The Institute for Development Impact (I4DI) is an international research and consulting firm with a focus on global sustainability. In June 2020, when organizations, many of which are documented in this database, took action against systemic injustices, we began to think what we could do ourselves to contribute to the movement. Given our position at the nexus between research and technology,  we thought our institutional skillset could best be used to develop a historical archive/database to document, map, and visualize the tangible results of the global protests and racial justice activism in the wake of the murder of George Floyd. Committed to using evidence and data to improve social policy for more equitable outcomes, I4DI saw this as a contribution to the important work that has been done, and still needs doing, to build an anti-racist culture and promote racial justice around the world, because Black Lives Matter. To that end, the Data for Social Change project was launched. 

Over the summer of 2020, the core research team jointly developed the overall project scope, coding structure, and data collection protocols. Later in the year, our team onboarded several data contributors to help input and categorize results. With their support, we were able to grow the database to over 600 data points. Our data visualization team worked concurrently to build the charts and maps you see on the homepage. Due to difficulties of the covid-19 pandemic, progress slowed in 2021, with much of the data entry stopping entirely. However, as of June 2021, we are very pleased to launch the D4SC website, exhibiting what we were able to achieve in the past year.  Yet we still see this project as incomplete. Hundreds, or most likely thousands, of results can and should still be captured. As we take this next step to share publicly the database, we look forward to opportunities and/or partnerships that could continue driving forward the goals of D4SC.