Democratic activists worldwide are most successful when they share skills and learn from each other across ideologies and cultures. The World Movement for Democracy (WMD) provided such a global forum in Jakarta, Indonesia, where activists, practitioners, academics and policy makers generated ideas for promoting and strengthening democracy.

Thanks to the support of the European Commission and other partners, NDI has organized a two-year dialogue program to facilitate the development of recommendations to strengthen transatlantic cooperation on democracy support.

The idea came to Vuka Crnjanski when she heard a government official say of a group illegally charging tolls on Serbia's highways: "It's OK to steal a little. This group just went too far."

"Such a statement should have gotten the minister in serious trouble," said Crnjanski, who had worked with NDI as a political party and civil society trainer and was formerly senior figure in Serbia's Liberal Democratic Party. "However, there was virtually no reaction to the statement from any political parties, government officials, NGOs or the media."