The Connect U.S. Fund is a small team of foreign policy advocates working to build relationships among diverse actors and deliver targeted asks to policymakers. Our current program includes advocacy in five key areas: nonproliferation, climate change, reform of international financial institutions, support for U.S. civilian capacities, and human rights. Through a program of grant-making and operations which foster stronger collaboration and advocacy among nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) active on these issues, the Connect U.S. Fund seeks to advance responsible U.S. global engagement in an increasingly interdependent world.

The foreign policy community includes a variety of actors: policymakers navigating a complex, interconnected foreign policy landscape; NGOs competing for their time and attention; and foundations supporting projects to advance their vision of a better world. At the Connect U.S. Fund, we create new dynamism between and within these segments of the foreign policy community by:

• Incentivizing collaboration, not competition, among NGOs. The overwhelming majority – approximately 95 percent – of our annual grant-making program is devoted to funding collaborative advocacy efforts.
• Focusing on discrete, neglected issues for targeted, results-oriented advocacy. We connect advocates, scholars, funders, and policymakers to support narrow, achievable policy asks with support from the broadest possible segment of the community.
• Responding quickly to unmet needs with the guidance and support of foundation partners. Through our rapid response grants and quick convening capacity, we are able to fund unexpected, time-bound opportunities to achieve specific policy outcomes. Members of our donors’ collaborative help identify projects in need of rapid funding and lend their own expertise to evaluating proposals.

Connect U.S. community members agree that collaboration and collective action are the most effective ways to achieve important policy goals, while also building a more powerful movement for responsible U.S. global engagement. Community members leverage one another’s resources and skills, share lessons learned, develop complementary strategies, share information and craft mutually reinforcing messages. The community helps strengthen existing connections and fosters new linkages that bridge issue, geographic, and constituency divides.

The Connect U.S. Fund was created in 2004 and is supported by a donors’ collaborative which presently includes the Open Society Foundations, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, and the Ploughshares Fund.