1. ISC Serbia
Civil Society Advocacy Initiative (CSAI)
Key Achievements

2. ISC Serbia
CSAI Key Achievements
The Civil Society Advocacy Initiative (CSAI) program is a seven-year, $27.5
million initiative funded by USAID that supports Serbian civil society in its
ability to influence public policy, serve as government watchdogs, and conduct
sustained advocacy campaigns on a wide variety of reform issues.
CSAI promotes civil society CSAI strengthens the
advocacy through grants, civic sector by helping
training and tailored CSO coalitions to
technical assistance to improve the legal and
Serbian CSOs to develop regulatory framework
institutional capacity and and operate with
the ability to promote maximum leeway in the
causes of relevance to current environment.
Serbian citizens.

3. ISC Serbia
CSAI Key Achievements
The CSAI program directly supported 230 CSOs throughout the country through
364 grants worth a total of $13.5 million dollars.
The program has assisted 230
Vojvodina CSOs of all sizes, ranging in CSOs
experience and capacity,
and operating in a range of 364
West Central East different sectors. The program grants
Serbia
Serbia Serbia has also worked with CSOs in $13.5
all five regions of Serbia and milion
South supported CSO-led initiatives
Serbia in over one-third of all Serbian
cities and municipalities.

4. ISC Serbia
CSAI Key Achievements 1430 civic
activists
CSAI trained more than 1430 civic activists and leaders, based
in 50 communities across the country, from 250 CSOs in principles
of effective advocacy initiatives and citizen engagement. In 50
communities
From 250
CSO
The program’s Mobile Advocacy School (MAS)
Designed by ISC in 2008, MAS trainings help
improve grantees and non-grantees’ advocacy
skills, particularly individuals residing in
ethnically mixed and economically
underdeveloped municipalities, by providing year-
round technical assistance to the civic sector.
CSAI formed the Advocacy Resource Persons (ARP) team of consultants
Under the guidance of CSAI’s ARP team, participating CSOs learned how to
develop strategic action plans to maximize the impact of their issue-based
advocacy campaigns.

5. ISC Serbia
CSAI Key Achievements
The CSAI program improved the legal framework for CSO work and supported
provision of legal and policy reforms.
The program drafted legal provisions for: The program assisted with the
establishment of the Office for
o Law on Associations, CSO/Government Cooperation
o Law on Volunteers, And the Local Gender, Roma
o Law on Endowments and and Environmental Councils in
Foundations, tens of Serbian municipalities
o Law on Social Housing, and cities.
o Law on Personal Data Protection,
o Law on Data Confidentiality,
o Unified Voter List,
o Corporate Tax Law and Property Tax
Law.
Supported provision of legal and policy reforms (national and local) on election
legislation, promotion of government transparency and accountability, socio-
economic development, environment, youth, vulnerable populations and other
issues. From the beginning of CSAI program authorities passed 30 national laws
and statutes and 56 local decisions.

6. ISC Serbia
CSAI Key Achievements
Supported numerous issue-based advocacy campaigns that helped to build a culture of
democracy and stimulate effective citizen engagement in key reform areas.
CSAI established three
innovative CSO-led joint Supported numerous issue-
initiatives bringing based advocacy campaigns
to:
together strategic
coalitions of stakeholders
o revitalize local school
to tackle the most yards and playgrounds;
pressing societal issues. o clean up of rivers and
illegal dumps;
o create employment for
people with disabilities;
o provide goods and
services;
o support human rights for
all communities.

7. ISC Serbia
CSAI Key Achievements
The CSAI program helped develop CSO-private sector partnerships and
encourage corporate philanthropy and CSR
CSAI helped launch the first
CSAI organized five
ever Business Leaders Forum
consecutive VIRTUS
in Serbia with members from
Corporate
17 leading Serbian and
Philanthropy
international companies to
Excellence Awards to
encourage CSR and
honor socially
philanthropy within the private
responsible businesses
sector.
operating in Serbia.
CSAI successfully organized highly visible
and important corporate volunteer events,
such as “Our Belgrade” and “Our Gornji
Milenovac,” which helped forge
sustainable CSO-private sector
partnerships.

8. ISC Serbia
CSAI Key Achievements
CSAI took the lead in highlighting the role of social media in digital activism, galvanized
CSOs to get engaged in new and innovative ways and showed citizens how significant
change can be crated through social media and new technologies.
CSAI’s New World program helped
CSAI supported the establishments of the
increase the capacity of CSOs to
effectively use social media and new Share Conference
technologies to advocate more
effectively for their causes, recruit
additional support, and become
more efficient in their work.

9. ISC Serbia
CSAI Key Achievements
CSAI supported various youth-related issues ranging from youth advocacy and
activism to youth employment and entrepreneurship.
grants
youth focused
34 youth
focused grants
CSAI participated in:
in total value
o increasing youth participation in cultural life of $1.2 million
through various activities; USD.
o creating volunteering programs for youth to
support the elderly; CSAI supported:
o preventing youth violence;
o developing models for working with at-risk o The establishment of the Ministry of
youth; Youth and Sports and 70+ Youth
o improving the socio-economic position of offices around the country;
disabled and at-risk youth. o The adoption of the Government of
Serbia’s National Youth Strategy;
o Junior Achievement (JA) program;
o Partnership@Work program to
develop cross-boarder relations
between Serbian and German high-
school students.

10. ISC Serbia
CSAI Key Achievements
CSAI undertook significant effort to improve the image and visibility of the civic
sector and to cultivate an improved understanding, and appreciation, of CSO
achievements.
CSAI’s supported Visibly Better
Campaign to highlight the important
role that CSOs play in towns and
communities across the country.
This national-level campaign
highlighted the impact of a cross-
section of CSOs operating in the
country. The campaign involved a
series of high-profile events that
significantly increased the presence of
CSOs in both traditional media
outlets and social media networks to
show the important work that CSOs
do throughout Serbia.