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Power, Equity, and Justice in Community Philanthropy – How a Field is Changing
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In October of 1978, a committee met to explore the possibility of a merger between the National Council on Philanthropy (NCOP) and the Coalition of National Voluntary Organizations (CONVO). The vision was more than the mere marriage of two small organizations facing uncertain futures. Participants in this endeavor dreamed of an entity that would represent the entire nonprofit sector. The organization they birthed in 1979, Independent Sector (IS), was a meaningful step forward in unifying the sector. The IS board represented a broad range of sub-sectors and causes and also made strides in gender and, to a lesser extent, racial and religious diversity. Yet, there was an inherent tension in the project. Yes, it was true that people did not want to “interfere with pluralism” but they also wanted “a strong voice” to champion the sector—those involved called this dilemma a “persistent contradiction.” The tension was resolved in favor of the concerns of the powerful national non-profit institutions and foundations: tax policy, government relations, and sector advocacy. That is, the umbrella organization acted principally to preserve the sector, as constituted, and had little appetite for structural reform or discussion of competing notions of “the good” within the sector. Critics pointed to the exclusion of local organizations fighting issues that challenged societal injustice and inequitable distribution of power and resources. To them, and in retrospect to the authors of this paper, greater sector “unity” entailed consolidation of traditional power and continued marginalization of communities already on the periphery. Though four decades have passed, the same tension remains in the philanthropic sector. Contest and division between various interests and constituencies is as evident now as it was then. Enthusiastic support for the advancement of public goods often over-shadows issues of power—including the ability to impose one’s own definition of the public good on others. This critique has been leveled forcefully in recent years. Is it possible or even desirable to seek greater unity for the public good? Whose voices are privileged in the quest for greater sectoral unity? These are the questions this paper aspires to provoke and inform by examining the founding of the first major nonprofit sector association in the United States.
During the 1960s, the Ford Foundation was one of the largest philanthropic organizations in the United States. This article examines the shifting strategies which Ford deployed in an attempt to tackle urban disorder in U.S. cities between 1965 and 1982. From 1966 to 1969, Ford engaged in a series of experimental projects which sought to dampen unrest through “community action” and grassroots mobilization, many of which required working with Black Power organizations. Yet, after this generated considerable political controversy, the foundation shifted toward funding liberal police reform, establishing the Police Foundation in 1970, a Washington-based organization whose research provided the intellectual underpinning for “Broken Windows” policing. Studying the Ford Foundation’s programming during this period can illuminate the understudied contribution of liberal philanthropy to the rise of the carceral state, as well as the connections between the grassroots antipoverty efforts of the 1960s and the punitive turn of the 1970s.
This systematic literature review reports on the content of past empirical studies of nonprofit collaboration within and across the sectors, published between 1972 and 2015 (n = 657). An analysis of these articles reveals four major themes: diverse but “siloed” data; imbalance in research coverage; the dominance of “big four” organization theories; and limited improvement in research sophistication. It further identifies five specific research gaps: the insufficient attention to the forms and intensity of nonprofit collaboration; the divergences and contradictions in theoretical reasoning and empirical evidence; the lack of attention to the moderators and/or mediators of collaboration; the lack of understanding of collaborative failure; and the lack of comparative studies. These findings help to inform collaboration research and practice by observing the value in using a broader scope of literature and methods to build knowledge in this area.
Over the course of American history, philanthropists have been both praised and pilloried, depicted as redeemers of democracy and a threat to it. Despite the shifting social terrain in which they have operated, philanthropists — and the organizations they create — have grown in number and influence, acting as a catalytic force in the genesis and development of the modern nonprofit sector. Philanthropic largesse has also played a powerful role in shaping civic life and political affairs. This chapter argues that it is important to understand not only how philanthropists are seen, but also how they see. In narrating the development of American philanthropy from the late 19th to the early 21st centuries, our aim is to capture changes in what it means to “see like a philanthropist”—that is, to illuminate the meanings and ends of philanthropic wealth. We focus on three core influences on philanthropic visions: (1) the sources of philanthropic wealth, (2) its organizational embodiments, and (3) the criticisms leveled at its outsized influence. We examine the reciprocal dynamic between political challenges to elite power and philanthropic visions. We show that philanthropists have transposed the practices they used to earn their great fortunes into the organizational routines of their philanthropies and turned these into requirements for those who receive their funding. The actions of past philanthropists weigh heavily on future philanthropists, Consequently, the political might of philanthropy both channels and enables the critiques to which its influence is subjected. In narrating this long arc of history, we show how the super-rich’s perceptions of themselves and their role in public life have evolved as well as the myriad ways philanthropy has altered civic and political discourse.
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is marked by the consolidation of sustainability as a key guiding principle and an emphasis on cities as a potential solution to global development problems. However, in the absence of an agreement on how to implement sustainable development in cities, a set of urban policy solutions and ‘best practices’ became the vehicles through which the sustainable development agenda is spreading worldwide. This article shows that the rapid circulation of Bogota´ as a model of sustainable transport since the 2000s reflects an increasing focus of the international development apparatus on urban policy solutions as an arena to achieve global development impacts, what I call the ‘leveraging cities’ logic in this article. This logic emerges at a particular historical conjuncture characterised by: (1) the rising power of global philanthropy to set development agendas; (2) the generalisation of solutionism as a strategy of action among development and philanthropic organisations; and (3) the increasing attention on cities as solutions for global development problems, particularly around sustainability and climate change. By connecting urban policy mobilities debates with development studies this article seeks to unpack the emergence, and the limits, of ‘leveraging cities’ as a proliferating global development practice. These urban policy solutions are far from being a clear framework of action. Rather, their circulation becomes a ‘quick fix’ to frame the problem of sustainable development given the unwillingness of development and philanthropic organisations to intervene in the structural factors and multiple scales that produce environmental degradation and climate change.
After the election of Donald Trump to the U.S. presidency, a self-defined “resistance” movement arose to block his agenda. This movement cut across the normal boundaries of political activism to create new forms of advocacy and new models of cooperation. Major components of the resistance were ideological interest groups, women’s organizations, environmentalists, heretofore disengaged Millennials, racial and ethnic groups, community nonprofits, and, ostensibly, foundations and leading philanthropists—those we term “patrons.” We systematically examine the behavior of patrons to determine what role they played at this unique time in American history. We place this research in the context of interest group behavior, asking how patrons may have facilitated representation, altered strategic plans, reoriented advocacy, and repositioned themselves within policy communities supporting similar goals. Our findings undermine the idea that patrons played a central role in the developing resistance to the new administration, despite the fact that the new president was working against their values and the programs they support. However, a non-trivial minority of patrons, both institutional and individual, did mobilize their voice, institutional resources, and coalitions to resist the Trump agenda. These examples allow us to explore how patrons in some conditions might fulfill the roles of interest groups conventionally understood.
How does donor funding affect the independence, role perceptions, and ideology of the journalism it supports? We begin to answer this increasingly important but underresearched question with a year-long case study of the humanitarian news organistion IRIN as it transitioned from being funded by the United Nations to a private foundation, run by a Malaysian billionaire. Using content analysis, in-depth interviews, and ethnographic research, we document the changes that occurred in IRIN’s outputs, target audience, and public service values, and the complex interplay of influences that produced these changes. We find that, in this case, donor power operated entirely indirectly and always in concert with the dominant professional values within IRIN. In doing so, this case study highlights the importance of journalistic agency and contextual variables in the journalist–donor relationship, as well as the potential significance of contradictory dynamics. We also use this case to test whether Benson, Hessérus and Sedel’s model of media owner power can help to explain the workings of donor power.
Studies examining the role of philanthropic foundations in advancing social change have primarily focused on the impact of foundations’ financial resources. Few scholars have analyzed how foundations also leverage social mechanisms to advance and legitimate desired change. We conceptualize philanthropic foundations as agents of change known as institutional entrepreneurs to illuminate the social mechanisms they employ in pursuit of institutional change. We study the case of charter schools within the field of U.S. public education, where foundations elevated a new organizational form—the charter management organization—by engaging in three social mechanisms: recombining cultural elements to establish the form, enforcing evaluative frameworks to assess the form, and sponsoring new professionals to populate the form with preferred expertise. We argue that foundations are distinctive due to their ability to simultaneously pursue social mechanisms that are often considered to be the realms of different types of institutional entrepreneurs.
Systematic review methodology can be distinguished from narrative reviews of the literature through its emphasis on transparent, structured and comprehensive approaches to searching the literature and its requirement for formal synthesis of research findings. There appears to be relatively little use of the systematic review methodology within the higher education sector. This paper outlines the systematic review methodology, including variations, explores debates regarding systematic reviews from the educational literature and describes particular issues for its application within higher education. We conclude that thoughtful use of the systematic review methodology may be of benefit to the sector.
A substantial section of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in the global South depend on foreign funds to conduct their operations. This paper explores how the availability of foreign funding affects their downward accountability, abilities to effect social change, and their relative influence in relation to traditional grassroots, membership‐based organizations (GROs), which tend not to receive such funding. Drawing on a case study of Nicaragua, we challenge the notion that foreign funding of domestic NGOs leads to the evolution of civil society organizations, which have incentives and abilities to organize the marginalized sections of society in ways to effect social change in their interests. Instead, we find that foreign funding and corresponding professionalization of the NGO sector creates dualism among domestic civil society organizations. Foreign funding enhances the visibility and prestige of the “modern” NGO sector over traditional GROs. This has grave policy implications because foreign funded NGOs tend to be more accountable to donors than beneficiaries and are more focused on service delivery than social change oriented advocacy.
A review of the funding strategies and priorities of the Carnegie, Rockefeller, and Ford Foundations over the past twenty-five years indicates that although these major philanthropies have adjusted to changing international and national contexts, they continued to engage in the same activities identified by Arnove (1980) in Philanthropy and Cultural Imperialism. These foundations claim to attack the roots causes of the ills of humanity; however they essentially engage in ameliorative practices to maintain social and economics systems that generate the very inequality and injustices they wish to correct.
In international relations, a long list of private donors has joined governments in addressing global problems and their financial contributions are mind-boggling. We argue that the transformational potential of philanthropists such as Bill and Melinda Gates and Michael Otto relies largely on mechanisms of power with others, i.e. cooperation and learning. There are situations in which power is neither attributed solely to A nor to B, but to both. Comparing the cases of Gates and Otto, however, we simultaneously emphasize that power with is not exercised independently from power over dimensions. If we simply assume philanthropists to be do-gooders, we may become inattentive to often hidden or invisible conflicts of interests and values.
This article examines the role of philanthropy in conservation as a way of exploring how and why conservation might be becoming more neoliberal. It describes how conservation philanthropy supports capitalism both discursively and in more practical ways. Philanthropy is examined in terms of the two forces considered to be driving the neoliberalization of conservation — the need for capitalism to find new ways of making money, and the desire of conservationists to engage with capitalism as the best way of getting things done. It demonstrates how philanthropy can speak to both of these logics simultaneously, particularly through emerging ideas of philanthrocapitalism, which may be enhancing the neoliberalization of both philanthropy and conservation.
Objectives. Although recent research has documented the contributions of philanthropic foundations as “patrons” of the major identity movements, scholars know very little about the specific ways foundations have influenced these movements' development and impact. This study examines the role of foundations in shaping the U.S. women's movement of the 1960s–1980s, in particular the role that foundations played in deciding which of its claimsmakers—and by extension, its claims—would be sustained.
Methods. The study is based on an original data set of nearly 6,500 foundation grants to women's groups, or for women's causes, from 1970 to 1990. It examines shifts in the types of groups that received foundation grants and in the female interests that these groups represented.
Results. Philanthropic patrons were central to transforming women from servants of society into claimants against the state. Likewise, foundations played a critical role in segmenting U.S. womanhood into politically relevant subgroups (civic stewards, battered women, lesbians, etc.) with ever narrower policy claims.
Conclusions. By legitimizing identity subgroups and their policy agendas, foundations played an important role in the development of special interest politics in the second half of the 20th century. In this way, professional grantmakers have constituted a critical yet overlooked force behind the construction of U.S. hyperpluralism, in the process diminishing the capacity of gender to unite women in common cause.
The role of philanthropic capital in biodiversity conservation is rapidly changing. Philanthropists increasingly seek to bankroll solutions to the biodiversity crisis, scaling up the size of their ambitions and gifts to help close what scientists and policymakers call the “biodiversity financing gap.” This paper interrogates the rising prominence of philanthropic capital in conservation governance, focusing on a class of actors I call “philanthro-environmentalists.” Unlike big, international NGOs and philanthrocapitalists, philanthro-environmentalists do not engage market-based, for-profit approaches to finance conservation. Rather, they engage a “dollars for policy” approach that leverages the power of their philanthropy to improve public conservation outcomes. Taking Chile as a case, I trace how a transnational network of philanthro-environmentalists is using a novel mechanism known as Project Finance for Permanence to exact substantial political and fiscal commitments from the state in exchange for substantive philanthropic support for a mega conservation initiative in Chilean Patagonia. I argue that Project Finance for Permanence targets policymaking as the primary site of philanthropic intervention, affording philanthro-environmentalists greater control over state conservation governance. Yet, I also argue that this case raises serious questions about the limits and implications of leveraging philanthropic capital to solve public environmental problems. Bridging literatures on conservation governance and conservation finance, the paper contributes new conceptual insights into the evolving dynamics of philanthropy-state relations in an age of biodiversity crisis.
This paper examines and theorizes the organizational structures and effects of an ambitious urban volunteering program that has been developed by one of Germany’s wealthiest philanthropic foundations in order to support, enhance, and promote volunteering. As such, the program represents an epitome of a transformative philanthropy by which foundations hope to bring about lasting societal consequences on all spatial scales. However, by attempting to trigger effects outside its own boundaries, foundations are at risk of overstraining themselves. Based on formal documents, interviews, and participant observations, the paper illustrates and theorizes how the foundation combines rather traditional moral and formal rules of philanthropy and volunteering with ambitious and transformative goals. More precisely, the paper explores (i) how and why the foundation enacts itself and its environments, (ii) how and why it uses interactions to exploit the power of the gift, and (iii) how and why it tries to use a scientific evaluation to generate legitimacy. In contrast to comparable studies that infer from practice to (neoliberal) motives the paper takes the organizational constitution of foundations more seriously. Consequently, it invokes a cybernetic notion of control to understand the program’s multifarious relationships of power.
Cet article examine et théorise les structures organisationnelles et les effets d’un ambitieux programme de volontariat urbain mis en place par une des fondations philanthropiques les plus riches d’Allemagne dans le but de soutenir, développer et promouvoir le volontariat. En tant que tel, le programme est l’incarnation d’une philanthropie transformatrice par laquelle les fondations espèrent provoquer des conséquences durables sur la société et ce à toutes les échelles spatiales. Néanmoins, en tentant d’avoir des effets en dehors de leurs propres limites, les fondations courent le risque de s’épuiser. Tiré de documents officiels, d’entretiens et des séances d’observation participante, cet article illustre et théorise la façon dont la fondation associe des règles morales et officielles relativement traditionnelles de la philanthropie et du volontariat à des objectifs ambitieux et transformateurs. Plus précisément, l’article explore (i) comment et pourquoi la fondation se définit elle-même et son environnement, (ii) comment et pourquoi elle utilise les interactions pour exploiter le pouvoir du don et (iii) comment et pourquoi elle tente d’avoir recours à une évaluation scientifique pour augmenter sa légitimité. Contrairement à des études comparables qui déduisent de ces pratiques des motivations néolibérales, cet article prend plus au sérieux la constitution organisationnelle des fondations. En conséquent, il convoque une notion cybernétique du contrôle afin de comprendre les relations multiples que le programme entretient avec le pouvoir.
Este artículo examina y teoriza las estructuras organizativas y los efectos de un ambicioso programa de voluntariado urbano que ha sido desarrollado por una de las fundaciones filantrópicas más ricas de Alemania para apoyar, mejorar y promover el voluntariado. Como tal, el programa representa un epítome de una filantropía transformadora por la cual las fundaciones esperan tener impactos sociales duraderos en todas las escalas espaciales. Sin embargo, al intentar generar efectos fuera de sus propios límites, las fundaciones corren el riesgo de sobrecargarse. Basado en documentos formales, entrevistas y observación participante, el artículo ilustra y teoriza cómo la fundación combina reglas morales y formales bastante tradicionales de filantropía y voluntariado con objetivos ambiciosos y transformadores. Específicamente, el artículo explora (i) cómo y por qué la fundación se representa a sí misma y sus entornos, (ii) cómo y por qué usa interacciones para explotar el poder del regalo, y (iii) cómo y por qué trata de usar un método científico de evaluación para generar legitimidad. A diferencia de otros estudios que relacionan la práctica a los motivos (neoliberales), el artículo toma la constitución organizativa de las fundaciones más en serio. En consecuencia, invoca una noción cibernética de control para comprender las múltiples relaciones de poder del programa.
Philanthropic foundations play increasingly prominent roles in the environmental arena, yet remain largely under the radar of environmental governance scholars. We build on the small body of existing research on foundations in environmental governance to outline a research agenda on foundations as agents of environmental governance. The agenda identifies current understandings, debates, and research gaps related to three themes: 1) the roles foundations perform in environmental governance, 2) the outcomes of environmental philanthropy, and 3) the sources of foundation legitimacy. We call for more systematic and empirical research using diverse theoretical perspectives and methodological approaches. This research agenda will contribute to literature on agency in environmental governance by providing a more comprehensive picture of who governs the environment and how. Coming at a time when foundations are facing growing public scrutiny, it can also inform contemporary debates and offer practical insights for effective and equitable environmental philanthropy.
Business schools have played a significant role in creating and sustaining many of today’s grand challenges, including income inequality, the gig economy and climate change. Yet calls for change go unanswered. With a critical perspective on philanthropy, an understanding of power and historical reflexivity, this article helps develop our understanding of why business schools are so deeply rooted in managerialism and so resistant to change. Through archival research, I show how the Ford Foundation used its money and influence in the 1950s to embed a managerialist ideology in American business schools as part of its efforts to sustain and strengthen the capitalist system. Through its outward face of objectivity and neutrality, combined with targeted support of specific schools, individuals and research, the Ford Foundation went beyond shaping the structure and curriculum of business schools to shaping the ideology and identities of management scholars. The more that we, as business academics, understand the full histories of our own institutions and the often hidden or ignored sources of power that played a role in their development, the easier it will be to change business schools in ways that fit our current contexts and support our current and future needs.
Foundations are often criticized as organizations of elite power facing little accountability within their own countries. Simultaneously, foundations are transnational actors that send money to, and exert influence on, foreign countries. We argue that critiques of foundation power should expand to include considerations of national sovereignty. Recently, countries across the globe have introduced efforts to restrict foreign aid, wary of the foreign influences that accompany it. However, it is unknown whether these restrictions impact foundation activity. With data on all grants from US-based foundations to NGOs based in foreign countries between 2000 and 2012, we use a difference-in-difference statistical design to assess whether restrictive laws decrease foundation activity. Our results suggest that restrictive laws rarely have a significant negative effect on the number of grants, dollars, funders, and human rights funding to a country. These results call for attention to considerations of foundation accountability in a transnational context.
Global philanthropy, especially large US philanthropic foundations, has played an active but not unproblematic role in international development. In this article, we theorize the institutional strategies by which global philanthropy exercises its disproportionate influence. In particular, we offer bridges, interdigitates, platforms, and satellites as metaphors for theorizing the connections and disconnections that philanthropic foundations engineer. We draw on the interdisciplinary scholarship on philanthropy and development to identify three epochs: scientific development (1940s – 1970s), partnerships (1970s – 2000s), and philanthrocapitalism (2000s – present). In each of these, we outline how philanthropic foundations have used the above metaphorical institutional mechanisms—separately and increasingly in combination and more sophisticated ways—in making connections and disconnections across developmental geographies, histories, imaginaries, and institutions. Potentially generative, metaphors, we conclude, both offer ways to interpret the disproportionate power of philanthropy as well as challenge it by identifying philanthropy’s underlying assumptions, telos, and exclusions of development.
All non–governmental organizations (NGOs) rely on funding to support their work. But how does the source of funding shape the types of advocacy groups engage in? Using novel panel data collected by the Environmental Funders Network, this research examines how funding from government, foundations, business, and members shape the advocacy work of environmental NGOs (ENGOs) in the UK. Past research suggests that elite funding sources channel groups into institutional advocacy, such as lobbying or litigation, and away from public advocacy, such as protesting. This paper confirms previous research while also showing that all types of funding channel group actions. Foundation and business funding is associated with more institutional advocacy, government funding is associated with non–political advocacy such as species conservation, and member funding is associated with public advocacy. By comparing across funding types, this study demonstrates the ways in which groups are both helped and hindered by funding from different sources.
Global philanthropy is a significant source of financial resources in contemporary international relations, and it has provoked intense debates about the appropriateness of involving private foundations in global policymaking. Despite these facts, International Relations as a discipline has shown remarkably little reference to philanthropy as an important and relevant actor in global politics. In this article, I make the case for explicitly incorporating philanthropy into international relations analyses. Drawing on both historical examples and contemporary cases from the global health space, I show how philanthropy exerts a unique and independent influence within international society and that it needs to be understood holistically rather than focusing solely on individual philanthropic organisations. I also discuss how this expanding influence raises serious questions about accountability and legitimacy. Rather than making an argument about the appropriateness of philanthropy’s involvement in international society, this article aims to make the case for philanthropy’s analytical inclusion within the discipline.
This paper explores the negotiations of foundation program officers who aim to challenge structural inequality across regional geographies of poverty. Beyond the limits to confronting capitalist relationships of production as discussed in critical philanthropy literature, this paper shows how the professional “grantor–grantee” relationship reproduces institutional structures of power. Through the lens of Erving Goffman's “presentation of self” and data from archival and ethnographic research on immigrant and farmworker funding in California's Central Valley and recent interviews with program staff at large foundations in New York City, the paper suggests that Goffman's concepts of performance, idealization, negative idealization, and disruption expand upon a Gramscian theorization of hegemony by highlighting a micro-sociology of power. Building consensus among greatly unequal actors and managing idealized stories about poverty and philanthropy, the foundation program officer brokers political opportunity for grassroots organizations and yet more commonly generates consent.
Negative Returns: The Impact of Impact Investing on Empowerment and Advocacy - Volume 49 Issue 3 - Jeffrey M. Berry
Explaining Liberal Policy Woes in the States: The Role of Donors - Volume 49 Issue 3 - Alexander Hertel-Fernandez
More than Patrons: How Foundations Fuel Policy Change and Backlash - Volume 49 Issue 3 - Sarah Reckhow
Philanthropy has existed in various forms in all cultures and civilizations throughout history, yet most people know little about it and its distinctive place in our lives. Why does philanthropy exist? Why do people so often turn to philanthropy when we want to make the world a better place? In essence, what is philanthropy? These fundamental questions are tackled in this engaging and original book. Written by one of the founding figures in the field of philanthropic studies, Robert L. Payton, and his former student sociologist Michael P. Moody, Understanding Philanthropy presents a new way of thinking about the meaning and mission of philanthropy. Weaving together accessible theoretical explanations with fascinating examples of philanthropic action, this book advances key scholarly debates about philanthropy and offers practitioners a way of explaining the rationale for their nonprofit efforts. © 2008 by Robert L. Payton and Michael P. Moody All rights reserved.
This article presents a theoretical and methodological approach to studying how philanthropic power is maintained through the process of negotiating consensus between greatly unequal partners such as wealthy funders and social movement leaders. It is proposed that grant agreements between private foundations and social movement organizations construct idealized spaces of public participation and discursive theories of change that draw attention away from structural inequality and antagonism, ultimately generating consent. Drawing upon archival and ethnographic research on philanthropic investments in addressing migrant poverty in California's Central Valley, the article shows how consensus between foundation staff and farmworker and immigrant organizers promote funding frameworks that exclude questions that challenge relationships of power and systems of agricultural production that contribute to enduring poverty across the region. The Gramscian conceptual frames of “discursive power,” “hegemony as politics,” and “strategic articulation” are presented as a theoretical framework from which to understand the power of private philanthropy as consensus broker during historical moments of crisis.
This paper critically evaluates the theory of patronage and professional social movement organizations (SMOs) advanced by McCarthy and Zald (1973, 1975, 1977) and the social control theory advanced by their critics (McAdam, 1982; Wilson, 1983; Haines 1984a, 1984b) in interpreting the development of black insurgency. Drawing on time-series analysis of the patronage of private foundations, structural facilitators, and the changing goals, organization and forms of black insurgency between 1953-1980, we find support for the social control theory insofar as: 1) the black movement was an indigenous challenge with professional SMOs playing a secondary role; 2) elite patronage was reactive and directed at moderate classical SMOs and professional SMOs; 3) this patronage professionalized the movement, strengthening the staff in classical SMOs and creating new professional SMOs; and 4) these processes did not generate movement growth and may have accelerated movement decay. Yet, contrary to the social control theory, we also found that: 1) movement decay had multiple sources, professionalization being secondary to partial success and strategic problems; and 2) professionalization may have weakened the challenge but did not transform movement goals or tactics. "Channeling" may be a more apt metaphor than "control" for analyzing the effects of patronage and professionalization on social movement development.
Philanthropy plays a major role in university-based scientific, engineering and medical research in the United States contributing over 7Billion a year. This major contribution to U.S. scientific competitiveness comes from private foundations as well as gifts from wealthy individuals. From the researcher’s perspective, analysis in this paper demonstrates that science philanthropy provides almost 30% of the annual research funds of those in leading universities. And yet science philanthropy has been largely overshadowed by the massive rise of Federal research funding and, to a lesser extent, industry funding. Government and industry funding have drawn intensive analysis, partly because their objectives are measureable: governments generally support broad national goals and basic research, while industry finances projects likely to contribute directly to useful products. In contrast, philanthropy’s contribution to overall levels of scientific funding, and, more importantly, the distribution of philanthropy across different types of research is poorly understood. To fill this gap, we provide the first empirical evaluation of the role of science philanthropy in American research universities. The documented extent of science philanthropy and its strong emphasis on translational medical research raises important questions for Federal policymakers. In determining their own funding strategies, they must no longer assume that their funding is the only source in shaping some fields of research, while recognizing that philanthropy may ignore other important fields.Institutional subscribers to the NBER working paper series, and residents of developing countries may download this paper without additional charge at www.nber.org.
Foundations are prime constructors of hegemony, by promoting consent and discouraging dissent against capitalist democracy. There is considerable collaboration among foundations and their networks of nonprofits; between philanthropic foundations and profitmaking corporations; and between the foundation world and government entities, local, state, national and international. We do not have to posit any secret conspiracies (although they may well exist). The proponents of “civil society” celebrate the erosion of boundaries, especially those between the public and private sectors, while “networks” consisting of funders and grassroots organizations enable the powerful to appear as just another participant. These developments, as Zbigniew Brzezinski has observed, “obscure asymmetries in power and influence.” Democratic institutions are quietly being supplanted by a “new feudalism.”
"Venture philanthropy" burst loudly onto the scene in the mid- to late 1990s, promoted as a way to revolutionize grantmaking. Today the field has been refined, and its proponents are more modest. The case of venture philanthropy provides insights into the construction and evolution of a "new" organizational field and "new" professional culture, topics that require further scholarly exploration. Qualitative research examining venture philanthropy organizations and their leaders is reported here. Findings suggest that although the dot-com boom was an important prompt, the construction and diffusion of the field depended on opinion leaders who strategically defined, legitimated, and advocated the new model. The fit with existing culture and institutionalization via networks were also important. Implementation difficulties and the business-nonprofit culture clash are among factors forcing evolution of the field. Several avenues for further research on this understudied field, and on other new fields and hybrid professional cultures, are suggested by these findings. © 2008 Association for Research on Nonprofit Organizations and Voluntary Action.
This article traces the relationship between the Ford Foundation and the black-power incarnation of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) from 1967-1969, through two grants to CORE for voter registration and leadership training in Cleveland's black community. It uses this case to analyze what has often been seen as a key turning point in the history of American racial liberalism in the mid-1960s, when American society wrestled with the meaning of black freedom within the paradox of African Americans' newly reaf- firmed legal equality and the social reality of structural inequality that continued to plague black people nationwide. While the race-conscious liberalism that resulted might be seen as new, this article argues that the asymmetrical relationship of the Ford Foundation and CORE was based on shared convictions about organizing the ghetto that were both mainstream and often longstanding. It also demonstrates the ongoing force of white power in the black-power era.
The American chemical-industrial complex grew at a phenomenal rate which provoked the public's increasing concern with the environment. The most prominent liberal philantropic organizations, like the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations, have been actively funded by progressive activists including those involved in the environmental movement. Its strategic grant-making practices have played an important role in helping solidify elite cultural hegemony through the co-option of the environmental movement by channeling the movement's work away from more radical ventures. The foundation funding remained a significant source of money for environmental groups. The foundation support made up around a quarter of the total organization income of the large, thereby establishing American environmental groups. Although the foundation funding is typically relatively small, the liberal foundations have helped promote "the primacy of 'professional-led' advocacy, lobbying, and litigation over direct action and grassroots organizing, a single-issue approach to problem-solving over more principled approaches and the 'neutralization' of environmental politics in comparison to linking environmental problems larger issues of social justice and corporate power".
A taxonomy of literature reviews in education and psychology is presented. The taxonomy categorizes reviews according to:
(a) focus; (b) goal; (c) perspective; (d) coverage; (e) organization; and (f) audience. The seven winners of the American
Educational Research Association’s Research Review Award are used to illustrate the taxonomy’s categories. Data on the reliability
of taxonomy codings when applied by readers is presented. Results of a survey of review authors provides baseline data on
how frequently different types of reviews appear in the education and psychology literature. How the taxonomy might help in
judging the quality of literature reviews is discussed, along with more general standards for evaluating reviews.
The Givers: Wealth, Power, and Philanthropy in a New Gilded Age
- D Callahan
Callahan, D. (2017). The Givers: Wealth, Power, and Philanthropy in a New Gilded Age. Knopf
Doubleday Publishing Group.
The Foundation: A Great American Secret; How Private Wealth is Changing the World
- J L Fleishman
Fleishman, J. L. (2007). The Foundation: A Great American Secret; How Private Wealth is
Changing the World. PublicAffairs.
A Versatile American Institution: The Changing Ideals and Realities of Philanthropic Foundations
- D C Hammack
- H K Anheier
HAMMACK, D. C., & ANHEIER, H. K. (2013). A Versatile American Institution: The
Changing Ideals and Realities of Philanthropic Foundations. Brookings Institution Press.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7864/j.ctt127w2j
Giving and getting: Philanthropy as a social relation
- S A Ostrander
- P G Schervish
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