Reimagining Strategic Philanthropy: From Principal-Agent Problems to Bottom-Up Learning in Foundations

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Abstract/Contents

Abstract: Foundations are beginning to dwarf the U.S. government as agents of global development, both in terms of financial resources and influence. There is, however, little research on the top-down nature of foundations’ role in development. This study interviewed staff at 17 foundations, either actively working against or failing to address this top-down nature, about the factors contributing to hierarchical dynamics in philanthropy, as well as mechanisms to reduce resulting power imbalances. The results indicate that foundations face various principal-agent problems of social coordination in their work. The strategic philanthropy framework attempts to address these problems by shifting more control to the principal, thereby intensifying top-down hierarchies. In contrast, participating foundations had redefined strategic grantmaking as working against top-down hierarchies and emphasizing investing in and learning from partnerships with grantee organizations. These foundations used bottom-up organizational learning to incorporate grantee knowledge and expertise into their decision-making and move towards more participatory grantmaking. Bottom-up learning was, however, lacking in the officer-board and grantee-board relationships, limiting foundations’ abilities to fully utilize the knowledge they were acquiring from their grantees. Overall, bottom-up learning and its ability to create participatory grantmaking was strongest in community foundations.

Type of resource	text
Date created	June 2018

Author	Vig, Ayushi

Location	https://purl.stanford.edu/sz475vn8750

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License: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC).

Preferred Citation: Vig, Ayushi. (2018). Reimagining Strategic Philanthropy: From Principal-Agent Problems to Bottom-Up Learning in Foundations. Stanford University, Stanford CA. https://purl.stanford.edu/sz475vn8750

Undergraduate Honors Theses, Graduate School of Education

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