After many years of political wrangling, the UK has finally left the European Union. We are now in the middle of establishing a new relationship with European states. Central to this will be the new UK-EU Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA), and civil society should play a role in shaping its implementation.

Significantly, the UK remains part of Europe, which is larger than the political union. Ties remain not only in a geographical sense, but also between the sectors which have strong links to Europe (for instance in business, culture, academia etc.), and think of their activities in a wider European context.

The EU has always provided an additional framework for these ties to exist and flourish. But most sectors have a myriad of networks that are not necessarily predicated on EU membership per se. These ties are widely impacted by Brexit due to the legal and economic ramifications, but they also continue to exist in spite of these impacts.

Civil society has felt the changes that came with leaving the EU from the early days. The potential loss of EU funding was one of the major concerns, with many small and medium-sized charities being part of the service supply chains that benefitted from EU funding programs, mostly on the local level. Initially, losses were estimated to be around £258m, with the real number potentially higher. The UK Government has since then made a commitment that any shortfall in EU funding post-Brexit will be replaced by the UK Shared Prosperity Fund. This is set to replace EU funding that came from the structural funds in full and should be launched in early 2022.

As part of the TCA, the UK decided to associate with Horizon Europe, the EU’s €95.5bn research and innovation research funding programme that succeeds Horizon 2020. Many civil society organisations will benefit from continued access, such as health and medical research charities.

In other areas, such as the Erasmus student exchange programme, the UK chose to forge its own path. The new Turing programme is designed to help up to 35,000 students to work and study abroad. However, unlike the Erasmus programme it does not offer placements for teaching, college staff and youth workers. Of course, philanthropy is already active in cross-border exchanges. Yet, this is an example of where the UK departure from the EU has created a gap, or opportunity, that could be filled by philanthropic actors. For instance by expanding their existing work, helping to create new schemes, or bring in new partners and unlock additional resources.

Read the full article about building philanthropy bridges by Daniel Ferrell-Schweppenstedde at Alliance Magazine.