A message from our founders

Arcadia serves humanity by preserving endangered ecosystems and cultural heritage and by promoting knowledge sharing through open access. We protect complexity and work against the entropy that leads to barren lands, depleted seas and homogenous cultures.

Fair and resilient societies depend on diversity and innovation, and complexity spurs development and change. Once inflicted, simplification is hard to reverse. Arcadia helps people remember their cultures and protect their natural surroundings. If these vanish or are degraded, coming generations will have no base for a vibrant, sustainable and just future.

Because scientific and academic knowledge is not private property, but belongs to all, we promote open access, making information available without barriers of cost or distance. Open access is socially just. All gain when knowledge is no longer locked behind paywalls or available only far away. Those excluded by the current system – which is to say, the vast majority of the world’s people – reap the biggest benefits. Our societies and economies profit too, from wiser decisions, improved schooling, better-informed citizens, and deeper and broader academic research that spurs technological and social innovation based on shared knowledge.

Arcadia does not accept applications. We seek out organizations with strong leadership, that operate efficiently, collaboratively and ethically, pursuing the evidence that helps achieve our ambitions.