Association for Progressive Communications (APC)

History and Activities

Association for Progressive Communications was founded in 1990 through the collaboration of GreenNet in the United Kingdom, the Institute for Global Communications (then known as PeaceNet/EcoNet) in the United States, and several other IT and communications organizations located in Sweden, Canada, Brazil, Nicaragua, and Australia. ³

The organization was created to be a membership network of left-of-center organizations and activists. Originally, APC operated under the Tides Foundation, a major center-left grantmaking organization and major pass-through funder to numerous left-leaning nonprofits. ² In 1998, APC was granted independent 501(c)3 recognition separate from the Tides Foundation. ²

APC is based in San Francisco, California, but contains members and associates in 74 countries located in North America, Central America, South America, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. ¹ The goals of the organization are to use communications and information technology to promote left-of-center ideals such as social justice and environmental sustainability. ²

APC promotes itself as a feminist network of technology innovators and practitioners governed by the values of local ownership, free expression, open content and software, gender equality, and diversity, and it focuses primarily on the global South. ²

APC has two primary program areas. ² The first it its Communications and Information Policy Programme advocating for values-aligned policies and activism in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. ⁴ The organization’s second program is the Women’s Rights Programme created to challenge perceived sex discrimination, promote “gender justice,” and increase the power of women in politics and online. As part of its Women’s Rights Programme, APC hosts a variety of gender activism websites, including Feminist Principles of the Internet, which promotes a women’s technology movement; ://EROTICS, which focuses on researching the intersection between internet and communications technology on the one hand and sexuality on the other; and Explore Feminist Principles of the Internet, which hosts feminists for conversations on how to apply feminist principles to the internet. ⁵

APC also regularly publishes research, reports, policy and issue papers, presentations, and toolkits produced by its members and partner organizations. ⁶

Since its founding, APC has offered grants to member organizations, including travel grants of up to $2,000, research and campaign grants of up to $12,500, and grants to implement APC’s strategic plan of up to $50,000. In 2020, APC awarded 19 project grants at a total of $263,077 as well as 19 research and campaign grants for a total of $94,795. ⁷

Strategic Priorities

Every four years, Association for Progressive Communications membership defines the organization’s strategic priorities. ² From 2020-2023, the organization’s strategic priorities included promoting sustainability, challenging existing power structures, and fighting for an internet that is governed inclusively and democratically. The organization’s strategic priorities were to be achieved through realizing six outcomes: harnessing the collective power of the organization’s community, including excluded and discriminated-against minorities into the governance of the internet, including people of different genders and sexualities into the governance of the internet, empowering those who face discrimination and oppression with more online autonomy, making the internet be recognized as a so-called global public good managed in an inclusive and transparent manner, and mitigating the negative environmental impact of the internet and digital technologies. ⁸

Partners

Outside of its formal members and associates, Association for Progressive Communications partners include Global Fund for Women, a nonprofit feminist foundation; Just Associates, an international left-of-center advocacy organization focused on global women’s issues; Sex Work Awareness, an organizations that advocates for the legalization of prostitution; Urgent Action Fund for Women’s Human Rights, an organization that partners with global women’s movements to support women and transgender people’s interests; and more. ⁹

People and Governance

Association for Progressive Communications is governed by a board of directors elected by members and a council consisting of representatives of member organizations. ¹⁰ The executive director of the organization is Concepcion Ramilo from the Philippines. ¹¹