Center for the Development of Democracy and Human Rights

The Center for the Development of Democracy and Human Rights (CDDHR) is a Russian public policy and advocacy NGO founded in 1998. The Center’s mission is to foster the development of effective democratic institutions and sustainable mechanisms of human rights protection by providing public policy analysis and recommendations, creating conditions for public participation in decision making, ensuring accountability of governments and inter-governmental organisations, and building the capacity of civil society. The Center is doing research, advocacy and coalition-building on a wide range of human rights and democracy issues, including protection of civil and political rights, security of human rights defenders and shrinking civil society space, implementation of international human rights obligations, strengthening of international human rights frameworks and instruments, understanding of mechanisms of functioning of authoritarian regimes, and developing strategies of the human rights movement. CDDHR works in Russia and the countries of the post-Soviet region as well as at the European and global level. It has been playing a leading role in international advocacy with governments and inter-governmental organisations, articulating civil society positions at the UN, the Council of Europe, the OSCE, and the EU, and amplifying the voice of civil society.