Effective Philanthropy: Another Take is a collection of 11 stories describing a philanthropic intervention against some form of injustice (socioeconomic and/or political) at a local, national or global scale.

Each story addresses seven key questions grantmakers wrestle with in order to effect systemic social change.

What is the problem? What is the solution? How do we address it?  What are the risks?What are the challenges? What was achieved? What next?

Here is what people are saying about it:

“These terrific stories show how social justice grantmaking is smart and effective. So many funders, unfortunately, think they know best and impose solutions on communities and grantees, but the funders in these stories know that the best solutions come when the people affected get to truly lead.”

The Fourth Olga Alexeeva Memorial Prize of £5,000 will be awarded to an individual who has demonstrated remarkable leadership, creativity and results in developing philanthropy for progressive social change in an emerging market country or countries. All finalists will be featured in a special supplement to be published with the September 2016 issue of Alliance Magazine. The winner will be announced, and invited to deliver a keynote speech, at the Global Summit on Community Philanthropy in Johannesburg on 1-2 December. All finalists will be invited to this conference.

For more information about the prize and nomination forms, go to http://www.alliancemagazine.org/olga-alexeeva-memorial-prize/

From grassroots to global movement! 

All over the world - from Brazil to Russia, from China to the Congo and from Palestine to South Africa - community philanthropy has emerged as an essential tool for strengthening communities' voice and power.

Join us in Johannesburg to celebrate the dynamism and potential of this flourishing movement at the Global Summit on Community Philanthropy, 1st - 2nd December 2016!

Call for ideas

What are the burning issues or essential tools that you would like to discuss at the Summit? Ideas for inspiring speakers? Creative ways to present your work? Send us your ideas!

Read more

THE IDEX ACADEMY6-10 March 2016, Sonoma, California

If you want to help usher in transformative social change, today's global challenges require your most ingenious thi

An earlier version of this article was first shared on September 15, 2015. It has since then been updated to include the latest information and we will attempt to continue to update the information as work progresses. Do keep checking in.

Recent pictures have brought to light the seriousness of the refugee crisis in Europe. Many actors in the philanthropy sector are quickly mobilising to gather and share information, make sense of whats going on, identify work on the ground that foundations can support and think about the best role (both immidiately and in the long run) that the philanthropic community can play.

There are atleast three initiatives currently where foundations can participate, contribute and benefit:

The first edition of SYRIA – BEYOND WAR is now out! Read it here. 
 
SYRIA – BEYOND WAR is a newsletter commissioned by swisspeace and NOREF to disseminate information regarding peacebuilding activities in relation to Syria to interested parties on a quarterly basis.

If you wish to have your activities featured in our upcoming newsletter, or have any feedback, please contact Yosra Nagui at [email protected].

This is a pilot copy, if you wish to subscribe to receive future newsletters (four times a year), please click here.

Trust Africa and IssueLab, a service of the US‐based Foundation Center have launched an online database, which consolidates literature on African giving. It currently comprises of almost 800 documents and includes resources
 in English, French, Arabic and Portuguese, covering multiple countries and ranging from formal philanthropic literature to writings on local systems of solidarity.

The database comes at a critical time when social justice philanthropy practitioners on the continent have been pushing to take into account African giving systems in all their myriad forms, both formal and informal. Recent conversation in the field have asserted the need to look beyond the dominant northern based concepts in order to develop the agenda for African philanthropy.

The closing date for nominations for the Third Olga Alexeeva Memorial Prize has been extended to 30 April 2015.

The Prize of £5,000 is for an individual who has demonstrated remarkable leadership, creativity and results in developing philanthropy for progressive social change in an emerging market country or countries. The prize will be for the individual winner to use at their discretion. If you know someone who has been doing outstanding work in developing philanthropy, nominate them by clicking here.

The closing date for nominations is 30 April.

Click here for more information about the prize.

If you have any questions, contact [email protected]

Should philanthropists and foundations fund artists directly to create the art they want to make? Should they fund theatres and galleries to make art more available to more people? Should they fund only work that explicitly promotes social change? Or should they fund the arts ‘in their own right’ – whatever that means? 

These are the questions that run through all the articles and interviews in the March issue of Alliance.

The Society We Want, a report based on research commissioned by the Webb Memorial Trust by leading pollster YouGov on attitudes to poverty in the UK has shown the qualities that people most treasured were social ones such as fairness, security, safety, freedom, compassion and tolerance. Economic indicators mattered far less.

Click here to download the report.

From a list of 17 key components of a good society identified in pilot research, the highest economic indicator ‘well paid work’ was ranked sixth, while ‘prosperity’ came twelfth.

The research forms a key plank of the WMT`s report, launched on March 2, 2015 at a cross-party conference in central London, which responds to the question “what does a society without poverty look like?” Answers are drawn from population studies, a manifesto created by children and young people, and Trust-commissioned research projects.

The findings of this in-depth report are: