In brief
About the project
Civic involvement enhances quality of life, communal living, and democracy. Germany has an active civil society, with some 23 million people involved in work for the public good. Involvement also depends on contact points, organizational structures, and local resources. These might be volunteer agencies, multigenerational centers, sociocultural centers, mothers’ centers, community foundations, senior citizens’ offices, self-help organizations, or communal field offices.
In practice, however, such organizations tend to be underfunded, with a low profile and a lack of links between them. Promoting these local contact points and centers of civic involvement is a key step on the road to the communal living of the future – the Committed Community.
This networking program aims to do just that. At present, it advises and accompanies 50 well cross-linked and visionary working organizations all over Germany; from Flensburg in the North to Titisee Neustadt in the Black Forest. Through network meetings, Web seminars as well as method workshops participants receive valuable impulses for the development and implementation of their community-strengthening concepts. In order to offer an encompassing support, the program also grants funds up to a figure of three million Euros.
Among other supportive endeavors, this financial promotion enables the persons in authority to cope effectively and creatively with urgent problems in their municipalities, to pursue their core-themes stringently and to extend the network of local partnerships.
Benefactors of the Committed Community
The Committed Community networking program is a joint initiative of the Bertelsmann Foundation, the BMW Foundation Herbert Quandt, the Generali Zukunftsfonds, the Körber-Stiftung, the Robert Bosch Stiftung, and the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth. Together, we aim to not only strengthen local infrastructure in order to foster civic involvement but also test new kinds of strategic collaboration. This applies both to partnerships between foundations and the public sector as well as alliances between the benefactors and local organizations that support civic involvement.
More information
You are interested in learning more about Committed Community? Visit the project's website