- Are worldwide fundraising practices, ethics and regulation dominated by ideas developed in English-speaking countries?
- If so, do these crowd out practices and ideas better suited to the local culture of philanthropy?
- New Rogare project and working paper aims to provide a roadmap for fundraisers to professionalise fundraising in ways that are best adapted to local cultures.
- A key implication is that there can be no universal standard of fundraising ethics that applies around the world.
Much of the thinking about best practice, ethics and regulation in fundraising is originated and developed by people in English-speaking countries – also known as the ‘anglosphere’. These ideas are then exported to professions around the world. However, since they have been developed inside a particular, English-speaking (anglophone) culture, are these ideas always best suited to other cultures. And even if they are well suited, do they crowd out local ideas and practices about fundraising and philanthropy that could be more effective?
The international fundraising think tank Rogare has set out to help fundraisers in different cultures construct a roadmap to professionalise fundraising that is grounded in their local culture, rather than necessarily adopting and implementing ideas developed in the anglosphere.
Our initial ideas are set out in a new working paper – Does one size fit all? Cultural differences in the evolution and development of global fundraising professions – available for download here.
Alice Ferris, partner in US fundraising agency GoalBusters (a Rogare Associate Member), and a member of Rogare’s Council, says:
“Calling something best practice doesn’t make it universally best, and the fundraising profession keeps mistaking its own reflection for a universal law. What gets called best practice is often just the dominant culture’s practice, treated as though it were neutral and beyond question. Left unexamined, that habit exports the assumption that one culture’s way of fundraising is the way for communities who never agreed to that premise.
“My hope for this project is that it builds humility in both directions. Humility from the anglosphere to ask why something became ‘best practice’ before assuming it belongs everywhere, and humility from local cultures to look honestly at the assumptions of their own fundraising practices. The real work isn’t defending or throwing out any single standard. It’s asking what value that standard was meant to serve, and then finding out how that value already lives, or could live, in a given community.”
Does one size fit all? does not provide – much less dictate – the route fundraisers in different countries and cultures should take to professionalise (which would be inappropriate anglophone behaviour). Instead, we are providing a template approach that fundraisers could adopt to devise their own routes, especially in determining whether their practice and ethics have been distorted by practices from the anglosphere.
For example while in the English-speaking world, there is an almost universal prohibition on paying fundraisers by commission, this might be acceptable in non-anglophone countries (or it might not – we genuinely don’t know).
Similarly, standard donorcentred fundraising practice singles out the donor for praise and recognition for having been the person responsible for some beneficial outcome – the ‘because of you…’ type DM letter. Anglophone culture is typically individualist in that if values the autonomy of individuals. However, in more collectivist cultures that value the collective good of the group above the individual (as are found in Asia), such a donorcentred approach might not play so well.
Ian MacQuillin, director of Rogare, says:
“We are aware that ‘professionalisation’ is a contested concept. So we have clearly set out what we mean by professionalisation, which is for a collective group of fundraisers engaged in the collective endeavour of raising money for nonprofit organisations to collectively move their practice from a lesser to a greater degree of effectiveness, efficiency and accountability, in the context of their local culture of philanthropy.
“For our purposes, ‘professionalisation’ categorically does not mean adopting the behaviours and attitudes of any one perceived cultural norm. But we unashamedly advocate for fundraising everywhere strive to professionalise as much as it can. In many instances, simply borrowing and co-opting codes and practices from the USA and UK will not be enough.”
Implications for fundraising ethics
Rights-Balancing Fundraising Ethics has been designed by Rogare to resolve cross-cultural ethical dilemmas. Since this balances fundraisers’ duties to both donors and beneficiaries, and since these duties may vary between cultures, this implies that a practice that is unethical in one culture (such as paying commission) could be ethical in a different culture and, as such…
…There can be no universal global standard of fundraising ethics.
How we intend this project will work
The purpose of this project is not for Rogare to tell fundraisers in any particular country what they should do to professionalise (which would not be in the spirit or ethos of the thing). Instead Does one size fit all aims to provide a template approach that fundraisers in various countries or cultures could follow or adapt.
We recommend a four-stage process:
1. Identify the characteristics of the local social culture.
2. Identify and describe the local culture of philanthropy.
3. Using their understanding of the first two points, compare anglophone best practices, ethics and standards against their cultural values and culture of philanthropy to determine which are appropriate and work within those cultures, and which are more problematic, and why.
Consider the most appropriate forms of professionalisation that would facilitate organised fundraising becoming as effective, efficient and accountable as possible within the local culture of philanthropy. Does one size fit all contains a series of prompt questions under three headings:
a) How should fundraising be organised/how should the interests of fundraising and fundraisers be represented?
b)How should fundraising be accountable to its stakeholders?
c) A fundraising career.
Fundraisers do not need Rogare’s involvement to do this. Nonetheless, we hope to establish working groups in some countries/cultures, and to begin by exploring these issues with Hopi Nation nonprofits in the USA, in collaboration with GoalBusters. We have also had initial discussions with members of the Māori community in New Zealand/Aotearoa about doing similar.
Any fundraisers in any country/culture who would like to collaborate with Rogare should contact Rogare’s direct Ian MacQuillin via cultures@rogare.net.
- We were able to undertake this work at Rogare thanks to the ongoing generous support of our Associate Members: ST (Stephen Thomas Ltd), Ask Direct, GoalBusters, Giving Architects, Chell Perkins, Fundraiser in the Room, and our strategic partnership with the Chartered Institute of Fundraising. Their support ensures all Rogare’s reports and other outputs are freely available to the fundraising profession.
