A newly-founded think-tank at the University of St Andrews is pitching for a $100m award to combat the rise of online intolerance and prejudice.
The Third Generation Project is part of a coalition of six organisations bidding for the MacArthur Foundation’s flagship ‘100&Change’ programme.
The competition will award the sum “to a single proposal designed to help solve a critical problem affecting people, places, or the planet”.
The collective human rights think-tank – based in the University’s School of International Relations – has worked alongside Pact International, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the Economist Intelligence Unit, Search for Common Ground and Show of Force on the bid.
The coalition’s proposal ‘i_Tolerant’ aims to create a global movement of citizens with “community based compassion” who are trained to combat prejudice both in person and virtually.
Professor of International Relations at St Andrews, Ali Watson, is the executive director and co-founder of the Third Generation Project (TGP).
She said: “As a social justice-oriented think-tank, joining this consortium and proposal fell perfectly within our remit to foster more discussions about the rights we have as communities and not just as individuals.
“Now more than ever, particularly in the UK and the US, the virtual world cannot be ignored as an alternative space where human rights are violated.
“In this case, we are seeing that the internet holds little respect for human rights and often fosters intolerance for the right of marginalised groups to even exist.”
With Facebook and Google acting as advisory partners, i_Tolerant would pilot, evaluate and refine innovative initiatives to combat such intolerance.
If successful in the bid, the Third Generation Project, along with the Economist Intelligence Unit, would be funded for the research element of the bid.
More on the proposal can be found here.
