New Project: “Improving the communications capacity of Ukrainian think tanks”

From 1 November 2015, Ukrainian Think Tanks Liaison Office in Brussels (UTTLOB) began implementing part of the Project “Improving the communications capacity of the grantees of the Think Tank Development Initiative”, with the support of Think Tank Fund, Open Society Foundations (Budapest, Hungary), SIDA and International Renaissance Foundation (Kyiv, Ukraine).The main role of the Office in this project is to organize four advocacy visits and their follow-up, to the Western Europe. In the framework of the project, the Office will also produce an Advocacy Guide on how to do advocacy in Brussels and in the EU member states.

The advocacy trips to the Western capitals will:

Strengthen the capacities of the Ukrainian think tanks*. The participating think tanks will receive hands-on mentoring on developing policy messages, speaking to Western European audiences, and delivering their policy analysis in a manner that is resonant beyond Ukraine’s domestic context. As a result, they should become better equipped for doing policy outreach in the Western Europe in the future.
Be an opportunity for the Ukrainian think tanks to provide much needed analysis of the situation on the ground in Ukraine to the local national policy and opinion-makers.
Enhance the capacity of the UTTLOB to work with Ukrainian think tanks, improve its knowledge and policy networking beyond Brussels, and set higher standards for policy advocacy.

The first advocacy visit will be to Brussels. During the visit, the participants will take part in a workshop with a well-known Brussels-based Media and Presentation Coach Laura Shields. Ms. Shields will provide the representatives of the participating think tanks with valuable tips and inside knowledge into the issues and complications of the ‘Brussels village’ and how it relates to the EU as a whole.

The public event will take place on 30 November. More information will be available shortly.

The information about the other advocacy visits, organized by the UTTLOB for the project, will be given in a due time.

Organizations participating in the Project:

European Dialogue, Texts UA, DiXi Group, Ilko Kucheriv Democratic Initiatives Foundation, Institute of World Policy, Association for Self-Organization of the Population, Center for Society Research and Europe without Barriers (hereinafter – the participating organizations).