George Soros. Grants from national governments often require NGOs to adopt a narrow, country-specific approach; OSF had an EU-wide focus (Photo: Central European University)

Feature

Who will fill gap left by Soros' Open Society Foundations?

EU Political

Health & Society

by Linda A. Thompson, Brussels,

George Soros. Grants from national governments often require NGOs to adopt a narrow, country-specific approach; OSF had an EU-wide focus (Photo: Central European University)

Although Ðorđe Jovanović had been puzzled by several of Open Society Foundations' recent decisions, the Brussels-based director of the European Roma Rights Centre was still shocked when the deep-pocketed charity announced last week that it would discontinue much of its longstanding funding of European initiatives.

In an interview with EUobserver, Jovanović likened the charity's decision to pull out of Europe to a company abruptly letting go of a longti...