Mar 22, 2021

Fund for Global Human Rights;

For nearly twenty years, the Fund for Global Human Rights has been a vocal champion of participatory philanthropy. We provide flexible general support that allows local groups to define and lead their own agendas. Fund grantees identify their priorities and approach and collaborate with program staff on defining measures of progress toward their intended outcomes.To us, participatory grant-making—which empowers affected communities to decide what and who to fund—is a further step in shifting power to grantees and movements.In 2019, the Fund partnered with Purposeful, a feminist movement-building hub for adolescent girls, to pilot a participatory grant-making initiative in Sierra Leone aimed at promoting youth leadership and amplifying the voices of young people.As our first foray into realizing the potential of participatory grant-making, this experience taught us many valuable lessons about how to foster genuine participation of children and young people.A targeted and intentional approach to reach a diverse group of children and youth is essential. This helps prevent a participatory process that only benefits young people in urban areas and those from higher socio-economic backgrounds.We also learned that true participation requires letting go of power while ensuring that young people have what they need to make meaningful and informed decisions. Support to child and youth-led groups should go beyond grant money to include a comprehensive package of grantee-led learning and accompaniment.The biggest lesson is about the need to be open and flexible throughout the process. Being willing to adapt as we went along allowed us to respond and make changes (almost) in real time. It also allowed us to learn from the young people about what it means to use your voice and make yourself heard in ways far beyond what we could have anticipated.

Dec 04, 2019

Candid; GrantCraft;

En este documento titulado "Decidiendo juntos: Transferencia de poder y recursos mediante el proceso participativo de otorgamiento de donativos", examinamos por qué y cómo implementan los donantes la asignación participativa de donativos y transfieren el poder a las comunidades que reciben el impacto de sus decisiones de financiamiento. Con ejemplos y reflexiones de un grupo diverso de donantes, exploramos los beneficios, los desafíos y los modelos del enfoque participativo de financiamiento.

Oct 01, 2019

Sillerman Center for the Advancement of Philanthropy;

Social Justice Funders Spotlights present stories of innovative, effective social justice philanthropy in action. Each spotlight focuses upon a grantmaker and a grantee.Headwaters FoundationThis spotlight is part of Sillerman's Participatory Grantmaking project.

Oct 01, 2019

Sillerman Center for the Advancement of Philanthropy;

Social Justice Funders Spotlights present stories of innovative, effective social justice philanthropy in action. Each spotlight focuses upon a grantmaker and a grantee.Disability Rights FundThis spotlight is part of Sillerman's Participatory Grantmaking project.

Oct 01, 2019

Sillerman Center for the Advancement of Philanthropy;

Social Justice Funders Spotlights present stories of innovative, effective social justice philanthropy in action. Each spotlight focuses upon a grantmaker and a grantee.Hyams FoundationThis spotlight is part of Sillerman's Participatory Grantmaking project.

Jul 01, 2019

CIVICUS - World Alliance for Citizen Participation;

The question of how grassroots groups and activists based in the global south can mobilise adequate support to overcome the growing ecological, social, political and economic challenges they face and achieve positive change is a serious one that requires our attention. These groups face significant challenges in accessing key resources (financial and otherwise) to sustain their work.CIVICUS embarked on a consultation process to identify, in a participatory way, possible mechanisms that would increase the scale and quality of resources, both international and domestic, for groups and movements. Over the course of five months, we have had the privilege to learn from activists, organisers, young leaders and progressive funders from around the world about resourcing challenges, and to sense-check solutions and co-create scenarios based on lived experiences, bold ideas and deep understanding of social problems.This consultation is an attempt to move conversations forward at a practical level, exploring options that, pulled together, could help start a radical transformation in the range and quality of resources accessible to grassroots groups. As well as sense-checking the relevance, appeal and feasibility of emerging concepts, the process itself has been significant. These early explorations have directly engaged the groups that we seek to better resource, including a cross-section of grassroots activists, the financial arms of social movements and other strategic partners.

Jun 01, 2019

Transparency and Accountability Initiative;

Funder grantmaking and learning practices are best when informed by grantee organization needs and experience. Yet, there are many factors that limit or even block this feedback loop.As funders, Transparency and Accountability Initiative (TAI) members recognize our responsibility to listen and respond to grantee questions and concerns, even when we are unable to provide the desired responses.We invite grantseekers to draw inspiration from this guide to seek clarity and advocate for potential needs with current and prospective funders.We hope the conversations highlighted in the guide will help you and your program officers continue to strengthen grantmaking and learning practices with your partners.

Apr 02, 2019

Stars Foundation; With And For Girls;

Funding for adolescent girls has been gaining traction in recent years. While feminist funders have traditionally focused on women and young people, there has been a drive to put more flexible funding in the hands of girl-led and girl-centered organisations. This evaluation reviews and assesses the With and For Girls Collective, the With and For Girls Award and the awards journey with a view to drawing out lessons from the Collective's experience to help encourage funders to increase flexible funding and other resources to girl-led and girl-centered organisations globally.

Oct 29, 2018

Mama Cash;

Money & Movements brought together 100+ activists & funders to strategise about the future of resourcing feminist movements and social change globally. We came from around the world and across movements – women's rights, sex workers' rights, LBQTI rights, youth, indigenous rights, environmental and economic justice, disability rights, health, and more.Together, we asked:* What is the change we want to see... bold and fully-resourced?* What do our movements need to be resilient?* What would a transformative funding ecosystem look like?* What is the future of funding?Each of these graphics illustrates a key takeaway from Money & Movements. They are meant to inspire funders and movements seeking to build a more just world. Learn more and find versions of this tool in Spanish and French at: https://www.mamacash.org/en/money-and-movements

Oct 11, 2018

FRIDA The Young Feminist Fund; IWORDS Global; Mama Cash;

The research used in-depth interviews and an online questionnaire, as well as an exhaustive desk review to collect data from girl-led groups and organisations, girl-centred organisations and the stakeholders that support them at different levels. This is an exciting opportunity to spotlight how girl-led organising takes place and how funders can provide flexible support that responds to the needs of girls and their organising. 

Oct 01, 2018

London School of Economics and Political Science;

The modern version of the large philanthropic foundation found in the US and the UK emerged in the early 20th Century, but these have increased in size and ambition in recent years. Foundations such as the Gates Foundation offer wealthy elites an opportunity to perpetuate their influence, and thus are accused of enabling plutocratic philanthropy. The growing field of participatory grantmaking aims to address concerns about elite influence in traditional foundations by devolving decisions about philanthropic funding to those affected by the outcome of those decisions. In this research I develop a case study, based on 15 semi-structured interviews with people involved in both traditional foundations and participatory grantmakers, to understand articulations of participatory grantmaking and provide insight into how the approach differs in practice from traditional foundations. I find that inparticipatory grantmaking issues of power are foregrounded, and notions of legitimacy, agenda-setting, and accountability differ. Participatory grantmaking articulates activists as legitimate decision-makers, and unlike traditional foundations, where staff feel primary accountability to an unelected board, participatory grantmaking staff feel accountable to a broader movement. I discuss the broader implications of these findings for participatorygrantmaking as well as the use of participatory approaches in more traditional foundations. A two-page summary of the report can be found at: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zpX7Ry7czcbvtcbzZDFcxZng3lzPR76S/view?usp=drive_open

Jun 01, 2018

Disability Rights Advocacy Fund, Inc.; Disability Rights Fund, Inc.;

This Progress Report is an update to the 2013 "One in Seven" Report about Disability Rights Fund (DRF) and  Disability Rights Advocacy Fund (DRAF's) early years. This report lifts up the accomplishments of the past ten years, celebrates the voices of persons with disabilities, and offers a pathway towards building the future together.

May 01, 2018

MATCH International; Nobel Women's Initiative;

The launch of Canada's Feminist International Assistance Policy in June 2017 included an allocation of $150 million over five years to the Women's Voice and Leadership Program, signaling a commitment to work closely with local women's organizations to advance the Sustainable Development Goals. This presents an extraordinary opportunity for Canada to show global leadership. To explore practical and creative ways of delivering on this commitment, The MATCH International Women's Fund, the Nobel Women's Initiative, and Global Affairs Canada hosted a panel and workshop that tapped the experience and wisdom of international experts, human rights activists, government officials, and civil society partners. This report has been prepared by the Nobel Women's Initiative and The MATCH Fund as a summary of this two-day event.

Apr 20, 2018

RSF Social Finance;

The purpose of the RSF Shared Gifting Program is to activate ownership, distribution, and allocation authority for grant funding among the participants of the Shared Gifting Circles. RSF began experimenting with this model of funding in 2011. This document shares our current best practices around creating and facilitating a successful Shared Gifting Circle.

Apr 17, 2018

Foundation Center; GrantCraft;

While slogans like "think globally, act locally" have been around for decades, still so much decision making about philanthropy happens by stakeholders outside them. This paper intends to address the struggle funders face with giving up power, despite caring deeply about championing local leadership and initiatives. Learn about the "community philanthropy approach" and practical examples of how funders have shared and shifted power without losing sight of their strategic imperatives.