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On this episode, we talk to philosopher and lawyer Patricia Illingworth about her recent book Giving Now: Accelerating Human Rights for All, and about how we can apply the framework of human rights to some of the big questions about the nature and role of philanthropy. Including:

• What does it mean to use human rights as a framework for understanding donor responsibilities?
• Is philanthropy a choice or a duty?
• Do human rights responsibilities apply to all philanthropy, or just a certain portion of it? If a donor has given substantially to rights-furthering causes, is it acceptable for them to give additionally in a different way?
• Would an idealized world still contain philanthropy, or would it be one in which all philanthropy was unnecessary? If there was still some philanthropy in an idealized world, what kind would it be?
•  Is the rise of “purpose-driven business” and “compassionate capitalism” something we should welcome or be sceptical about?
• Should nonprofits always reject tainted donations, or is it possible to “turn bad money into good”?
• Can a human rights lens help us to determine whether source of wealth are tainted, and what course of action we should take? 
• In cases where wealth itself isn’t tainted through its mode of creation, but the donor may be ethically problematic, is it more or less acceptable to take the money?
• What is “moral self-licensing” and why does it provide a basis for thinking that nonprofits should not accept untainted money from tainted donors?
•  Do charities or funders that make use of “poverty porn” infringe on the human rights of recipients? What does this mean for nonprofit fundraising?
• Can philanthropy be used to strengthen democracy, or is it inherently anti-democratic?
•  How can a human rights lens help us to determine when philanthropy is acting positively even though it is running counter to democracy?
• Why is a philosophical perspective on philanthropy valuable/important? 

Related Links:

• Patricia's book Giving Now
• Excerpt in SSIR, "Tackling Moral Self-Licensing"
• Patricia's personal website
• Philanthropisms podcast episode on tainted donations
• Philanthropisms podcast episode on combining profit & purpose
• Philanthropisms podcast episode with Emma Saunders-Hastings
• Philanthropisms podcast episode with Ben Soskis
• WPM article on Patagonia and nonprofit corporate ownership
• WPM guide to tainted donations

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In this episode we take a deep dive into an issue that has been generating a lot of debate recently: is pluralism in philanthropy a good thing, or not? Including:

• What has caused the latest furore, and what has the reaction been?
• Is philanthropic freedom genuinely under threat, and if so why? Or is this just a straw man?
• Should donors and foundations be free to "engage in the unfettered pursuit of their own mission, interests and prerogatives", or are there arguments for constraining this freedom?
• Is there an inherent tension in philanthropy between individual liberty and systemic equity? How can we balance these competing demands?
• Should we value pluralism because it enables diversity of thought and values, and provides the material for a healthy "battle of ideas" that can strengthen democracy? 
• Is pluralism a necessary part of allowing marginalised groups and communities to overcome the "tyranny of the majority" and drive social change?
• Is accepting that civil society will contain things we may not like or agree with the necessary cost of pluralism? Is this a price worth paying?
• Is pluralism a noble idea in theory but naive in practice, when in reality power is skewed towards defence of the status quo and vested interests?
• Can everyday giving help to produce a form of pluralism that avoids some of the problems that come when we rely on elite philanthropy?
• Do we need to constrain pluralism, and if so how?
• To what extent is this a US-specific debate?
• Do nonprofits need to be "civil" or "polite" when they disagree? Or does this ignore the historical reality of social change?

Related links

• The letter to the Chronicle of Philanthropy that has sparked this debate, "We Disagree on Many Things, but We Speak With One Voice in Support of Philanthropic Pluralism"
• Vu Le, "Philanthropy’s equivalent of “All Lives Matter”"
• Edgar Villanueva, "Debunking the Myth of Philanthropic Pluralism"
• Phil Buchanan, "Who Is Threatening ‘Philanthropic Freedom?’"
• Philip Rojc, "The End of Philanthropic History and that Pluralism Op-Ed"
• Philanthropisms podcast with Edgar Villanueva
• Philanthropisms podcast with Emma Saunders-Hastings
• Why Philanthropy Matters article, "Voluntary Woke? Philanthropy, Civil Society & The Culture Wars"
• Rhod's article for Beacon Collaborative, "Can we agree to disagree when it comes to philanthropy?"
• Supreme Court Justice Lewis Powell verdict in "Bob Jones University vs United States"
• JS  Mill, "

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In this episode we take a look at the long history of the relationship between philanthropy and music. Including:

Philanthropy supporting music

• Patronage & philanthropy
• Who gets to decide which music count as "art"?
• How did Victorian paternalism tie in with the promotion of music?
• How and when did the state come to accept responsibility for funding music?

Musicians as Philanthropists

• How does the fact that many musicians come from relatively modest or poor backgrounds inform their giving?
• Celebrity musician philanthropy: from Jenny Lind to John Legend
• The history of charity fundraising concerts

Philanthropy in Music

• Are there any good songs about philanthropy?

Related Links

• Rhod's article on "Marcus Rashford, Dolly Parton and public perceptions of Philanthropy"
• Classic FM, "Who were the great patrons of music?"
• Classic FM, "Seven times when great composers made some noise for charity"
• Drummond (1978)  "The Royal Society of Musicians in the Eighteenth Century"
• Uy, Michael Sy (2017) "The Big Bang of Music Patronage in the United States: The National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Ford Foundation". (PhD Thesis)
• Samples (2016) "The Humbug and the Nightingale: P. T. Barnum, Jenny Lind, and the Branding of a Star Singer for American Reception"
• Rolling Stone, "Prince, the Secret Philanthropist: ‘His Cause Was Humanity’"
• Guardian, "The philanthropic acts of George Michael: from £5k tips to nurses' gigs"
• Nonprofit Quarterly, "Sankofa Philanthropy: Hip Hop’s Sixth Element"
• BBC, "10 pop stars who donated unbelievable amounts of money"
• Rolling Stone, "Heal the World: 20 Songs for a Good Cause"
• Lee (2010)"Heeding the Call: An Historical Overview of Philanthropy in Rock"

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In this episode we talk to philanthropist Dr Ewan Kirk, founder of the Turner Kirk Trust, about why he believes it is so important that philanthropists are willing to take risks and give the organisations they support  'permission to fail'. Including:

• Why is it so important to give charities permission to fail?
• What factors make something a “good” failure rather than a “bad” one?
•  What is the nature of the risk in philanthropy? 
• Is philanthropy as a whole too risk averse? 
• Can we do anything to encourage donors/funders to take more risks and be willing to “fail”? 
• Why is it important, in terms of giving charities the freedom to take risks, that we get away from asking them to deliver specific outcomes?
• Should we still try to gauge the effectiveness/success of funding?
• Would more unrestricted funding help to foster a culture of risk taking and innovation?
• When looking for genuinely transformative solutions to long-standing problems, it is necessary to support ‘upstream’ work (e.g. research, policy and advocacy) as well as ‘downstream’ work (e.g. direct interventions)?
•  Is there sometimes a danger that philanthropists go too far in looking for “big bets” or “moonshots”, and overlook more immediate issues and potential solutions as a result?
• Is it necessary to rein this tendency in at all? (i.e. to set parameters for what is “acceptable risk” when it comes to deploying philanthropic resources?)
• If one of the potential “exits” for risk-taking philanthropists is to get the state to adopt innovations or change the way it does things, what is best way of ensuring that this happens?
• If philanthropy genuinely has a higher risk tolerance than the public sector, why is that?
• Could the state itself become more risk-tolerant, or will it always need philanthropy?

 
Related links:

• The Turner Kirk Trust
• Ewan's interview for the Beacon Collaborative on "Why donors should give charities ‘permission to fail'"
• Why Philanthropy Matters short guide to core cost funding
• Why Philanthropy Matters short guide to impact measurement

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In this episode we talk to Michael Thatcher, CEO of US nonprofit rating service Charity Navigator,  about why and how the organisation tries to help people to choose charities more effectively. Including:

• What is Charity Navigator? What is its mission and what services does it offer to try to achieve that goal?
• What criteria does the Charity Navigator rating system encompass?
• What are the biggest challenges when it comes to gathering and providing data on nonprofit organisations?
• What are the key audiences for charity ratings and how do they use the information?
• Can ratings systems help to address the problem of donors focusing on unhelpful measures like overhead ratios? 
• How do growing debates about whether measurement in the non-profit world too often becomes a tool for reinforcing the power dynamics between donors and recipients affect the work of charity ratings services and platforms?
• One of the functions of a rating service like Charity Navigator is to help keep people safe from charity fraud. How do you do this in a way that boosts trust in non-profits, rather than contributing to cynicism?
• Are nonprofit platforms neutral intermediaries, or do they have a role in shaping giving to make it more effective/equitable? 
• What role does Charity Navigator play in disaster/crisis response? What specific challenges does this pose? 
•  Do platforms like Charity Navigator have any role in rebalancing inequities in how funding is distributed (i.e. by highlighting under-resourced cause areas or geographies)?
• What responsibilities do platforms bear for the choice of which organisations do and don’t make it onto their lists? Is it ever necessary to take decisions to exclude certain organisations, even where they are legal?
• With increasing focus on giving to social movements, grassroots organisations and even individuals, does Charity Navigator have any plans to expand its ratings beyond traditional non-profits?
•  What new possibilities might emerging tech offer for Charity Navigator's work in the future?

Related Links:

• Charity Navigator
• Mashable article on Charity Navigator's new website
• Vox article on Charity Navigator's merger with Impact Matters
• Philanthropisms podcast episode with Martha Lackritz-Peltier
• Philanthropisms podcast episode on the Platformization of Philanthropy

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This episode is the first of what will hopefully be a regular series, in partnership with the European Research Network on Philanthropy (ERNOP), in which we discuss their quarterly Research Notes. This is a new project that will produce short, accessible summaries of recent academic research relating to philanthropy, with the aim of bringing research to a wider audience of practitioners, policymakers and others.

In this initial episode, Rhod talks briefly to Barry Hoolwerf, Executive Director of ERNOP, and Sevda Kilicalp, Head of Research & Knowledge at Philea (one of the key European philanthropy infrastructure bodies) about why and how the research note project has come about, and what some of the challenges are when it comes to bridging the gap between academia and practice in philanthropy.

There are then 3 short interviews with academics whose work is featured in the initial set of research notes, about the focus of their research, key findings and why it is relevant to practitioners:
- Giedre Lideikyte Huber, from the University of Geneva
- Elisa Ricciuti, now an independent researcher but formerly at  SDA Bocconi School of Management, Milan
- Malika Ouacha, PhD candidate at  Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University in the Netherlands

Related Links:

• ERNOP's research notes
• Background on the research note series
• ERNOP's call for Practitioner Experts
• Reflections on the International Philanthropy Research Conference 2022 from ERNOP & Philea
• Giedre's paper (with Marta Pittavino) "Who donates and how? New evidence on the tax incentives in the canton of Geneva, Switzerland"
• Elisa's paper (with Francesca Calo) "Are foundations assessing their impact? Concepts, methods and barriers to social impact assessment in Italian foundations" 
• Malika's paper "Diasporic Volunteering in Cross-National Perspective: Is faith-based more effective than secular philanthropy? A case of the Netherlands and Morocco"
• Philanthropisms podcast episode with Mihaela Giurgiu.

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In this episode Rhod talks to philanthropy adviser Emma Beeston and academic Dr Beth Breeze about their new book Advising Philanthropists. Including:

• What are some of the key elements of philanthropy advice?
• How much is philanthropy advice about objective, technical things (e.g. tax, structures etc) and how much is it about subjective things (about finding purpose, understanding values etc)?
• At what stage in their ‘philanthropic journey’ are donors most likely to seek advice?
• Where do donors tend to get philanthropy advice from? What impact does the source of the advice have on the nature of the advice?
• Is philanthropy advice normally a one-off or time limited service, or an ongoing relationship?
• To what extent do advisers see their role as neutral agents servicing the demands of donors vs active agents challenging them/shaping their approach? 
• What factors make for a successful donor/adviser relationship?
• What does “success” look like for a philanthropy adviser? (i.e. more giving, ‘better giving’, both?)
• What are some of the biggest challenges/frustrations for philanthropy advisers? 
• How common is it for private banks/wealth management firms to offer philanthropy advice? 
• When they do, is this seen as a business proposition (i.e. by increasing client retention, strengthening relationships etc), or part of the company’s social responsibility?
• What are the core skills you need to be a philanthropy adviser?
• What is the relationship like between philanthropy advisers and fundraisers? Do the latter see the former as useful points of contact with wealthy donors, or unhelpful gatekeepers?
• What role can philanthropy advisers play in helping to manage the transfer of wealth between generations?
• Are there any signs that next gen donors are more or less willing to seek advice on their giving?
• Are next gen donors looking for the same kind of advice as previous generations or different kinds?
• How much power do advisers have to shape donor’s giving?
• Does this bring responsibilities (e.g. to be transparent about who they are, and what role they play?)
• How many advisers see it as part of their role to make donors aware of critiques of philanthropy and offer them ways of addressing them?

Related Links:

• Emma and Beth's book Advising Philanthropists
• The University of Kent Centre for Philanthropy Masters in Philanthropic Studies (where, if you enrol, you can get taught by Beth, Emma and me!)
• Beth's book In Defence of Philanthropy
• Emma's website
• Emma on the Charity Impact Podcast with Alex Blake
• Emma and Beth's guest article for Inside Philanthropy "Lifting the Curtain on Philanthropy Advising"
• Emma's blog for DSC, "Shedding some light on philanthropy advising"
• Rhod's WPM article "You’re the Philanthropist Now!: A roll-your-own adventure"

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On this episode, as part of our occasional mini-series in partnership with NPC, we talk to Tris Lumley about open philanthropy: what it is, why it is important, and how we make it happen. Including:

• What is NPC’s Open Philanthropy project? How did it come about?
• How has NPC been putting some of its thinking about open philanthropy into practice?
• What is the difference between “outward openness” and “inward openness” in philanthropy?
• Do foundations (and donors) need to be more transparent? 
• If so, why? (Is this primarily about making philanthropy more legitimate, or more effective/efficient?)
• What do they need to be open about? (e.g. income, spending, diversity of staff/trustees, how decisions are made etc).
• How can we make use of open data in philanthropy?
• Why might some funders be reluctant to be more open? Is this ever justified?
• Does philanthropy need to get better at valuing different forms of knowledge?
•  How do you balance the value of experience and the value of expertise?
• Are there challenges for traditional grantmakers when it comes to bringing communities and people with lived experience into decision making processes?
• What does the focus on inclusion mean for our approaches to measurement?
• How important is core-cost and multi-year funding when it comes to making philanthropy more inwardly open?
• Is trust-based philanthropy more open (i.e. because it asks less of grantees in terms of reporting etc), or more closed (i.e. because it relies on developing trusting relationships and can therefore become cliquey)?

Related Links

• NPC's Open Philanthropy project
• Why Philanthropy Matters guides to Core Cost Funding and Measuring Impact.
• Philanthropisms podcast episodes with Angela Kail and Dan Corry from NPC.
• Philanthropisms podcast episode with Sadaf Shallwani.

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In this episode we talk to historian and political scientist Claire Dunning about her book Nonprofit Neighborhoods: An urban history of inequality and the American state, and her work on the history of radical philanthropy in Boston. Including:

-What are the “nonprofit neighborhoods” described in the book?
-Can participation in nonprofits become an alternative to involvement in the mainstream structures of civic participation, rather than a route into them? Does this undermine the Tocquevillean ideal of voluntary associations as “nurseries of democracy”?
-Is there any danger that in becoming partners with/agents for the state, nonprofits undermine their own ability to speak out? Is this due to active stipulation by state funders, or more through self-censorship by nonprofits?
-Have government efforts to involve nonprofits been driven in part by a desire to bypass the scepticism that might otherwise have been aimed at big government-delivered welfare and social reform programmes?
-To what extent was the involvement of nonprofits in programmes like the War on Poverty designed centrally (i.e. by Washington policymakers) and how much was a result of local implementation?
-What does the history of FUND (Fund for Urban Negro Development) and BUFF (Boston Black United Front Foundation) tell us about the challenges of trying to use philanthropy to address deep-seated issues of racial inequality?
-Is it ever possible to have truly “no strings attached “ giving, or are there always hidden strings?
-What can history tell us about the risk that foundations and other funders co-opt social movements by deliberately introducing grant stipulations etc aimed to direct the focus of the movement away from controversial areas or soften their tactics?
-What can the FUND/BUFF example tell us about current debates between donor-centric and community-centric fundraising?
-What value can a historical perspective can bring to philanthropists, funders and non-profit professionals?
-Are there limits to the utility of historical comparison in understanding the present? What should we take into account or be aware of?
-What is the value of historical edge cases?

Related Links:

• Claire's book Nonprofit Neighborhoods
• Claire's article in Nonprofit & Voluntary Sector Quarterly, " No Strings Attached: Philanthropy, Race, and Donor Control From Black Power to Black Lives Matter" (currently open access).
• Claire's 2018 paper "Outsourcing Government: Boston and the Rise of Public–Private Partnerships"
• Philanthropisms podcast with Emma Saunders-Hastings
• Philanthropisms podcast with Tyrone McKinley Freeman
• Philanthropisms podcast with Maribel Morey
• Why Philanthropy Matters guide to philanthropy & the welfare state

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In this episode Rhod talks to Jake Ferguson and Vanessa Thomas, two of the Committee members of the Baobab Foundation - a new member-led endowed grantmaker that is seeking to address issues of systemic racism and intersectional injustice in the UK. Including:

• How did the Baobab Foundation come about? 
• What has been the progress so far?
• Has the momentum behind addressing issues of racial justice that we saw in the nonprofit world following the murder of George Floyd in 2020 been maintained?
• Why have Black and minority-led organisations historically lost out when it comes to philanthropic funding?
• How is Baobab foundation trying to shift power to those who would traditionally have been seen as the recipients of philanthropy?
• Why has Baobab decided not to adopt a traditional charitable structure?
• How is Baobab trying to influence the way other funders work?
• Does the philanthropy sector in the UK have a diversity problem?
• Can Baobab play a longer-term role in offering a route into grantmaking for more people from Black and minority communities?
• Why is building an endowment such an important aim of Baobab?
• Can Baobab play a useful role as an intermediary in overcoming some of the barriers in relationships between more traditional/risk-averse funders and grassroots organisations/social movements?
• Are there challenges in trying to bring together different types of knowledge (e.g. lived experience and professional expertise)? How do you navigate these?
• Why was it important for Baobab to adopt a horizonatal, non-hierarchical structure?
• How can measurement be a useful tool for organisations that receive funding, and not just a means to reinforce the dominance of the funder?
• How can donors, funders and CSOs get involved with Baobab Foundation?

Related Links:

• Baobab Foundation
• Philanthropisms podcast with Sara Slaughter and Derek Mitchell
• Philanthropisms podcast with Derek Bardowell
• Philanthropisms podcast with Sadaf Shallwani
• WPM article on charities and politics