The British Columbia Council for International Cooperation (BCCIC) is a coalition of people working in solidarity with partners across the world working to improve their own conditions. Our diverse and capable membership is made up of international development organizations, civil society groups and individuals. We also works alongside different communities (geographical, social, interest-based, among other types of communities) through BCCIC programming, the youth-led Climate Change Branch and regional chapters.
Our Vision
British Columbians are engaged in global collaboration for a just, equitable, socially inclusive and sustainable world.
Our Mission
As a network, BCCIC facilitates and engages its members and British Columbians to build relationships, share knowledge and develop capacity towards achieving sustainable global development.
What Guides Our Work
BCCIC’s work is guided by the priorities, needs and expertise of our members and their Global South partners.
Our Strategic Directions
All that we do is directly informed by our strategic directions:
Rethinking Cooperation: Unlearning and Relearning as a Continuous, Dynamic Process
Connecting Voices: People to People, People with People
Supporting Members’ Organizational Capacity
Our Guiding Principles
While BCCIC’s membership may have diverse ways of addressing global or local issues, we are brought together through our shared commitment to the Istanbul Principles.
BCCIC’s guiding principles draw from these values and approaches, and include:
Human rights and social justice, equity for all
The right to development, with dignity, decent work, social justice and equity for all people.
Gender equality and equity, and promotion of women and girls’ rights
Members embody gender equity while supporting individual and collective rights, and full participation of people in the development process.
Ownership of people over the development initiatives that affect their lives
Members support marginalised people and communities’ goals, based on the understanding that sustainable processes depend on individuals, communities and countries having their own governance, voice and agency.
Environmental sustainability
Members embody approaches that promote environmental sustainability;
Members center the rights of vulnerable and marginalised people in response to the climate crisis.
Organisational accountability
Members are accountable to the populations they work with, to the public that supports them, to their own membership or community, and to transparency in pursuit of their goals.
Partnerships in development, solidarity for shared or common goals
Relationships and partnerships are developed freely and as equals, based on shared development goals and values, mutual respect, trust, organisational autonomy and solidarity;
Recognition of unequal power relations and action to redress the power balance in partnerships, for more transparent and effective paths towards the shared goals.
Commitment to mutual learning
Recognition that knowledge has been generated for decades on development issues, and actively seeking the knowledge and evidence drawn from development practice;
Focus on long-lasting sustainable change Collaboration for more effective results and conditions for lasting change for marginalised populations Promotion of the currently marginalized populations’ role in shaping the policies and practices that affect them.
Representation
BCCIC represents its membership through our work with:
Global Affairs Canada: drawing GAC’s attention to our BC-based membership’s concerns.
Cooperation Canada: coordinating provincial support for Cooperation Canada initiatives.
The Inter-Council Network: representing the province’s priorities within a pan-Canadian coalition of international cooperation actors/agencies and sharing resources with councils from other provinces.
Federal Government: monitoring Canadian foreign policy and coordinating provincial NGO responses and advocacy to foreign policy.
Provincial Government: maintaining contact with MLAs through one-on-one and joint initiatives to share perspectives.
Academic Communities: maintaining links with academic institutions on sustainable development.