I come to PSJP’s working paper on Philanthropy in Russia two and a half years removed from direct engagement in the Russian philanthropic sector since the Mott Foundation halted grantmaking to organizations there. Reading the paper, published in January 2018, therefore helped me reacquaint myself with some of the actors, trends and challenges faced then,…
Philanthropy in Brazil has the potential to play a much larger role in expanding and consolidating democracy. The working paper on Philanthropy in Brazil, recently published by Philanthropy for Social Justice and Peace (PSJP) in association with Alliance, WINGS and Brazil’s Philanthropy Network for Social Justice, is an important tool for a comprehensive understanding of…
Thanks to Nora Murad for raising important issues in her blog responding to PSJP’s report on Philanthropy in the Arab Region. Local discourses are something I work hard to highlight, including asset-based (vs needs-based) development and horizontal philanthropy that tends to ‘shift the power’. What is needed is to encourage people out there who are…
A comprehensive and well-written report, Caroline Hartnell’s just-released Philanthropy in the Arab Region: A working paper gave me a feeling of déjà vu. The report featured the same deservedly respected experts that are featured in every report on Arab philanthropy, and they were saying things I’d heard for years at conferences, in articles, and, I…
By Bassma Kodmani I started to highlight the sentences that inspired me, as I often do, with the intention of citing Barry Knight’s Rethinking Poverty in my own lectures or writings, but I found myself highlighting whole paragraphs. This book is much more than a book on poverty. It is about creativity and leadership, about power relations…
India is said to be the world’s second most unequal country, after Russia. Despite tremendous progress in reducing absolute poverty in the past two decades, and despite India’s promising economic growth, 97 per cent of the country would still be considered poor or low-income by global standards. What can developed countries with high levels of poverty like the UK learn…
Caroline Hartnell’s Philanthropy in the Arab Region: A Working Paper is a fascinating account of the breadth of generosity and innovation in the Arab region. Philanthropic practices covered in the report run a wide gamut from traditional philanthropy, which emanates from social solidarity and religious values of giving, to corporate philanthropy, impact investing and social…
By Birger Stamperdahl The non-profit sector in India is perhaps unlike that of any other country. By many accounts, the sector is massive, made up of hundreds of thousands of registered groups ranging from neighbourhood associations to well-organized non-profits with national reach. The diversity and size of the sector is probably larger than that of any…
By Barry Knight ‘Come to the edge’ was the invitation, and 200 came. The premise of the Edge Funders Conference held in New Orleans from 17th to 20th April 2018 was that from the edge you can see all sorts of things that you can’t see from the centre. The discussion lived up to its…
By Swarna Rajagopalan I founded and run a small nonprofit, Prajnya, far from the capital city and off the radar of foundation offices; our work features neither in CSR schedules nor in government schemes; we have no FCRA or marketing genius. All I had when I started off was a decent slate of academic and interpersonal skills,…