Are nonprofits going to be relevant in the next two decades?

Reimagining nonprofits through collaboration and conflict.

Are civil society organizations having the desired impact? Is it happening fast enough and at scale? This is a question that I have been often asked in the last 10 years- from funders, grassroots leaders, trustees of nonprofits amongst others. For years, I have struggled to answer this question, without defending nonprofits or deeply criticism them. In a world with dramatically changing political context, enormous impacts of war and climate and a shrinking funding environment, these questions are fundamental to the existence of non-profits. Even large multilateral agencies, like the UN, are struggling to maintain trust and uphold justice in the face of misinformation and populism.

Without getting into a very detailed history on the formation of nonprofits, the proliferation of NGO’s started in the 1980’s & 90’s. As part of global rise towards neoliberal policies, shrinking state and government social programmes were coupled with the formation numerous nonprofit organizations. The conscious intention was for nonprofits to cover any gaps in social protection and justice programmes, that governments were failing to cover. This ranges from nonprofits running feeding schemes for school kids, managing early childhood centres, providing mobile health clinics, supporting & enabling self-built housing, resisting evictions through public interest law, holding government accountable for open transparent budget etc. The formation of nonprofits allowed large wealthy high net worth individuals to fund nonprofit work (often as a result avoiding paying taxes in their countries of origin), inadvertently controlling aspects of social justice work.  There is extensive literature around that describes this phenomenon of ‘well mannered’ high paying NGO workers that ‘represent the poor’ and take decisions on their behalf. Since the last 35 years, NGO’s have often replaced or pretended to be quasi social movements (or networks). This has been exceptionally damaging to civil society as political education, social programmes etc are now managed on budgets for venue & catering, rather than on self organizing and volunteerism. Similarly, there is extensive writing on the unreasonable control of philanthropy using funding criteria’s that are exclusionary to certain groups & individuals; favoring nonprofits & projects that align with their own political allegiance; and forcing onerous Monitoring and Evaluative frameworks to make development predictable & deterministic.  

“As part of global rise towards neoliberal policies, shrinking state and government social programmes were coupled with the formation numerous nonprofit organizations”

Despite all this, I feel that many nonprofits play an essential role in stitching our society together. In particular, small locally embedded & grounded organizations often have profound impact given their proximity to the people and issues.  

In very simplistic way, I classify grassroots non-profit organizations in two categories. This analysis does not account for the many provocative nonprofit think tanks, research and policy advocacy organizations that contribute and complement grassroots-based nonprofits).

Capabilities model: participation, intermediation and negotiation

The first model believes in the power of collaboration and intermediation. Imagine a community hall- leaders are attending a workshop on municipal budgets, housing, land, education & health advocacy. Subsequently, the conversation moves to a government Boardroom, where leaders, using their knowledge, debate & negotiate with municipal officials for improved service delivery. Simultaneously, such nonprofits observe different forms of community organizing and self-help, and leverage this approach to document learnings and ultimately shape government policy.  Such developmental model comes in the way of “engaging meaningfully” across government, community organizations & private sector actors. The aim is to intermediate relationships- getting communities to understand government programmes, policies and procedures, simultaneously ensuring community leaders are ‘Boardroom ready’.  The nexus of much of these programmes emerges from Capability Theory (by Amartya Sen that challenged that GDP, income and consumption is not the only measure of development) and later informed the ABCD (Asset Based Community Development).

Generally, such organizations have strong internal systems, governance and financial management. In other words, such non-profits are very stable and long lasting. The vision of change is pragmatic, slow and incremental. Four very tangible tools that come under this model, often underpinned by capacity development, workshops, training programmes etc, are.:

1.        Self-build models for housing

2.        Savings and stokvels

3.        Community led data collection

4.        Participatory design and planning techniques

This way of working is deeply hopeful.  When the stars align, it builds a new form of confidence and capability both at the community and government level. The hope also comes from the focus on tangible improvements- taps, toilets, homes built etc. The ideological aspiration is that deep citizen & community participation will build long term resilience and embed ‘relational methodologies’ into government processes.  Whilst these are exceptionally powerful, there are limitations to what this model can achieve.

1.        Ignoring power, rights and justice: Often such models ignore the systemic power structures of class, gender, race and ethnicity. It often assumes that the power ‘outside’ is within the control of the ‘community’ and that by organizing & preparing we can navigate deep political change. ABCD and intermediation can seldom challenge power controlled through capital and systemic societal structures.;

2.        Expectations are hard to manage: The point above relates to expectation management. Often communities follow the process of ABCD and collaboration with the expectation that it will lead to a dramatic change in their living conditions, but often this does not materialize. The failure can be attributed to not accepting the importance of political power. For instance, when communities plan their informal settlements through participatory techniques, but do not see their homes ever coming to fruition, often have not engaged deeply with fundamental power structures.;

3.         Good cop, bad cop: Municipal officials and politicians embrace non-profit organizations that are cooperative and well mannered. There is a preference for nonprofits that perform essential service delivery functions- feeding schemes for homeless, shelter systems for the vulnerable, providing social protection and support to gender-based violence victims, housing training centers etc. But this idea of ‘collaborative’ nonprofits is also used as a tool to exclude and vilify other civil society groups that might approach the problem differently.

4.        Balancing relational work with institutional reform: The nature of this work is deeply relational. Building bridges is a huge strength and relies heavily on the ability of the leaders and staff to manage complex intermediation and relationships. A huge weakness arises when these relationships become hugely reliant on individuals and their ability to work across the aisle. This can often preclude institutional reform particularly within government, where behavior is often determined by dogmatic pursuit of policy directives (rather than ethical, risky and lateral thinking)

Activist model: shaping public discourse, accountability and transparency

The second model is driven by systemic change. The activist model is often run by the notion that procedures and processes undermine the rapid fulfilment of human & constitutional rights. Imagine a room full of people, directly impacted by an issue, undergo a process of political education. They prepare to take to the streets to fight against injustice and discrimination. The comrades will not stop at anything- protest, confront the politicians, challenge the state in the courts etc. The mobilizing and organizing is dominated by politics and power, and systemic drivers of poverty and inequality. The aim is not preparing people for the boardroom but for the street and action. The nexus of the approach comes from the seminal work of Franz Fanon & Paolo Freire amongst others. Change, conceptualized in this approach, is disruptive, uncomfortable and urgent. Often such organizations are chaotic internally, with lots of redundancies, overlapping functions and require exceptionally decisive leadership that can shape choices and priorities. There are four tools that such nonprofit organizations use regularly:

·      Organizing and aligning with grassroots social movements

·      Protests and marches to raise awareness

·      Strong social and print media presence

·      Public interest law

This model directly speaks to anger and rage when one is faced with daily & systemic injustices.  The tangible, small improvements are important, but true systemic change takes place in society and public discourse. The use of media and political provocations/ actions are a critical component of such work. The aim is to push the boundary of the law to new levels. Whilst these are exceptionally powerful, there are limitations to what this model can achieve.

1.        Small changes feel inconsequential: Such nonprofits struggle to view small changes in attitude or behavior, improvements in services etc. as a victory. Rather than thinking of these are crucial milestones in a journey, they are often conceptualized as a compromise.

2.        Binaries of right or wrong: Such nonprofits come with clear binaries of right or wrong, just or unjust, equal or unequal. While these binaries are crucial to establish theoretical concepts of ‘justice and equality’, they are often limiting when building broad based support across class, race and gender. Often such binaries exclude people on the fence, and those in opposition. The exclusion, often limits the popularizing of the issue, and ultimately builds an echo chamber of like-minded people. In terms of psychology, it fuels a much more aggressive opponents, who would have reasonably agreed moral & ethical issue.  

3.        Legal versus behavior versus policy: The use of public interest law is seen as a critical instrument for accountability and transparency. Changes prescribed by the legal system seldom inform changes in behavior or policy. Often it leads to clarify the role and responsibility of government, but often stops short of pragmatic steps- such as procedures and processes for delivery- that ultimately bring about tangible change.

4.        Social and media as accelerators:  Social and print media are often accelerators of such nonprofit organizations. They are used as an integral part of challenging government in public forums. But often such tactics are based on rage, anger and impulse, but often do not tactically look at building stronger behind the cause. Using empathy and emotions are a much more effective tool than flatlining rage and anger all the time.

So, what next?

Over the last two decades, I have worked with a range of nonprofits- charities, multilateral agencies, international organizations, local NGO’s support community organizations & social movements. I often get intellectually paralyzed on how to move beyond this simplified analysis. But, given the nature of shrinking funding, climate & humanitarian crisis, is there a way of reshaping nonprofit organization to meet this challenge? Are there other compelling models that we should explore?

“Given the nature of shrinking funding, climate & humanitarian crisis, is there a way of reshaping nonprofit organization to meet this challenge? Are there other compelling models that we should explore? ”

I have been reading about B-Corps as organizations that have the ‘highest rating for environmental and social performance’. But given its ‘performance impact’, it still lacks a clear criterion for measuring its internal labor practices. It also has little that speaks to historical injustices or indigenous rights.

The questions raised at the beginning around relevance, speed, scale & impact, are calling for a departure from the nonprofits to something more innovative & catalytic. I will be exploring this over the coming months, but feel free to reach out and debate.