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Analysis
Flying in the face of disaster?
The evidence of climate change now appears overwhelming and the role of carbon emissions in contributing to it equally so. One of the biggest culprits in this regard is aviation fuel, yet many people in …
High touch or high tech? Getting the balance right
I know what you want. You’d like me to pull a technological rabbit out of my hat – an easy solution to the problem with air travel. Unfortunately, there isn’t one. No rabbits here. None …
Comic Relief and climate change – first steps
Climate change has already had a very significant impact on many people in Africa in both subtle and catastrophic ways. In early 2006, Comic Relief began to recognize this trend and set in place a …
Climate change resources
The following is a selection of the available resources on climate change. It makes no claim to be comprehensive. It is simply an attempt to show some of the most current and relevant developments in …
Limited life or perpetuity? Achieving greater impact through philanthropy
Though the first ever limited-life foundation, the Julius Rosenwald Fund,was established as long ago as 1917, the idea that a foundation might have only a limited life still seems to subvert many traditional notions about …
Killing civil society with kindness?
Since 1997, the Government in the UK has embarked on a remarkable experiment with the voluntary non-profit sector. Ministerial speeches have extolled the virtues of voluntary action. There has been more public money made available …
US and European philanthropy must collaborate
Last year Rien van Gendt gave the closing remarks, and in preparing for this talk I thought I might just give his talk again because it was so good. It is always a privilege to …
BOP too good to be true?
In his now-famous book, Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid, C K Pralahad advocates ‘eradicating poverty through profits’. Bottom of the Pyramid (BOP) theories suggest that a win-win situation is possible if multinationals begin …
Intervening at the inflection point
Philanthropy harbours an interesting paradox. Structurally, charitable foundations can be designed to operate in the long run, in principle in perpetuity. For example, the largest charitable grant-giver to London-only causes, the City Bridge Trust, dates …
Reassessing the role of grant-giving in a foundation’s strategy: The case of the Roma Education Fund
Foundations whose aim is to achieve social and institutional change must have clear strategies. In this article we argue that in democratic societies grant-giving should not be the driving agenda for these foundations; rather it …