Stanford Social Innovation Review

JANUARY 11, 2024

Trust in institutions is necessary to create and improve the social contracts that govern democracy and allow communities and the nation to strike sustainable civic bargains. It is earned person by person, moving through large segments of society. American civil society institutions have an important role to play.

Civil Society 142

Civil Society Public and Social Policy Health Governance 142

Boardsource

SEPTEMBER 27, 2021

Perhaps more than any other time in recent history, civil society, including governments, nonprofits and the philanthropic sector, is revisiting the fundamental premises that structure its institutions, determine its value and, literally, justify its existence.

Leadership 92

Leadership Civil Society Governance Values 92

NonProfit Quarterly

OCTOBER 11, 2024

Donors and governments may shift their dollars…to focusing on necessities like food, water, energy, and healthcare. Unless we act aggressively to curb emissions, climate change will continue to put pressure on our insurance system and society at large. Pressures on Civil Society Financial experts warn of cascading impacts.

Insurance 130

Insurance Civil Society Healthcare Energy 130

NonProfit Quarterly

FEBRUARY 13, 2025

Schools were closed and so was the city government, out of an abundance of caution. For more on this topic: We All Have Value: Changing Relationships Through Radical Empathy The Appalachian Nonprofits Helping in Helene I guess well have to wait and see.

Governance 108

Governance Civil Society Values Culture 108

NonProfit Quarterly

FEBRUARY 5, 2024

Imagine a civil society in which communities, individuals, and leaders (nonprofit, social movement, philanthropy, business, education, and more) regularly engage in the process of self-examination for the sake of improving our world.

Civil Society 119

Civil Society Race and Ethnicity Culture Health 119

Stanford Social Innovation Review

OCTOBER 17, 2022

To achieve this, more businesses need to join with the government and civil society to actively confront inequality, poverty, and climate change together. Constant downward pressure on price and inequitable distribution of value results in high social and environmental costs for farmers that consumers and investors rarely see.

Agriculture 105

Agriculture Civil Society Poverty Environmental 105

Momentum Nonprofit Partners

FEBRUARY 12, 2024

Clear guidelines on financial reporting, governance structures, and conflict of interest policies can foster transparency without compromising sensitive donor information. Protecting donor privacy is not just about safeguarding individual rights; it's about upholding the values of a vibrant civil society.

Civil Society 89

Civil Society Public and Social Policy Philanthropy Nonprofits 89

Stanford Social Innovation Review

OCTOBER 25, 2023

There is much greater pushback against the “shareholder values revolution”—which elevated cost-cutting and the interests of shareholders at the expense of workers—than at any other time over the last four decades. It also ensures that any productivity gains are shared more fairly between capital and labor.

Public and Social Policy 142

Public and Social Policy Technology Civil Society Production 142

NonProfit Quarterly

SEPTEMBER 10, 2024

At the same time, within this austerity framework, nonprofits increasingly fill holes in sectors ranging from education to healthcare to journalism to social services that we depend on the most and that have been receiving less and less government support. Nonprofits are a feature of tax law and corporate governance laws.

Public and Social Policy 124

Public and Social Policy Law Governance Nonprofits 124

Stanford Social Innovation Review

MARCH 7, 2024

The effort involved training senior executives, both women and men, on how to be mentors, as well as working with the mentees to ensure that both groups strengthened their development and valued mutual learning during the mentoring sessions. The home visits also highlighted how geography increased their vulnerability.

Nonprofit governance and management 126

Nonprofit governance and management Collaborations Public and Social Policy Participation and motivation 126

Stanford Social Innovation Review

AUGUST 15, 2023

Governments representing deeply indebted nations are often unable to invest in health care, education, and other services, which, in turn, threatens their very political survival. For instance, some governments may perceive the imposition of environmental commitments as an infringement on their sovereignty.

Public and Social Policy 98

Public and Social Policy Environmental Governance Civil Society 98

Stanford Social Innovation Review

APRIL 13, 2023

A portfolio with more locally led organizations needs to be valued, specifically (though not exclusively), as an investment in the local NGO sector and the problems the sector is trying to address. The design process begins with how philanthropists consider impact.

Collaborations 115

Collaborations Organizational Development Civil Society Nonprofit governance and management 115

Stanford Social Innovation Review

FEBRUARY 9, 2023

All over the world, we are seeing the proliferation of an ecosystem that comprises impact investors, accelerators, support organizations, and social entrepreneurs who are all driven by the possibility of generating shared value so that both companies and society win.

Social Entrepreneurship 128

Social Entrepreneurship Entrepreneurship Social Enterprise Social Enterprise 128

Stanford Social Innovation Review

OCTOBER 17, 2022

All sectors have a role to play in achieving climate justice, but it’s fair to say that compared to government and civil society, business is late in addressing the challenge and is in fact frequently called out as part of the problem. Why Climate Justice Matters to Business.

Public and Social Policy 110

Public and Social Policy Civil Society Race and Ethnicity Energy 110

Stanford Social Innovation Review

JANUARY 24, 2024

A market innovation like creating a sustainable seafood market is unlikely to create enduring systems change without building strong relationships with civil society. The Garfield Foundation offers a different example of how networks with capacity achieve systems change that evades individual groups.

Civil Society 133

Civil Society Energy Collaborations Leadership 133

Stanford Social Innovation Review

FEBRUARY 27, 2024

DEC is able to achieve major policy wins because each member organization adds unique value to a carefully coordinated campaign effort that can ramp up at opportune policy moments. This networking led to the inclusion of civil society, businesses, and local organizations to enhance equity in the plans.

Public and Social Policy 132

Public and Social Policy Energy Nonprofit Administration and Development Collaborations 132

Stanford Social Innovation Review

JULY 1, 2024

In 1990, governments around the world, with the leadership of the United States, began a 13-year effort to map human DNA through the Human Genome Project (HGP). Governments agreed that all DNA sequence data be released in publicly accessible databases within 24 hours after generation.

Collaborations 108

Collaborations Public and Social Policy Ethics Public Policy 108

Stanford Social Innovation Review

JUNE 28, 2023

For example, New York City created the innovative concept of a Voluntary Local Review (VLR), based on the Voluntary National Reviews that nations submit to the UN, in which local and regional governments adopt and track their progress toward the SDGs.

Collaborations 105

Collaborations Public and Social Policy Nonprofit governance and management Governance 105

Philanthropy 2173

JANUARY 9, 2025

Photo by Dalton Abraham, Unsplash They must not only worry about the official US government under Trusk. Listen to us, we are civil society. Both Wikimedia and the Internet Archive are well-established, cornerstone organizations of civil society. Worry about #KingMusk himself. And his minions. What about offense?

Civil Society 98

Civil Society Law Governance Foundations 98

Stanford Social Innovation Review

FEBRUARY 24, 2025

Were in a period of polycrisis, yet the business world, government, and civil society persist in their siloed approaches to solving it. By resourcing, growing, and mainstreaming social innovation, we can sidestep the boundaries that limit us to create new and shared public value. Our vision?

Governance 96

Governance Philanthropy Collaborations Finance 96

Stanford Social Innovation Review

MARCH 4, 2024

By Lina Srivastava The aftermath of the OpenAI governance controversy revealed the extent to which power has been consolidated by AI tech giants, a situation with dangerous implications for critical aspects of society. To establish effective AI governance, then, is the challenge for civil society organizations and social innovators.

Governance 142

Governance Civil Society Public and Social Policy Ethics 142

Stanford Social Innovation Review

FEBRUARY 8, 2024

When contemplating migration that can deliver massive income gains to low-income households and benefits to both sending and receiving economies—but must maintain public support in a difficult political climate—public, private, and civil society actors all play important roles in a complex system’s effective functioning.

Public and Social Policy 144

Public and Social Policy Finance Recruitment Poverty 144

Stanford Social Innovation Review

MARCH 11, 2025

Traditional state-centric security frameworks can actually generate insecurity through militarization that escalates the potential for conflict, through surveillance that undermines civil liberties, through resource diversion from human development, and by the exclusion of key voices from security decisions.

Agriculture 69

Agriculture Environmental Civil Society Collaborations 69

NonProfit Quarterly

JANUARY 28, 2025

Three developments, in particular, worry me: a drop in rates of giving to nonprofits; widespread staff burnout; and an increasing effort to target nonprofits based on their missions and values. First, I would suggest that we desperately need a campaign to help educate Americans about the value of the nonprofit sector. We can volunteer.

Nonprofit Administration and Development 119

Nonprofit Administration and Development Charitable Organizations Philanthropy Homelessness 119

Stanford Social Innovation Review

OCTOBER 18, 2023

Several recent studies reveal that, globally, people under 30 lack trust in their national governments, do not feel heard by politicians, and have lower levels of participation in national elections. For participatory bodies to be successful, their role in government must go beyond consultation alone.

Public and Social Policy 132

Public and Social Policy Governance Civil Society Public Policy 132

NonProfit Quarterly

MARCH 19, 2025

So, Beautiful Solutions was, right from the beginning, designed to be learning from anywhere in the world where people were growing democratic economies and governance. So, we launched the first iteration of this project in partnership with them and developed a first-round set of stories, principles, and values. We chose the latter.

Governance 70

Governance Education Education Values 70

Stanford Social Innovation Review

MARCH 13, 2024

Naming gifts provide donors with reputational and market value , what legal scholar William Drennan refers to as “ publicity rights ,” and beneficiary organizations and their constituents with financial and mission-driven value. Ethical egoism posits that fulfilling one’s duty to act out of self-interest is the highest moral calling.

Ethics 122

Ethics Public and Social Policy Universities Philanthropy 122

Stanford Social Innovation Review

JUNE 17, 2024

If this disregard for people and our planet is fraying the fabric of our society and our democracy, it’s more than a moral issue: it is a historic opportunity for corporations to re-envision their purpose, their guardrails, and the value they deliver to all stakeholders—workers, customers, communities, shareholders, and our planet alike.

Public and Social Policy 131

Public and Social Policy Civil Society Governance Public Policy 131

Philanthropy 2173

MARCH 5, 2020

Original post Since we started the Digital Civil Society Lab I’ve been invited to countless conferences, workshops, and philanthropic or corporate launches of “some kind of tech” for “some kind of good.” What commercial applications call externalities, civil society and the public sector exist to address.

Civil Society 59

Civil Society Ethics Participation and motivation Universities 59

NonProfit Quarterly

FEBRUARY 21, 2024

Access to news is key to an engaged civil society, and without it, social worlds shrink and become suffused with disinformation and bias. Mainstream media sometimes offers the kind of investigative reporting that exposes bad corporate actors and sheds light on the power structures governing politics and the economy.

Public and Nonprofit Management 136

Public and Nonprofit Management Nonprofit governance and management Civil Society Foundations 136

Stanford Social Innovation Review

AUGUST 30, 2023

Indeed, these digital technologies would enable people to transcend the geographic boundaries that constrained their ability to pursue the lives they valued, enabling them to acquire more social, economic, and political power. However, current reality is miles apart from that vision.

Race and Ethnicity 145

Race and Ethnicity Public and Social Policy Civil Society Governance 145

Stanford Social Innovation Review

JULY 26, 2023

Civil society and humanitarian organizations are attuned to the reality that these streams of people generate massive amounts of data that can, for instance, help channel aid to the neediest, predict disease outbreaks, and much more.

Public and Social Policy 52

Public and Social Policy Civil Society Governance Ethics 52

NonProfit Quarterly

SEPTEMBER 12, 2024

These laws, purportedly designed as a check on foreign interference, limit civil society organizations and restrict democratic practice by cutting off funding from foundations to movement organizations. A Government of National Unity As a response to the dwindling support, the ANC agreed to form a coalition government.

Philanthropy 95

Philanthropy Public and Social Policy Poverty Civil Society 95

NonProfit Quarterly

NOVEMBER 19, 2024

As philosopher Elizabeth Anderson argues in Private Government , people now live most of the time within private authoritarian bureaucracies or firms in which they own nothing, have no authority, and constantly must resist incursions in their private life. Mariana Mazzucato, The Value of Everything: Making and Taking in the Global Economy.

Public and Social Policy 103

Public and Social Policy Universities Civil Society Governance 103

NonProfit Quarterly

DECEMBER 14, 2022

These practices and their associated values—cooperation, sustainability, justice, interdependence, autonomy—make possible a transformative vision. Ecological destruction and historic inequalities stem from much more than moral failings, government inaction, lack of knowledge, or elite interests.

Non-Profits 116

Non-Profits Universities Collaborations Civil Society 116

Bloomerang

NOVEMBER 1, 2024

The best stories you can tell are those that lead from your collective community’s values. In fact, your organization exists because of stories—stories of problems you’re working to solve, plus stories of donors helping you solve them. Why is this important? 88% of nonprofits have budgets under $500,000.

Civil Society 113

Civil Society Participation and motivation Nonprofit governance and management Public and Nonprofit Management 113

Stanford Social Innovation Review

FEBRUARY 18, 2025

Transform Finances recent SSIR article Investing in Enterprises That Work for Everyone and accompanying report threw a much-needed spotlight on how Alternative Ownership Enterprise (AOE) models can help redistribute economic value, looking at the landscape in the United States. million dairy farmers who own the business.

Governance 71

Governance Public and Social Policy Production Finance 71