Peace Development Fund - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.

org/wiki/Peace_Development_Fund

Peace Development Fund

The Peace Development Fund is a non-profit public
foundation, based in Amherst, Massachusetts. Its
Peace Development Fund
mission statement describes it as working "to build the
capacity of community-based organizations through
grants, training, and other resources as partners in the
human rights and social justice movements.[1]

The fund was co-founded in 1981 by Bob Mazer and

Meg Gage, and originally focused on funding grassroots
anti-nuclear organizations. They soon expanded to fund
groups opposing the Reagan administration's policies in
Central America, and later to low-income community
organizing not necessarily related to war-and-peace
issues. This last led to a broadened board of directors:
as Meg Gage put it in 2007, "…to build a strong peace Founded January 1, 1981
and social justice movement, you have to connect with Founder Bob Mazer and Meg Gage
people of color… I'm very proud of the large, diverse
board we built."[2] Type Human rights and social justice
Location Amherst, Massachusetts
History Area Global
served

Grants and Programs Website www.peacedevelopmentfund.org

(http://www.peacedevelopmentfu
nd.org)
Grant Applications and
Reporting

What Peace Development Fund Funds

The Peace Development Fund makes grants to organizations and projects working to achieve
peaceful, just and equitable relationships among people and nations. They believe that the change
in values needed to establish a more just and peaceful world can come about only if it is strongly
rooted in local communities that value the importance of building movements to create systemic
social change. These are communities that view everyone, especially young people, as a vital force
in the transformation of society. We recognize young people’s ability to reshape our society
politically, spiritually and culturally. The Peace Development Fund is committed to supporting
organizations and projects that recognize that peace will never be sustained unless it is based on
justice and an appreciation of both the diversity and unity of the human family. They understand
peace to be a consequence of equitable relationships—with our fellow human beings and with the
natural environment of which we are a part and on which we depend. Recently Peace Development
Fund have witnessed the negative effects of the United States as the world’s sole superpower, neo-

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Peace Development Fund - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_Development_Fund

liberalism and the globalization of capitalism, the limiting of civil liberties in the U.S. and abroad,
decreases in funding for social services and the continued strengthening of the Right. Some of
these consequences include the widening gap between rich and poor, heightening militarization
and use of US military violence, increasing incidences of hate crimes and increasing poverty and
unemployment. This is evidence that some of the institutional and structural causes of injustice,
whether physical, social, or economic, remain largely intact. Challenging those causes and
developing community-based alternatives that promote a more just, nonviolent society is at the
heart of Peace Development Fund's grant-making program.

Notes
1. Mission Statement, Peace Development Fund. Reprinted in PeaceDevelopments, Peace
Development Fund, spring 2007, p.4.
2. "Building a Strong Foundation," PeaceDevelopments, Peace Development Fund, spring 2007,
p.4.

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