Structure and Aims
Survival works for tribal people's rights on three complementary levels: education, advocacy and campaigns. It also offers tribal people themselves a platform to address the world, while establishing a connection with local indigenous organisation, with focus on tribal peoples with more urgent threat from contact with the outside world. The educational programs are aimed at the people in the western world, with the objective of "demolishing the myth that tribal people are relics, destined to perish through ‘progress’". Survival International seeks to promote respect for their culture and explain the contemporary relevance in preserving their way of life.
If we want to help societies our first job is to listen, rather than to dictate what we think they need, and we must be prepared to be surprised. This is not just to do with remote tribal peoples: it's of vital relevance to all in a world where ideas of multiculturalism are misunderstood and under attack and where some increasingly want to force their views on others. —Stephen Corry, Director of Survival International, April 2007Today, Survival has supporters in 82 countries. Their materials are published in many different languages throughout the world. It is a registered charity in the United Kingdom and the equivalent in Germany, France, Italy, Spain and the United States, and has the capacity of receiving tax-free donations in the Netherlands.
Survival refuses government funding, depending exclusively on the public for its support, in order to ensure freedom of action. All the people sent into the field belong to Survival International staff, and there is no sponsoring of volunteers or visitors of any kind. The projects which are run oversea, are carried and managed by the tribe itself.
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