🚨 New paper 📑 available open access “The Gates Foundation’s network diplomacy in European donor countries” globalizationandhealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....

Our study is just a first step – more research is needed to investigate how the Foundation interacts with other donors (e.g. Gulf States, Singapore); better understand partners’ perspectives through in-depth research; how other private foundations seek to influence policy; etc.

10. If everyone becomes a partner of the Foundation, who remains to hold the Gates Foundation accountable?

9. How can we ensure that policy alternatives may also emerge – including some that might challenge the “Gates approach” to global health and development – if everyone is aligned with the Gates Foundation?

8. Is it appropriate for a foreign private actor to develop close diplomatic ties with governments, while in parallel, working with and funding other stakeholders to influence policy? Do we have regulations in place to ensure that these interactions are transparent and accountable?

7. The Gates Foundation’s network diplomacy gives it influence over public policy. Its links with and funding to a wide range of actors in the global health ecosystem represents a remarkable concentration of power in the hands of a private actor.

6. The concept of network diplomacy helps to make sense of the Gates Foundation’s direct and indirect engagement with European donor countries by highlighting its capacity to leverage its networks to advance its own policy objectives. Why does it matter?

5. The Gates Foundation has some favorite European advocacy partners. Save the Children (UK), DSW (Germany) and Focus 2030 (France) get larger, longer and more frequent advocacy and policy grants than other NGOs.

4. The Gates Foundation’s advocacy and policy grants go to activities that increase support for ODA; support the replenishment of Gates-funded global health initiatives; develop policy proposals; and “generate compelling and well substantiated development success stories”.

2. The Foundation funds actors across the entire global health and development ecosystem. Between 2007 and 2024, it awarded $400 million in policy and advocacy grants to a wide range of NGOs, think tanks, research institutes, universities and media organizations in the UK, Germany and France.

1.The Foundation has developed close ties with European political leaders, including through many high-level meetings in the UK, Germany and France and with the European Commission (up to 10 annually). Bill Gates has met with every French president during the past 25 years.