Did the pandemic prompt a rethinking of funder-grantee dynamics?
The pandemic also saw funders who had previously shied away from social justice work become more amenable to funding these critical areas.
Funds
How I lost my respect doing community-led work
I came into the development sector as a very passionate person. That passion drove my career from the “entry-level” to various senior roles. I rose to eventually manage one of the international organisations (INGO) as its Country Director. In this role, I was responsible for all country operations. The role came with many privileges and a lot of status. It gave me access to high-level meetings not only in Tanzania where I am based, but also at the international level. From this, I got a lot of respect, status, and access to a luxurious life.
To my feminist siblings, there is a funding crisis in feminist activism.
When the sector talks about donor fatigue or donors saying they don’t see where the money is going. Well, only less than 10% of your money comes directly to us. They should ask Northern CSOs about the other 90% – they shouldn’t ask us.
Llamamiento a los participantes en la COP28
Mientras los líderes mundiales se reunían en la COP de Dubai, más de 700 agentes de cambio que trabajan en comunidades de más de 80 países se reunieron en Bogotá con el objetivo de aprovechar y movilizar recursos para que todos puedan prosperar, incluso en medio de la crisis climática.
A call to COP28 participants:
As global leaders met at the COP in Dubai, over 700 change-makers who work in communities in over 80 countries met in Bogotá with a focus on harnessing and mobilizing resources so that all may thrive, even in the midst of the climate crisis.
Looking in the mirror: Personal reflections on decolonizing aid
As we undertook this work, we came to appreciate the depth of our personal conditioning as well as that of the staff, leadership, and organisations that engaged in these conversations. We became more aware of the extent to which our own personal perspectives and those of others involved in the discussions have been shaped by existing norms and practices of aid.
From Unicorn to Zebra: The transformation of ZGF
Unicorn organizations are extractive, ruthlessly competitive, and hierarchical in their relationships with others, especially local organisations, while zebras tend to have flatter structures informed by the people they serve, and they value empathy and solidarity. Unicorns speak sophisticated English and they “impress” with terms like scalability, profitability, innovation, impact, cash, burn rate, key performance indicators, and IRR (internal rate of return). Zebras don’t know those fancy words because they speak like regular people using less technical terms.
Measuring in complexity
On 9th May 2023, the Global Fund for Community Foundation hosted a meeting with Deepthy Menon in conversation with Barry Knight on Measuring What Matters. The following are extracts from the meeting repurposed into a written Q&A to extend this conversation to a wider audience.
Philanthropy: What’s trust got to do with it?
One of the things I struggled with early on when I started to understand the #ShiftThePower movement was the concept of “trust”. The idea was strange to me; during discussions around the concept, I asked if it was genuinely possible to trust that an organization could do the work independently without being held to so many checks and due diligence processes.
The Alliance of Funds: Collaborative philanthropy under construction in Brazil
Although collaboration is an old practice among philanthropic organizations, the idea of “collaborative philanthropy” in Brazil is relatively new and is a concept still under construction. Here in Brazil, collaboration is creating new relationships in the field of philanthropy for social justice. It all started in 2021.