Summary

The present report is submitted pursuant to Human Rights Council resolution 59/10, in which the Council requested the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to prepare a thematic report in follow-up to the report containing practical recommendations for the creation and maintenance of a safe and enabling environment for civil society, based on good practices and lessons learned, to review progress against the recommendations contained therein, to identify new and emerging trends concerning civil society space, including through an analysis of the specific contribution and risks faced by underrepresented parts of civil society, and to provide an updated set of recommendations in the light of those trends.

The report emphasized that open and pluralistic civic space is part of the essential infrastructure of peaceful, prosperous and resilient societies, and delivers concrete results for people. However, the global warning signs require not isolated but collective responses to overlapping legal and policy restrictions, administrative barriers, funding constraints, stigmatization, criminalization and digital repression, which increasingly cross borders. Digital and new emerging technologies must expand participation, and must not be used for surveillance, censorship, spreading disinformation or target critical voices. The report concludes that positive change is both necessary and possible, and proposes a six-part transformative approach to States and the human rights ecosystem as threshold issues for protecting civic space: 

• stand in solidarity with civil society actors under threat;
• uncover hidden strategies to shrink civic space and anticipate restrictions;
• invest in civil society, including through sustainable, locally grounded funding;
• enhance protection through better coordination;
• inspire through positive and unifying narratives; and
• respond to emerging threats, in particular in the digital dimension.