The challenges for foundations — and the nonprofits they support — will be stark in 2018, given all that has happened in the past year.
Hurricanes and wildfires ravaged dozens of American communities. White supremacists marched boldly in our streets. Deadly mass shootings happened with alarming regularity. Murders of black men and boys by police continued unabated and unpunished. President Trump stoked fires of hatred toward immigrants, Muslims, and people of color. Republicans forced through a tax plan that benefits the ultra-wealthy at the expense of everyone else, that will decimate charitable giving, and that sets the stage for spending cuts that will disproportionately hurt the poor and the vulnerable.
At the same time, there was one promising development that we must build on in the year ahead.
Many Americans became engaged in politics and resistance more broadly and more seriously than they had been in decades. As has often been the case in our country’s history, people of color — especially blacks — kicked off these efforts several years ago as a response to state violence targeting people of color.
Now, many others followed their lead. Citizen action and protest prevented multiple attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and women continued building on a movement against sexual harassment and violence that is rewriting social norms in a positive way. What’s more, candidates for public office who support women’s rights and civil rights won big in Virginia and Alabama, thanks to the efforts of grassroots organizations led primarily by black women.
Many foundations and major donors contributed to this uptick in civic engagement with rapid-response grants, long-term investments in community organizing, and more. Grant makers are having conversations about what it means to be effective and relevant in this time.
But mere discussion and sporadic philanthropic leadership are not enough. We are in a protracted battle for the soul of the nation, and our society needs sustained commitment and courage from wealthy elites who have a vision for a fair and more just society.
In 2018, what grant makers choose to do next is vital. America needs its foundations and wealthy donors to act on the recommendations that many nonprofit leaders have been making for years about how to be effective and support long-term changes in the systems that serve people, allow them social mobility, and protect the planet. We need foundations and other donors to use their incredible freedoms and privileges for the common good.
Here are three of the most important ways donors can move America forward:
Stand strong with communities under threat.
Neutrality is not an asset, despite the oft-repeated pablum about foundations being “neutral conveners.”
I’ll concede that there may have been a time when neutrality was valuable, but it certainly isn’t now. We need grant makers of all sizes and types to unequivocally stand with people of color, the poor, the disabled, immigrants, LGBTQ people, and others who are being targeted by the Trump administration and its allies.
Emboldened white supremacists and corporate titans are threatening our democratic experiment, and we need foundation leaders and wealthy donors to speak out and use their personal power to stand up for an inclusive and more just society.
Donors Nick Hanauer and Abigail Disney caught my attention in 2017 with their bold leadership, as did foundation chief executives Judy Belk, Jamie Merisotis, Grant Oliphant, Rip Rapson, Bob Ross, Luz Vega-Marquis, Darren Walker, and others.
Those leaders used their positions to speak out against President Trump’s travel ban, the GOP tax overhaul, white supremacy, and other bad policy and rhetoric coming from Washington. They did so in speeches and at conferences of nonprofit leaders, as well as through opinion articles, blogs, and email announcements to their constituents.
My message to every donor, every foundation CEO, and every trustee in philanthropy is that you should be thinking about when and how you will do more to stand with vulnerable communities in 2018. If not, your silence will convict you.
Invest in efforts to build political power everywhere, especially in the South.
As Dr. Ross, CEO of the California Endowment, has frequently pointed out, the most pressing social problems in our society don’t persist because of a lack of innovation but, rather, because of a lack of power. Donors can and should invest heavily in helping marginalized people build power, and that means funding community organizations and advocacy organizations, along with their related advocacy groups, often structured under Section 501c4 of the tax code.
We need these kinds of investments in every state and every county across the nation, and we need special attention and extra investment in the South.
Foundations and donors have ignored the South for too long, to the detriment of the entire country. Capacity to fight back does exist in the South, and there are tremendous opportunities to create change if foundations and major donors have the will and provide serious investment, especially in organizations led by people of color. Many groups, including Grantmakers for Southern Progress and the organization I lead, have been working to document the needs, opportunities, and challenges of funding social change in the South.
The civil-rights movement — our country’s most recent broad-based movement for social justice that effectively changed policy on the national level — was born and nurtured in the South. It is possible to have that kind of broad-based movement again if foundations step up and make bold investments in Southern leadership now.
Share power with grantees by providing multiyear general operating support.
We live in a world where opportunities and obstacles are constantly shifting. Providing long-term general operating support is always important, and in this current moment, it’s more crucial than ever.
General operating support allows grantees to adapt to changing conditions, to break down silos, and to focus on impact. Multiyear grants allow them to plan and to attract the best talent. For too long, foundations have used restricted support to set the terms of their grantees’ work. Deep, lasting change requires philanthropy to relinquish some of this power.
The world also needs grant makers to make decisions more quickly and to move money out the door faster. Some foundations are doing this, but far too many still take six months or more to consider grant requests before any money gets into the hands of the organizations working on the front lines. Simpler and more flexible application and reporting requirements would be a great step forward in 2018, too.
Most important, we need more urgency.
The threat I see for 2018 is that some foundations and major donors may feel like the worst of the crisis in democracy is behind us.
They may long for a return to normalcy in how they practice philanthropy. Nothing could be more dangerous. If donors return to business as usual, American democracy is at risk.
We need more urgency, more courage, and more focus from philanthropic leaders in 2018, not less. Wealthy elites in philanthropy cannot and should not lead the resistance that will make the country live up to its founding promise, but we can and must be partners with the grassroots leaders whose lives are at stake and who are risking so very much to build a better society.
Aaron Dorfman is CEO of the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy.
