As we enter the new year, we pause to reflect on a pivotal 2024—an unprecedented test for democracy with numerous crucial elections that shaped the global political landscape. It was a year defined by the explosive growth of AI, the pressing need to innovate within political parties, and a reinforced commitment to combat political violence. These themes have shaped our direction and approach as we move forward. Here are our team's top 10 highlights from the past year, presented in no particular order.
Thank you to our community of funders, partners, and wider hope makers for your support and collaboration. Your collective impact strengthens the Foundation’s mission to advance ethical, effective, and representative political leadership worldwide. Thank you!
We look forward to your continued support and collaboration in 2025 and beyond. Together we can help restore hope in political leadership when we need it most.
A GlobeScan study with the Apolitical Foundation reveals that 1 in 4 people—and 1 in 3 under 30—want to run for office, but barriers hold them back. Financial concerns top the list, with 45% globally—and 66% in Africa and the Middle East—citing a lack of resources. Another 37% don’t know where to start, especially young people. Mental wellbeing is also a key issue, affecting 1 in 4 aspiring leaders, echoing findings from our Mere Mortals: The State of Mental Wellbeing of Politicians report. It is time to break down these barriers and open more doors to leadership.
We welcomed 22 new founding teams from 25 countries to the 2024/25 Accelerator with support from the Daniel Sachs Foundation. Over six months, they gain the tools to establish non-partisan Political Leadership Incubators (PLIs)—programs giving aspiring leaders the knowledge and skills they need to enter and thrive in office—in their countries or communities.
We’re not going to get the diverse and effective leaders we need to address the challenges of the 21st century unless we equip our leaders and make the job more attractive. Our ground-breaking Mere Mortals report is featured in the BBC, The Guardian, Deutsche Welle, and RTE, positioning us as thought leaders on the mental wellbeing of politicians.
To address these concerns systematically, the Apolitical Foundation has developed three new evidence-based training modules focused on enhancing politicians' mental wellbeing. These programs, crafted with the latest in adult learning and behavioral science, aim to equip politicians with the tools to thrive in their demanding roles.
AI is changing politics, and it's happening fast. Understanding how political leaders can ethically and effectively use AI is critical to getting more diverse politicians into office and helping them serve their communities well. Apolitical Foundation’s Pitfalls and Possibilities report found that despite its downsides, opportunities exist for AI tools to open campaigning, engagement, and policymaking opportunities to emerging leaders who previously would not have had them.
🎤 Report launch event recording
We co-hosted a panel discussion at the UN Women HQ in NYC with UN Women, the eSafety Commissioner of Australia, and the Accelerator for Gender-Based Violence Prevention on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. Together, we explored actionable solutions and global partnerships aimed at ending Technology-facilitated Gender-based Violence (TFGBV) impacting women politicians.
We will delve further into this work in 2025, including through a collaborative pro bono campaign with global communications powerhouse VML and organizations like Women Political Leaders, Equality Now, Vital Voices, ShePersisted and more.
👩🏿🤝👩🏻 Full NYC event recording
We launched our third annual “PLEs to Watch” list highlighting the 78+ organizations in the PLEN. We found that most are women-led or co-led and that there is a growing wave against democratic backsliding. This network has momentum and great potential to continue expanding and scaling impact, with nearly 60% of PLEs in the network founded in the last five years. Even with tight budgets and volunteer-driven efforts, they’re building community and driving results through an upswing in collaborative initiatives.
The Leaders or Latecomers report found politicians across the political spectrum acknowledge the need to do things differently and could be more interested in innovations when they’re reframed as tools for solving the challenges they already face.
The Circular Power Politics guide examines various case studies from around the globe, detailing when and how politicians can integrate these democratic innovations into their political cycles. The guide provides a critical analysis of each approach, drawing extensively from the seminal work of Democratic Innovators of the 21st Century. The Democratic Innovators of the 21st Century 2024 Politicians’ Hall of Fame was unveiled at the Athens Democracy Forum in partnership with The Democracy & Culture Foundation.
We hosted 75 party-support thought leaders from around the world for the 2024 Political Party Peer Network Democracy Basecamp. The two days were full of multi-partisan discussions on how to equip political parties for the future. We are working on a collaborative report on understanding the state of political parties in the 21st century.
We launched the Leadership Excellence in Politics (LEiP) as a joint initiative of the Apolitical Foundation, Kofi Annan Foundation, Geneva Centre for Security Policy, and NexusVesting. LEiP is the first-of-its-kind initiative to ensure passionate well-meaning political leaders are set up to succeed by providing attention, research and training to understand the gap between what citizens expect from their leaders and what their leaders do, and to find solutions to reduce this gap.
Together we convened 15 young leaders from around the world for a week of leadership training, and we assembled an Expert Council of 18 leaders from politics, academia, and civil society to fill knowledge gaps about political leadership.
We awarded Recambio (Peru) and Elect Her (UK) the inaugural Political Leadership Impact Awards for helping emerging leaders transition to political life. The award, which will be presented annually, was presented at the first Apolitical Day, co-hosted by our sister company Apolitical.co.
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This article was prepared by Jessica Hendrick.