Philanthropy and Crises: Reflections from ERNOP 2023

The European Research Network on Philanthropy (ERNOP) held its 11^th conference in Zagreb, Croatia, from June 29-30, 2023. The conference theme focused on philanthropy and crises: Roles and functioning of philanthropy in times of societal upheavals. PFC staff members Laetitia Gill and Michele Fugiel Gartner attended to facilitate sessions and present their research.

Philanthropy is a global phenomenon, yet its manifestations are nuanced by culture and context. While the conference focused on Central and Eastern Europe, its high-level themes are important for Canadian foundations and practitioners. We share three key themes below:

1) Cultivating Safe Spaces

Within poly-crises or perma-crises, the state of living through one crisis after another, it has never been a more important time to bridge the knowledge and relationship gaps between academics and practitioners. ERNOP has recently focused efforts toward these ends through its Research Notes, a two-page synthesis of academic research that practitioner experts synthesize.

Similarly, the pre-conference day, ERNOP Safe Spaces, brought together academic and practitioner facilitators to develop a paper and host a conversation on five urgent philanthropy themes: diversity, leadership and governance, community, impact, and advocacy. The discussions generated unique cultural, contextual, and identity insights. In addition, the Journal of Philanthropy and Marketing will publish these papers and respondents’ commentaries to continue the dialogue, capture the jointly-created knowledge, and bridge perspectives.

Safe Spaces provided practitioners with a peer-learning space to exchange on topics essential to the functioning of philanthropic organizations but which often create friction and frustration. Practitioners were provided with academic reflections on the issues to understand better the processes and possibilities to overcome these frictions, stay on top of the most recent research, and connect their daily practice and strategic thinking with research evidence. For academics, it provided an opportunity to engage in in-depth conversations on important issues for philanthropic professionals and to integrate feedback into their work. Under Chatham House’s rules, the discussions provided a platform to share knowledge and raise new avenues for innovative research and collaborations. For instance, in the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion safe space, participants contemplated the role of philanthropy in promoting diversity, internally and externally. Should it be a priority for philanthropic organizations, and if so, why and how? Do foundations, staff and board members carry a special responsibility for promoting diversity to create more inclusive and equal societies?

2) Growing infrastructure supports the ability to collaborate and respond

How does civil society ensure it can weather crises? Each plenary session asked this question, offering theoretical and contextual views from Europe. There was a shared sense that developing philanthropic infrastructure, even bureaucracy, is essential for ensuring that organizations are resilient enough to handle crises. In one case, the back-to-back crises of COVID-19, natural disasters, and war in Ukraine came one year after each other. Crystallizing this idea, Michael Meyer, Institute for Nonprofit-Management at WU Vienna, suggested that “structure eats strategy for breakfast”, and, in praise of bureaucracy, that it is only if you have rules that you can loosen them when needed. The resilience of the nonprofit sector in several Eastern European countries was predicated on previous decades’ ability to invest in civil society support. While organizations were required to adjust their approaches in times of crisis, they could do so because systems, such as communication, funding, and management, were already in place.

3) Academic research to understand field phenomena

In navigating societal upheaval and crises, the philanthropic sector moves quickly. Sometimes, it does so too quickly that it cannot fully process and evidence the approaches it suggests and adopts. Terms such as strategic philanthropy, philanthro-capitalism, and engaged giving take years to understand, implement, and study. Academic research on the other hand, moves at a different pace. Some critics say it is too slow, but its conceptual capacity can provide breadth and depth of clarification that practitioners’ daily life does not allow.

Research can support knowledge of emerging concepts and current events. At ERNOP, emerging research was shared on ideas such as “systems change”, looking back to original research on “systems” and “leverage” to understand the obstacles to adopting this approach for philanthropic funders. If systems change is about a leverage point, why are 1-3 year grants incompatible? Has the field interwoven unrestricted funding norms into system change approaches? Must that always be the case?

In another example, researchers sought to understand the impacts of the Russian war in Ukraine on the nonprofit sector and volunteers. Written by Ukrainians and University of Geneva researchers, the article surveyed participants to identify the most pressing issues for Ukrainian volunteers and nonprofit organizations under martial law. The research highlights the importance of supporting the nonprofit sector and facilitating philanthropic giving in times of war. It identifies the effects of martial law on volunteers and national nonprofit organizations in Ukraine.

Research can also address the operational understanding of philanthropic organizations. One piece of research explored foundation investment strategies in the UK, Sweden, and Russia. Using public information, the researchers seek to define the prevailing norms of investment strategies. When markets are positive, do endowments spend more? Do they save for a rainy day when markets are negative? Are they hoarding assets – such as spending the same during negative times, but not spending more in the positive – thus, a net positive amount for their foundations? Does a disbursement quota impact these decisions?

Finally, while accountability is an evergreen topic within the philanthropic sector, there remains ambiguity over who drives the discourse, who makes the decisions, and how it is implemented. As such, the approaches to philanthropic accountability vary by individual and institution. New empirical research looked at high net worth individuals’ approaches to understanding accountability in their donations, demonstrating the awareness of accountability for charities but less for themselves. In an institutional philanthropic setting, the role of the CEO also impacts how accountability is understood and implemented, yet research on foundation roles remains understudied. Individuals and institutions have various norms for understanding accountability, which leads to the variation we see in the field.

Best paper

The best paper of the 2023 ERNOP Conference was awarded to Malgorzata Smulowitz (IMD), Peter Vogel (IMD) and Alfredo de Massis (IMD) for their article entitled, “What leads to impactful family philanthropy? Family incubation as a missing link”. Through in-depth case studies of ten enterprising families, the authors share a theoretical framework explaining how enterprising families successfully navigate their philanthropic activities. The paper identified a process model of family philanthropy, introducing a new construct of family incubation. Overall, the article contributes to the literature on contemporary philanthropy, family business research and entrepreneurship, crystallizing the pivotal role of family incubation in impactful family philanthropy and shed light on the dynamic evolution of family philanthropy.

Final thoughts

Theory and concepts determine how we understand the world. Gathering to hear new research and its development demonstrates knowledge creation as a creative endeavour. Philanthropy is a field which demands its researchers to move beyond the ivory tower and involve themselves on the ground to understand what is truly occurring. In times of crises, this positionality is more important than ever. Conferences such as ERNOP are part of the essential infrastructure, making the philanthropic field more resilient as research links across cultures, contexts, and positionalities. It provides a space to agree and disagree and, most importantly, to ask questions. Philanthropy has multiple manifestations and is driven by a variety of values. If one takes a plural approach to philanthropy, research is key to understanding values which underpin activities, evaluating the justness of those values, and contemplating the combination of values which create today’s philanthropic sector.