establish or reinforce mechanisms of structured cooperation, particularly between civil society organisations and public authorities in the area of tackling hate crime and hate speech, including to support investigation and prosecution and to protect victims;
- Activities to enhance the resilience of civil society organisations working on combating racism, antisemitism, hate speech and hate crime in all its forms, against threats and in particular cyber-attacks;
- Activities to tackle hate speech online, in particular to monitor the prevalence of hate speech on social media and the “ecosystems” of hatred online, to report hate speech content to IT companies, and to design effective initiatives to prevent and combat hate speech. These can include campaigns or educational activities to address the societal challenges of hate speech online.
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Eligibility Criteria
Regions / countries for funding
eligible entities
Education and training institution, International organization, Non-Profit Organisation (NPO) / Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO), Other, Private institution, incl. private company (private for profit), Public Body (national, regional and local; incl. EGTCs), Research Institution incl. University, Small and medium-sized enterprise (SME)
Mandatory partnership
No
Project Partnership
Proposals must be submitted by a consortium of at least 1 applicant (beneficiaries; not affiliated entities).
In order to be eligible the applicants (beneficiaries and affiliated entities) must:
- For lead applicants (i.e., the “Coordinator”): be non-profit legal entities (public or private bodies)
- For co-applicants: be non-profit or for profit legal entities (public or private bodies). Organisations which are for profit may apply only in partnership with private non-profit organisations
- be established in one of the eligible countries, i.e.:
- EU Member States (including overseas countries and territories (OCTs))
Specific cases:
- Natural persons are NOT eligible (with the exception of selfemployed persons, i.e. sole traders, where the company does not have legal personality separate from that of the natural person).
- International organisations are eligible. The rules on eligible countries do not apply to them.
- Entities which do not have legal personality under their national law may exceptionally participate, provided that their representatives have the capacity to undertake legal obligations on their behalf, and offer guarantees for the protection of the EU financial interests equivalent to that offered by legal persons.
- EU bodies (with the exception of the European Commission Joint Research Centre) can NOT be part of the consortium.
- Entities composed of members may participate as ‘sole beneficiaries’ or ‘beneficiaries without legal personality'. Please note that if the action will be implemented by the members, they should also participate (either as beneficiaries or as affiliated entities, otherwise their costs will NOT be eligible).
other eligibility criteria
Other eligibility conditions:
- Activities must take place in any of the eligible countries (EU Member States);
- The EU grant applied for cannot be lower than EUR 75 000;
- The project can be either national or transnational; the application may involve one or more organisations (lead applicant and co-applicants). Transnational projects are particularly encouraged.
- Financial support to third parties is not allowed.
Additional information
Topics
Relevance for EU Macro-Region
EUSAIR - EU Strategy for the Adriatic and Ionian Region, EUSALP - EU Strategy for the Alpine Space, EUSBSR - EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region, EUSDR - EU Strategy for the Danube Region
UN Sustainable Development Goals (UN-SDGs)
project duration
between 12 and 24 months
Additional Information
Proposals must be submitted electronically via the Funding & Tenders Portal Electronic Submission System (accessible via the Topic page in the Search Funding & Tenders section). Paper submissions are NOT possible.
Proposals (including annexes and supporting documents) must be submitted using the forms provided inside the Submission System (NOT the documents available on the Topic page — they are only for information).
Proposals must be complete and contain all the requested information and all required annexes and supporting documents:
- Application Form Part A — contains administrative information about the participants (future coordinator, beneficiaries and affiliated entities) and the summarised budget for the project (to be filled in directly online)
- Application Form Part B — contains the technical description of the project (to be downloaded from the Portal Submission System, completed and then assembled and re-uploaded)
- Part C contains additional project data and the project’s contribution to EU programme key performance indicators (to be filled in directly online)
- mandatory annexes (templates available to be downloaded from the Portal Submission System, completed, assembled and re-uploaded):
- detailed budget table/calculator: not applicable
- supporting documents (to be uploaded):
- CVs (standard) of core project team;
- the activity reports of last year (n/a for newly established organisations);
- a list of previous projects (key projects for the last 4 years) (template available in Part B) (n/a for newly established organisations);
- for any of the participants implementing activities involving children (persons under the age of 18): their child protection policy covering the four areas described in the Keeping Children Safe Child Safeguarding Standards.
Proposals are limited to maximum 70 pages (Part B).
Call documents
CERV-2024-CHAR-LITI call documentCERV-2024-CHAR-LITI call document(556kB)
Contact
Website
CERV Nationale Kontakstelle Österreich
+43 1 531 15–202907
ernst.holzinger@bka.gv.at
Website
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