Defining key concepts - Philanthropy for Social Justice & Peace

Tewa means support

Posted on May 5, 2020May 6, 2020 by Andrew Milner

If you look at Tewa’s website, it will tell you that the word means support in Nepali. Applied to the organization, it’s both appropriate and understated. Tewa’s story has been ably told. This is not the place to retell it. Instead, I want to draw attention to a few key ideas which inform it and…

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Paying the piper, calling the tune

Posted on February 27, 2020February 27, 2020 by Andrew Milner

It’s an old adage: who pays the piper, calls the tune. In other words, if it’s your money, you get to choose. In general, it might be a good rule, but there are times when it’s worth reconsidering. Towards the end of last year, PSJP published a paper based on conversations with 14 civil society…

You can give money away, but how about power?

Posted on February 12, 2020February 12, 2020 by Halima Mahomed

By Andrew Milner and Halima Mahomed ‘Development can be seen as expanding the real freedoms that people enjoy,’ wrote Amartya Sen. However, it seldom has. Instead, development has been reduced to much more easily identifiable numbers and targets. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Africa. Institutional philanthropy, which could potentially play a significant part…

Sustainability: we all say it, but what does it mean?

Posted on February 7, 2020 by Andrew Milner

A new paper by PSJP, Understanding Sustainability puts some substance to the concept of sustainability by talking to a group of diverse organizations from the fields of development and philanthropy about what they mean by it. It’s a worthwhile and timely exercise because, as the paper points out in its introduction, sustainability has become a…

‘I don’t think you ever arrive on your own’

Posted on December 6, 2019December 6, 2019 by Andrew Milner

In the last post on leadership, we saw how much importance all the organizations attached to encouraging and developing leadership among their constituencies. How do they apply that precept to themselves? Is it different from encouraging and developing leadership among the communities they serve? And how do they run or guide an organization, yet pay…

Each and all: leadership and social change organizations

Posted on December 6, 2019 by Andrew Milner

‘The happiness and sorrow; hope and despair and sense of fair treatment versus injustice in public life in any society is associated directly in part, if not whole with the culture and quality of public leadership.’ As Martin Macwan’s words indicate, few concepts are so important. But what is it? How is it practised in…

What makes a participatory leadership model?

Posted on November 19, 2019November 19, 2019 by Eva Rehse

Devolving leadership to partners is an important way to practise a just and equitable approach to grantmaking, but what are the nuts and bolts of such an approach? As part of a short series of articles on the nature and practice of leadership, Eva Rehse of Global Greengrants Fund outlines the organization’s model and identifies…

From development to dignity: a profound challenge for international cooperation

Posted on November 13, 2019 by Jonathan Glennie

‘Some people just don’t want to develop.’ During my years of work in international development I’ve heard this view expressed, implicitly or explicitly, by frustrated practitioners. It sounds bizarre, and demonstrates a monumental lack of empathy, but funnily enough it can often be right. Many communities don’t want to ‘develop’ according to someone else’s definition…

An enabling environment for leaders to thrive in development and philanthropy

Posted on April 5, 2019April 5, 2019 by Bernie Dolley

‘Leadership for what? Leadership for whom?’ These questions seem to be uppermost in conversations with colleagues. We all seem to be feeling that we have not perhaps done enough, or are not doing enough, in our respective leadership roles to feel like we are making a difference. We are all constantly bombarded with books, articles,…