The reason we engage in all of this is to enable us to offer both content and financial support to organizations and projects using games and play to resolve conflict. We are a registered nonprofit foundation in both Germany and the US, and welcome your proposals.
Below there are some examples of grant projects we financed recently.
A bold new initiative to bring together sixteen musicians to create exciting new music from the shared Nile culture, transforming the river from a source of conflict to a wellspring of joy, with concerts following up and down the Nile.
This project brought students from various Berlin schools together, teaching them to make films around the theme of “Territory”, a major source of conflict especially for those with a “migration background”. The films were performed in a movie theater to an audience of several hundred.
We supported this non-profit startup from their very beginnings when they launched a crowdfunding campaign to build a business incubation program that specifically supports Berlin-based entrepreneurs who have experienced forced migration and want to bring their project idea into reality. Participants are offered a tailor-made curriculum including an intensive yet playful ideation workshop and RGI negotiation training.
The US NGO Search for Common Ground initiated this project in its Beirut office, a full-fledged Alternative Reality animated game in the fictional land of Cedaria, designed to teach Lebanese and Syrian youth the fundamentals of conflict resolution. We advised on pedagogy and facilitator training and outreach, also ensuring the successful rollout of the game all over Lebanon.
Bond Street Theatre, a highly respected and also very innovative street theater company with roots in New York City but now running projects all over the world is passionate about applying fun to serious conflict and making a difference in the world. Their mission is "theatre-based programs in over 40 countries" to promote peace and mutual understanding through the arts.
The project that we are supporting this year is in Malaysia, which is not a signatory to the UN Convention on Refugees. Displaced people are therefore highly vulnerable and the target of much xenophobic conflict and violence. But Bond Street seeks to reach these communities through its young people, by means of the playful world of street theater.
This project uses the play of capoeira as a bridge to strengthen intra- and inter community relationships as well as to improve the level of psychosocial wellbeing of children and youth coming from or living in war-impacted societies. Capoeira provides a joyful celebratory way to meet others, and helps understand that differences can be a cause for celebration not aggression. Through sport and play participants learn to peacefully resolve conflicts and tensions, as well as deal with their traumatic experiences of war in a healthy way.
123+ helps build the capacity of LGBTIQ+ organisations and initiatives around the world, bringing together a global network of experts to both create curated tools and provide bespoke strategic support — all to create a world that is fair, equitable, and safe for LGBTIQ+ people and communities.
The Rational Games Small Grant program is by invitation only and provides targeted financial assistance to projects run by qualified organizations that make innovative use of games and play in the service of conflict resolution, negotiation or mediation.
Rational Games seeks to work with partners over a 2-3 year grant cycle, supporting projects that demonstrate an innovative and convincing commitment to utilizing games and play for conflict resolution, negotiation or mediation. Proposed projects should have a clear emphasis on practice rather than theory (no funding of conferences). Organizations submitting proposals must demonstrate a commitment to utilizing games and play for conflict resolution, negotiation or mediation in their approach.
