People in Need
We are a non-governmental, non-profit organization based on the ideas of humanism, freedom, equality and solidarity. We consider human dignity and freedom to be the basic values. We believe that people anywhere in the world should have a right to make decisions about their lives and to share the rights expressed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We strive for open, informed, engaged and responsible society that would be able to address problems at home as well as in the world. We want to actively participate in shaping a society where cultural, ethnic, racial and other differences are a source of enrichment rather than conflict.
We are an intrinsic part of the civil society. Our work is based not only on personal initiative and activity of hundreds of our employees and volunteers, both in the Czech Republic and in dozens of other countries, where we work, but also on trust and support we are endowed with by individuals, businesses, governments and international institutions.The scope of our activities, particular areas and priorities are determined independently with respect to the level of urgency and to our real capacity to change something. It is not so important to have the work done everywhere, however it is essential for us to make a real difference.In troubled regions around the world, we provide humanitarian aid on the basis of specific needs in the spirit of the Code of Conduct for the International Red Cross. We help people alleviate their distress and support them in the recovery period to be able to get back on their feet.
We fight poverty, whose causes we see in the limitations given by poor access to education, natural resources, healthcare, unequal treatment and discrimination, or by bad governance. We assist people in lifting these restrictions and support them so that they can enhance the quality of their lives. We try to identify the causes of these problems and, together with the people concerned, help with eliminating them.
The recent historical experience of our country enables us to help in some dictatorial or authoritarian regimes, and also in countries in transition. In the same way as the democratic world supported the struggle for freedom in communist countries, we encourage people who are active in voicing criticism and opening a dialogue with the power, in claiming to respect fundamental human rights and freedoms, and also in seeking a more open society. We strengthen the civil society so that it is able to stand as one of the pillars of good governance in newly-developing societies and countries.We lend a helping hand to our fellow citizen living in social exclusion through social work based on respect and shared responsibility. We solve peoples’ problems in mutual cooperation. Above all, we encourage young people in pursuing education so that they enhance their chance to succeed in life. At the same time, we attempt to contribute towards the solution of serious structural problems, namely over-indebtedness, discriminatory practice of self-governments, situation on the labour market or segregation trends in education.In addition, our work involves fostering the development of free and responsible people, who are well-informed about contemporary world, are able to directly and critically assess information and opinions, and they are willing to make a difference in the community. We bring personal testimony of the people we work with as well as important global issues such as climate change, sustainable development, fight for freedom and rights of people in dozens of countries, inequality in society, and the status of minorities.We believe that after decades of oppression and denial of free access to information, so symptomatic of our society at that time, we were given freedom as well as joint responsibility. We believe that closing our eyes to what is happening in a seemingly distant world is as short-sighted as forgetting our own past. This is the reason why we have been shaping up People in Need for over twenty years while building on tangible work and motivating the public to join us.