The International Council on Social Welfare (ICSW), founded in Paris in 1928, is a non-governmental organisation which now represents national and local organisations in more than 50 countries throughout the world. Our membership also includes a number of major international organisations.

Our member organisations collectively represent tens of thousands of community organisations which work directly at the grass-roots with people in poverty, hardship or distress. Almost all of them are independent organisations working in their own communities rather than branches of organisations based in other countries. Many have been established by people who are themselves experiencing hardship.

Within their own communities, our network of organisations provides help for a wide range of people who are poor, ill, disabled, unemployed, frail or oppressed. They help young people, older people, families, indigenous peoples, migrants, refugees and others who are experiencing special hardship or vulnerability.