Ethics – Critical Fundraising

Expanded typology describes many more ways charities are being cut out of doing good

New white paper expands the typology of ‘disintermediation’ – all the ways other actors displace nonprofits in giving, asking for support, and providing aid and help
Disintermediation is marked by whether or not a charity retains control in, and of, relationships with stakeholders – applies particularly to fundraising re donors
New concept of ‘citizen fundraiser/ing’ goes beyond ‘volunteer’ to describe fundraising done by lay people outside the remit of the fundraising profession
More detail on how other actors, particular companies, are delivering services and providing help to people in need
Expanded typology is first step in mapping the routes that charities could take to ‘reintermediate’ into the relationships and processes from which they are displaced
Seeking partners to co-create a toolkit to help charities reintermediate.

‘Citizen fundraisers’ are taking ownership of fundraising methods

People are increasingly raising funds for good causes outside the reach and remit of the fundraising profession.

While there have always been volunteers who have fundraised for charities, the case made in a new white paper from the international think tank Rogare – Death by a thousand cuts: How other actors are displacing charities from giving, asking for support, and providing help – is that the term ‘volunteer’ is no longer sufficient to describe and encompass all the ways that people conduct raising money for good causes.

OPINION: A wake-up call – addressing ethical AI in the nonprofit sector

So, you’re using AI ‘responsibly’, but, asks Cherian Koshy, are you using it ethically? The two are not the same thing.

NEWS: Research agenda explores ethical implications of using AI in fundraising

Generic concerns about the ethical use of AI can’t be overlain on to fundraising, since its use in fundraising throws up ethical dilemmas specific to this application
AI currently doesn’t have access to sufficiently-sophisticated thinking about ethics to be able to tackle ethical dilemmas in fundraising
Ethical and data literacy across the fundraising profession must be upskilled to ensure the most rigorous human oversight of the use of AI in fundraising.

REVIEW: Head to head – a conversation on behavioural science and ethics

Meredith Niles looks at a new paper considering the role of behavioural science in designing and implementing more effective compliance and ethics programmes, and considers how the learnings could be applied to fundraising.

OPINION: If the FPS is forced on the sector, charities should walk away from ‘self’-regulation

If the new Fundraising Regulator is bent on imposing damaging and impractical rules, David Pearce argues that its charities’ duty to walk away from self-regulation

OPINION: Where is the voice of the beneficiary?

The current debate about charity regulation is progressing without listening to the voices of one of its most important stakeholders. Zoë Bunter asks why no-one is considering what the effect will be on beneficiaries.

KNOWLEDGE: The effect of ethical decision making on fundraisers’ sense of moral identity

Fundraisers’ sense of themselves as moral individuals is damaged by having to make the difficult ethical decisions they encounter every day in their jobs, new research conducted by Plymouth University’s Centre for Sustainable Philanthropy (CSP) has revealed.

OPINION: Shame on those who are supporting the Fundraising Preference Service

The fundraising sector’s response to the proposed Fundraising Preference service has been ‘pathetically’ limp. Adrian Sargeant says all those who are endorsing it without any evidence that it is needed should feel ashamed.