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CONTRIBUTE BLOGS
04/02/2009 18:22
by Marcia Stepanek
When in Britain last week at
the Skoll World Forum, I was
referred to a recent article
in The Observer written by
Joss Garman, the 24-year-...
03/02/2009 22:35
by Marcia Stepanek
As the recent copyright woes
of Obama poster artist Shepard
Fairey show, there's a war
raging over what some now are
calling a new art form in ...
02/16/2009 07:24
by Marcia Stepanek
I just finished reading an
advance copy of "The Blue
Sweater: Bridging the Gap
Between Rich and Poor in an
Interconnected World,&qu...
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The Race Gap
DESPITE THE NATION'S CHARITY BOOM, the private philanthropy world has been slow to diversify its ranks to reflect the racial and cultural diversity of the communities it serves, says a study released this month by a leading nonprofit consultancy.
According to “Philanthropy in a Changing Society,” a study of the foundation sector’s approach to increasing its racial diversity: “The momentum since the mid-1990s [for diverse staffing and grant making] has been much slower, even as diversity of the United States and its interdependence with global communities continue to increase at an extraordinary pace.”
The study also reveals a race gap among staff members and directors at philanthropic foundations: In 2006, of 802 private foundations surveyed by Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisers, a nonprofit advisory group, 23.2% of staffers were non-white, compared to the 33.8% concentration of minorities in the general U.S. population for that year.
The most blatant lack of racial diversity was found to exist at the top—on foundation boards, where only 13% of board members are non-white, the study shows. Conversely, the highest level of racial diversity shows up in the ranks of program officers, thanks to active minority recruitment in that area. Some 35% of foundation program officers are non-white, the study says.
Reasons cited for the growing race gap include the retirement of influential African American CEOs and other high-level charity executives, who, in the early 1980s, used their influence broadly to promote diversity. Many of these leaders have not been replaced with people who share their same vision, the study says. Furthermore, the controversial political debates of the 1990s that questioned the value of affirmative action may have played a role, said senior professionals interviewed for the report.
According to Darren Walker, Vice President of Foundation Initiatives at the Rockefeller Foundation, there’s also a reluctance of most family-run boards to add outside members. “Power dynamics within our private foundations are at the board level, and it is important to underscore the role of leadership by making sure diversity is on the agenda,” he said. “It is not possible to be effective if you are working in diverse communities and don’t have diversity in your philanthropy.”
Gara LaMarche, president and CEO of the Atlantic Philanthropies, a New York-based charitable foundation, says diversity is critical to making change in the world. “If you have blinders on about race, you’re not going to be very effective.”
Yet Walker and LaMarche are careful to emphasize that many predominantly white foundations are making great strides meeting the needs of underserved, racially mixed communities.
The study also looked at effectiveness in grant-making from data provided by The Foundation Center, a New York-based resource center for nonprofits and foundations, which showed grant dollars distributed by major foundations to minority/ethnic communities in 2006 totaled only 7.4% of total grant dollars. Just like human resources figures at foundations, growth in this area appeared to flatten out in the 1990s, researchers say.
The report was released as debate rises nationally over the lack of diversity at charitable foundations. California lawmakers recently shelved legislation to require most charitable organizations to disclose the ethnic, racial, and gender composition of their staffs when 10 of the state’s largest foundations agreed to make a multimillion-dollar investment in minority communities and promised to issue annual reports updating those efforts.
Separately, some of the nation’s top foundation trustees and senior executives launched a three-year initiative, called the Diversity in Philanthropy Project, to engage other foundation leaders in aggressively promoting diversity at their institutions.
Jessica Chao, Vice President of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, says efforts like these are crucial to changing the racial makeup of the tight-knit foundation sector. “It’s like herding cats, they’re so individual and each one needs to look at itself and be aware. We’re now beginning to see a number of associations that are working to encourage their colleagues to promote diversity and offering them support along the way.”
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