Stefan Batory Foundation - History and Beginnings

History and Beginnings

The Batory Foundation was founded in 1988 when the communist system in Eastern and Central Europe was disintegrating. It was established by an American philanthropist of Hungarian extraction, George Soros, and Polish democratic opposition leaders of the 1980s. The mission of the Foundation was to contribute to the preparation of Polish society in the transition from communism to democracy, civil society and a market economy.

Early on, the Batory Foundation invested in the preparation of cadres for the market economy and democratic system taking roots in Poland by funding hundreds of scholarships and travel grants for economists, bankers, physicians, teachers, and local government activists. It also made a significant contribution to the various reforms being implemented in the country after the collapse of communism, supporting the reform of local government, public administration, and social welfare policy. These reform-related initiatives eventually gave rise to the Institute of Public Affairs, a major think-tank in Warsaw, which the Foundation helped to establish in 1995.

Based on the belief that democracy and open society cannot be realized without active involvement of the public, the Foundation disbursed hundreds of micro-grants to a variety of local civic initiatives, contributing to the establishment of numerous local organizations.

The Foundation has also been very active in the field of education and culture. It has promoted leadership skills and provided civic, health and business education to youth, trained teachers for foreign language instruction, provided Internet access to schools, worked to improve the quality of teaching and management at universities, and provided funding to allow for more diverse curricula. For many years the Stefan Batory Foundation has remained the only non-governmental patron of ethnic minority education and culture, and the leading promoter of culture on the local level: in neglected areas and provincial Poland, where it stimulated cultural life and worked toward equal access to culture.

In its grant-making activity the Batory Foundation has always concentrated on supporting innovative projects that break new ground and can serve as models for others. It has devoted special attention to the problems that were neglected or not sufficiently present in the public consciousness: it was among the first to address women's issues, child abuse, palliative care, and the rights of ethnic minorities and the disabled.

The role of the Stefan Batory Foundation has gone beyond grant making. It has served as a facilitator to promote open debates and discussions on important public issues, and acted as a liaison to advance knowledge and increase abilities of non-governmental organizations, universities, and motivated individuals through grants, fellowships, and conferences.

Since the very beginning the Foundation has not limited itself to assisting democracy in Poland, but it has made the support to democratic changes in the region one of its top priorities. As a result, the Foundation has become the largest non-governmental organization in Poland promoting international cooperation in Central and Eastern Europe and the Newly Independent States. The programs attracted thousands of influential leaders and opinion makers from CEE, Baltic and Balkan countries, Caucasus and Central Asia.

Until 2007, in 20 years of its existence, the Stefan Batory Foundation has spent USD 95,9 million on all its programs, USD 71 million of which were assigned for grantmaking.

Throughout 2007, the Foundation provided 513 grants to institutions and organizations, 47 travel grants to cover costs of 169 participants attending events and projects abroad, as well as 5 awards; overall expenditure for grantmaking and operational activities in 2007 totaled EUR 4,9 million.