Each year, Atlas Network selects ten partner organizations that are punching above their weight and generate impressive returns on philanthropic investment. These teams are known as Atlas Network Smart Bets.
The 2024 Smart Bets partners include groups with a clear track record of success in advancing individual freedom, in addition to up-and-coming rising stars which present unique opportunities for significant impact.
As part of Atlas Network’s Smart Bets program, each group will receive a $25,000 grant and a $10,000 matching grant for the following year.
The members of the 2024 Atlas Network Smart Bets class are:
American Conservation Coalition (United States)
The American Conservation Coalition (ACC) is building a liberty-minded environmental movement that provides young people with an alternative to the top-down, big-government mindset that has dominated the mainstream climate space for so long. Through its grassroots membership program, ACC aims to reach 40,000 members by the end of 2024, 65,000 members by the end of 2025, and 100,000 members by 2026.
Badger Institute (United States)
The Badger Institute’s experts seek to be the leaders in statewide policy debates by expanding and building a new, loyal, and engaged audience, and giving them the information they need to affect meaningful policy change. Funding of this new initiative will increase the Badger Institute’s reach by at least tenfold to more than 120,000 people over two years.
Center for Indonesian Policy Studies (Indonesia)
The Center for Indonesian Policy Studies (CIPS) engages with and empowers Indonesian youth. Content on the most popular social media channels, where young Indonesians consume information, will guide them to CIPS Learning Hub’s YouTube channel, the first online platform by an Indonesian think tank explaining the principles of free markets and open societies. The new platform will also be promoted through on-campus events for students and lecturers.
Free the People Foundation (United States)
Free the People Foundation is launching a new portfolio of entertaining content that broadens the reach of its message. Free the People will use this expanded audience to grow its dedicated community, exploring and populating alternative social media platforms and channels to create “A MarketSpace of Ideas.”
Ideas Beyond Borders (Iraq)
The “Open for Business in Kurdistan” project will transform the new business start-up environment in Iraq’s Kurdistan region. The two-year project will achieve three key outcomes: 1) The launch of a new one-stop registration website providing entrepreneurs with control over the forms needed to register their businesses within 24 hours; 2) a one-million-view social media campaign driving new business registration; and 3) pro-business legal reform via the region’s Parliament.
Instituto OMG (Dominican Republic)
Instituto OMG proposes establishing the foundations to increase and strengthen the competitiveness of the Dominican Republic, turning it into a true investment and business hub. The prioritized areas to improve are as follows: 1) Property, contracts, and liabilities; 2) legal entities; 3) foreign investment; 4) digital transformation; 5) permits; and 6) the broader labor market.
Institut Ostrom Catalunya (Spain)
Institut Ostrom Catalunya will execute an end-to-end advocacy campaign that will lead to profound regulatory reform in Catalonia. The policies will unlock new economic opportunities and boost industrial entrepreneurial activity in the region by cutting the burdensome regulations affecting urban planning, administrative licensing, and permitting.
Liberty Sparks (Tanzania)
Tanzania’s Economic Freedom Index scores reflect the prolonged time and effort to trade internationally in the country. Currently, Tanzania’s economy is distant from the frontier and performing poorly. Liberty Sparks wants to realign the various roles and functions of government agencies while removing the barriers to trade, improving economic performance in Tanzania.
Livres (Brazil)
Leading a movement in defense of liberalism, Livres informs Brazilian society to popularize liberal ideas, empowers leaders to develop activism and social projects, and reforms policy by providing intellectual support to key decision-makers. From updating Brazil's tax and regulatory structure to advancing free trade and spurring privatization, Livres supports "freedom in full"—personal and economic liberties. In 2019, Livres also launched a project to help Brazilians who wish to be exempt from mandatory military service, benefitting over 2,000 youngsters to date.
Prometheus (Germany)
The mission of Prometheus is to identify, support, and train the next generation of freedom entrepreneurs. Selected fellows will receive €20,000 in funding and continuous mentoring. For 100 days, they will learn firsthand what it means to be a “freedom entrepreneur” by working together in the Prometheus co-working space.
Over the course of the coming year, the Smart Bets will participate in a virtual pitch competition, with three finalists earning the chance to present their projects and win a $50,000 grand prize at Liberty Forum in New York City. All ten Smart Bets will also compete for the $25,000 Smart Bets Impact Award, presented to the most effective organization in the 2024 Smart Bets program.
“Atlas Network’s 2024 class of Smart Bets grantees are exactly that: Smart bets,” said Brad Lips, CEO of Atlas Network. “By rewarding their efforts to spread liberty in local communities that need it most, these groups are going above and beyond to make their donors proud. The nonprofit community can look up to this Smart Bets class as a North Star for philanthropic ROI.”