Announcing the new Possible Now Stitching Fellowships

As we further develop Possible Now, particularly on the road to the 2026 Summit in Kathmandu, we are delighted to announce the new Possible Now Stitching Fellowships. These are resourced fellowships for bridge-builders who are seeking to explore big questions from the perspective of emerging practice, to dissolve the boundaries of categories and siloes – which have too often artificially divided us – with a view to building “a bigger us.” Work undertaken as part of the Stitching Fellowships will aim to knit across divides and to foster systems and political consciousness within civil society and people-led action more broadly. The mandate of the Fellows is to listen, reflect, convene, translate, create and align.

Read more below to meet the Fellows, and to learn about some of the work they will be busy with in the coming months! More Fellows will be announced in the weeks to come, so keep checking back here.

Graciela Hopstein (Brazil)

The Possible Now Stitching Fellowship aims to continue the process of reflection initiated during my #ShiftThePower Fellowship. In fact, this new Fellowship offers an opportunity to follow-up on some of the ideas proposed in my paper The Crisis of Democracy and Civil Society: Challenges and Perspectives for the #ShiftThePower Movement (also available in Portuguese and Spanish). In this next phase, I will map and analyse strategic civil society players and dynamics in Brazil, taking into account the current political context marked by the presence of far-right dynamics and actors, a democratic crisis, shrinking civic spaces and politically-driven funding shifts. This initiative will combine the development of research involving the mapping of players and networks, the creation and promotion of permanent and open spaces linked to Possible Now, agenda building (around priority themes, concerns and debates) and the development of joint actions.

Facundo Ibarlucía, Red Comunidades Rurales (Argentina)

In the face of rapid technological shifts, what is possible now to build directly from civil society and through genuine community participation to protect our ecosystems and empower our trust-based civic infrastructure? This is the question I will be exploring with my Possible Now Stitching Fellowship, specifically looking at:

1. Accessible tech and AI literacy: Providing a clear, plain-language baseline on what these emerging technologies actually are and how they work. Demystifying it is essential so community leaders feel empowered rather than intimidated.
2. The socio-environmental impact: Understanding how technological innovations are transforming individuals, communities, ecosystems and international relationships. What are our organizations going through?
3. Community appropriation and innovation: Mapping existing local practices, digital rights and genuine tech sovereignty already taking place on the ground. What is possible now?
4. Reframing grantmaking: Addressing the “AI arms race” (AI writing proposals vs. AI scoring them) to push the philanthropic sector back toward trust, relationships and human connections. This is also linked with what important decisions we are delegating and why.

Nishchhal Kharal, Freedom Studio (Nepal)

With my Possible Now Stitching Fellowship, I am exploring “artivism”, specifically how art and creative practice shape narrative, and how the civil society sector can use creative approaches to tell stories that bring people together. I will be looking at how extremist and algorithm-driven narratives spread, and how creative story-telling can instead build social cohesion and trust. Working with artists and communities across my networks, I will be experimenting with community-led ways of telling stories that resist extractive, feed-driven models. Much of this will come together at the Possible Now Summit in Kathmandu this December, where I – along with Freedom Studio – will bring a creative community-building experience, using art and exploring narrative alternatives together.

Marina Kobzeva (UK)

I have spent around twenty years in humanitarian work, at every rung of it: on the receiving end of aid, then as national staff, a “field” worker and eventually an INGO Director. All of this taught me how much local crisis response competence is overlooked, because our optics are not calibrated to see it.

My Possible Now Stitching Fellowship supports the “Already There” research initiative, a growing public record of local crisis responses, told by the people who do it. This began with four years of asking communities in fifteen countries one question: “What does help that really helps look like?” We heard back, without exception: “Look at what we are already doing, and help us do more of it.”

Now I am having conversations with local responders across more than twenty contexts, in their own languages and on their own terms, alongside creating a living map of who is already there when a disaster strikes. People nominate themselves or each other, and legitimacy extends horizontally. Surfacing this work is the main purpose of my Stitching Fellowship, because recognition is upstream of resourcing, and what is kept invisible stays dismissible. Above all, I want to help make responders visible to each other so that people facing similar crises can find and support one another directly. Much of this feeds into the Possible Now Summit in Kathmandu in December, though the longer aim is to contribute to shifting who gets seen as legitimate, competent, fundable and central to any crisis response.

Pepe Onziema (Uganda)

My Possible Now Stitching Fellowship will investigate how marginalized communities create and sustain collective power beyond formal organizations and international donor support. Focusing on Uganda’s LGBTQ+ movement and the emergence of QuchuCoin, I will explore community philanthropy, mutual aid and the networks of trust that enable movements to endure. I will also examine the often unrecognized people and places that make organizing possible, from small businesses and artisans to cafés and other everyday spaces where community and solidarity quietly take root. Ultimately, I hope to contribute fresh thinking on how African social movements can sustain resilience, belonging and long-term viability from within.