The Right Livelihood Award

The idea of ‘right livelihood’ is an ancient one. It embodies the principle that each person should follow an honest occupation, which fully respects other people and the natural world. It means being responsible for the consequences of our actions and taking only a fair share of the earth’s resources.

In every generation, there are groups of people and individuals around the globe who valiantly uphold these principles of right livelihood. They should be the stars in our human cosmos; instead their work often entails personal sacrifice, being opposed by powerful forces around them.

The Right Livelihood Award exists to honour and support such people.

Proposals & Selection Process

Anyone – except Right Livelihood Award Jury and staff members – can propose anyone (individuals or organisations), except themselves, close relatives or their own organisations, to be considered for a Right Livelihood Award.

The Right Livelihood Award Foundation reserves the right to refuse clearly unsuitable proposals. Proposals must not be publicised, except to the candidate and possible referees. Failure to observe this invalidates a proposal.

In this way, the Foundation receives proposals from all around the world. Projects from “Third World” Countries and grassroots activists have the same chance of being proposed as, for example, a First World scholar or entrepreneur. Through this open nomination process, the Foundation gets a sense of what people around the world perceive as the most urgent problems – and who develops ways to solve them.

In any year, there are some 70-100 proposals for the Right Livelihood Award. After careful research by the Foundation’s research team, reports on all current proposals are submitted to the international Jury. The Jury meets annually at the end of September to select the Recipients. The year’s Awards are announced at a press conference in Stockholm ten days later.

The deadline for proposals for any current year is March 1st

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