Pan-African Democracy Lab
Community Action for Resilience (CARE) Programme
Policy and Practice Series
African Solidarity Fund for Humanitarian Action (ASFHA)
Pan-African Democracy Lab
A space for innovation in civic technology, citizens’ engagement, and accountability tools adapted for African contexts.
The Pan-African Democracy Lab is a continental innovation hub dedicated to developing civic technologies, citizen engagement models, and accountability tools tailored to African realities. It brings together technologists, activists, policymakers, and community organisers to co-create solutions that strengthen democratic participation and government responsiveness. By focusing on tools that work in low-resource, multilingual, and rural settings, the Lab addresses the unique challenges faced by African citizens in exercising their democratic rights. Its interventions are grounded in local context and cultural relevance, from digital town halls and election monitoring apps to radio dialogues and service delivery trackers.
Beyond tool development, the Lab serves as a knowledge and capacity-building centre, offering training, fellowships, and collaborative research on democratic innovation. It supports advocacy for digital rights and open governance, aligning its work with continental frameworks like the African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance. Through cross-border partnerships and regional engagement, the Pan-African Democracy Lab fosters a vibrant ecosystem of civic innovation that empowers citizens, amplifies marginalised voices, and reimagines democracy from the ground up.
Community Action for Resilience (CARE) Programme
Strengthening community capacity in conflict zones and climate-vulnerable areas to manage risks and rebuild social cohesion.
The Community Action for Resilience (CARE) Programme is designed to empower communities in conflict-affected and climate-vulnerable regions to better manage risks, recover from shocks, and rebuild social cohesion. By focusing on locally led solutions, CARE strengthens communities' capacity to assess their own vulnerabilities, develop inclusive response strategies, and foster peaceful coexistence. The programme integrates conflict sensitivity, climate adaptation, and disaster risk reduction approaches to ensure that interventions are both sustainable and responsive to the specific needs of affected populations.
Through participatory planning, training, and resource support, CARE helps establish community resilience committees, early warning systems, and locally driven peacebuilding initiatives. It promotes dialogue, trust-building, and collaboration among diverse groups, with special attention to the inclusion of women, youth, and displaced populations. By restoring social bonds and enhancing local preparedness, the CARE Programme contributes to long-term stability and resilience, enabling communities not just to survive crises but to transform and thrive in their aftermath.
Policy and Practice Series
A knowledge-to-policy platform that hosts dialogues, publishes position papers, and facilitates regional engagement between grassroots actors and decision-makers.
The Policy and Practice Series is a knowledge-to-policy platform that bridges the gap between grassroots realities and high-level decision-making across Africa. It creates a structured space for dialogue, learning, and advocacy by hosting public forums, expert roundtables, and community-led discussions that elevate the voices of those directly affected by development and governance challenges. Through these dialogues, the Series fosters mutual understanding and co-creation of solutions between civil society, grassroots actors, policymakers, and regional institutions.
Complementing its convening role, the platform publishes accessible position papers, policy briefs, and evidence-based recommendations that translate grassroots insights into actionable policy proposals. It also facilitates regional engagement through partnerships with think tanks, advocacy networks, and pan-African institutions, helping to shape policies that are inclusive, grounded, and reflective of lived experiences. The Policy and Practice Series thus serves as a catalytic interface for transforming knowledge into policy impact at national and continental levels.
African Solidarity Fund for Humanitarian Action (ASFHA)
A locally managed fund to support rapid humanitarian responses by African civil society actors, rooted in community needs.
The African Solidarity Fund for Humanitarian Action (ASFHA) is a locally managed financing mechanism designed to strengthen the capacity of African civil society actors to lead timely, community-driven humanitarian responses. Rooted in solidarity and locally led action, ASFHA provides flexible, rapid funding to grassroots organisations and networks responding to crises such as conflict, displacement, food insecurity, and climate-related disasters. By putting resources directly in the hands of those closest to affected populations, the fund ensures that responses are more agile, culturally appropriate, and aligned with actual community needs.
ASFHA also seeks to shift power within the humanitarian system by promoting African ownership and accountability in crisis response. It supports locally led coordination, builds the institutional capacity of civil society responders, and advocates for a reimagined humanitarian architecture that values local knowledge and leadership. Through strategic partnerships with African philanthropy, regional bodies, and diaspora networks, ASFHA aims to create a sustainable funding base that reinforces Africa’s ability to respond to its own humanitarian challenges with dignity, speed, and effectiveness.