Skoll Entrepreneur(s): Gemma Mortensen
Focus Area(s) Addressed: Peace and Human Security
Award Year: 2013

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ISSUE

• One in four people on the planet – more than 1.5 billion people – live in countries affected by societal fragility, conflict or large-scale violence.
• These people are twice as likely to be undernourished, 1.5 times as likely to be impoverished, and their children are three times as likely to be out of school.
• The initial response to armed conflict usually entails humanitarian assistance and relief, but sustainable solutions are decided at the political level. It is difficult for civil society to significantly influence these policies if they speak with disparate voices, rather than a collective, unified voice.

INNOVATION

Remaining entirely behind-the-scenes as a catalyst and coordinator, Crisis Action brings human rights and humanitarian organizations together across continents to protect civilians from armed conflict. By enabling civil society to speak as one at moments of crisis, it is able to spur the world’s most powerful decision makers into action. They harness the relative strengths of individual organizations to maximum effect on specific conflict situations.  Crisis Action only works on a handful of conflicts at one time, chosen against strategic criteria.

IMPACT AS OF JAN. 2013:

• In just eight years, Crisis Action has grown from a start-up with a single employee to an international organization with almost 30 staff in eight offices.
• Since its establishment in 2004, the collective advocacy it has facilitated has helped save thousands of lives by altering the course of government policy on armed conflict.
• Crisis Action has helped to: secure one of the largest UN peacekeeping forces for Darfur, Sudan; prevent Zimbabwean President Mugabe from torturing civilians by stopping the supply of bank paper to the regime; and convince the Arab League to respond to mass violence against civilians in Libya and Syria.