About
Everyones lives in a world where they must continue to fight for fair and just societies.
Look beyond the headlines and the past decade has delivered significant social progress. Global poverty levels are down and life expectancy is up. Hate crimes have fallen while progressive attitudes to equality are increasingly prevalent.
However, the last few years have seen a profound shift in the political environment. In countries around the world they are seeing a common set of challenges emerge.
Trust in experts, institutions, and the media has been eroded. The spread of misinformation and the devaluation of truth have created echo chambers that are entrenching views and polarising communities. Populist politicians are exploiting this, leading to a rise in authoritarian governments and the greater prevalence of insular, nationalist perspectives.
Civic space is also under attack, both on and offline, with freedoms of expression, assembly, and privacy being withdrawn. In parallel, the potential downsides of rapid advances in technology, especially those related to data use and artificial intelligence, are becoming clearer and more acute. Those with power are increasingly misusing technology and data to maintain and enhance their positions in society.
It is against this global backdrop that Luminate operates.
How they make a difference
Established in 2018, Luminate is a global philanthropic organisation with the goal of empowering people and institutions to work together to build just and fair societies.
They do this by funding and supporting non-profit and for-profit organisations and advocating for policies and actions that will help people participate in and shape the issues affecting their lives, and make those in power more transparent, responsive, and accountable.
They prioritise delivering impact in four connected areas that underpin strong societies: Civic Empowerment, Data & Digital Rights, Financial Transparency, and Independent Media.
Across all these areas, their strategy is long term yet responsive. This allows them to focus on supporting those driving sustainable solutions to deeply entrenched issues – while remaining flexible enough to react quickly to evolving challenges.
Luminate builds on a portfolio and wealth of expertise built up over a decade as the Governance & Citizen Engagement initiative at Omidyar Network. Established by Pam and Pierre Omidyar, founder of eBay, they remain part of The Omidyar Group.
To date, Luminate’s global work has supported 236 organisations, in 18 countries with over $314 million in funding.
