Editors’ Note: John Tyler, general counsel for the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, adds his perspective to HistPhil‘s forum on archives and knowledge management. As other posts in HistPhil’s forum on archives have ably demonstrated, foundations contribute to the creation of extraordinary amounts of knowledge, tools and information. As foundations consider options for what to do … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: Many Americans are anxious about Donald Trump’s presidency, and particularly Trump’s disparaging language and treatment of immigrants, Muslims, Hispanics, African Americans, women, the press, the judicial system, among other individuals and key institutions of American democratic life. They subsequently have wondered what role, if any, they can play in defending democratic values and principles … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: Brian Galle weighs in on the misunderstood legacy of heiress Adele Smithers, who passed away last week. HistPhil readers will have noticed the passing last week of Adele Smithers, the heiress and careful monitor of the charitable trust established by her late husband, R. Brinkley. The New York Times obit describes her as having … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: Charlotte Clements continues HistPhil’s forum on archives and knowledge management. In this post I want to offer a UK perspective on the archives of philanthropic and non-profit organisations. I am sure that several of the issues I highlight are common outside the UK and I am interested in working across borders to share knowledge … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: HistPhil co-editor Maribel Morey reports on her impressions of a forum on populism, the world order, and the Trump era hosted by the Carnegie Corporation and Time Magazine at the foundation’s offices last week. At the Carnegie Corporation offices in midtown Manhattan this past Tuesday, I attended a panel discussion coordinated by the foundation and Time Magazine on “A Populist … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: Mircea Raianu follows up on last year’s post on the Tata Trusts with historical insights on the corporate scandal that has rocked India and has implicated the nation’s largest philanthropy. In late October 2016, an extraordinary corporate scandal broke out in India. Tata, the country’s largest, most influential, and most widely respected business group, suddenly … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: The following is an interview between HistPhil co-editor Maribel Morey and Hewlett Foundation President Larry Kramer, which took place over email in the past weeks. For earlier Q&As between Kramer and Morey, please follow this link. Below, Kramer discusses the foundation’s forthcoming plans to establish formal archives and the organization’s use of its history in its decision-making … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: During a speech at the 64th annual National Prayer Breakfast in Washington last week, Donald Trump reaffirmed his campaign promise to “get rid of and totally destroy the Johnson Amendment.” Here, Winnifred Fallers Sullivan offers a history of the amendment and some analysis on its likely future. President Trump announced at the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: Joanne Volpe Florino continues HistPhil’s forum on archives and knowledge management with a post detailing the archival strategy of The Atlantic Philanthropies. This past December, The Atlantic Philanthropies made its final awards, becoming the largest limited life philanthropy to complete its grantmaking. The end of this aspect of its organizational life has been long-planned … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: education scholar Sarah Reckhow continues HistPhil‘s forum on archives and knowledge management. Her post examines how new institutional forms within the sector are reshaping and constraining philanthropic research, and what this might mean for the philanthropy archives of the future. The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI) has received substantial media attention and scrutiny during … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: The following is an edited transcript of an interview between HistPhil co-editor Benjamin Soskis and Ford Foundation president Darren Walker. In 2011, the Ford Foundation moved its archives, which had previously been housed in its New York headquarters, to the Rockefeller Archive Center (RAC). Two years later, Walker became president of the Foundation. Since … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: Lucy Bernholz continues HistPhil‘s forum on archives and knowledge management. Foundations and archives often share a structural commitment to perpetuity. Yet most foundations haven’t shown an interest in organizing their own archives or in making them available to future scholars. This is a missed opportunity for institutions that care about their long-term impact. … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: Last Week, Pablo Eisenberg, for decades one of the nation’s leading progressive critics of foundations, wrote an important op-ed in the Chronicle of Philanthropy calling for six reforms necessary to strengthen the nonprofit sector in the Trump era. One of those involved changes to Independent Sector, transforming it into “a new powerful coalition solely of charities.” In making … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: Laura Miller and Rachel Wimpee, historians and project directors at the Rockefeller Archive Center (RAC), continue HistPhil‘s forum on archives and knowledge management. The RAC is the nation’s leading repository of philanthropic archives, holding the records of such important institutions as the Rockefeller, Ford, and Russell Sage Foundations, as well as numerous nonprofits … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: This post, from Lisa Brooks and Gabriela Fitz at IssueLab, opens HistPhil’s forum on philanthropy, archives, and knowledge management. IssueLab is a searchable, browseable knowledge sharing platform that collects, curates, and distributes the social sector’s knowledge. IssueLab also supports ongoing learning and research in the sector, believing in the power of the sector’s collective … Continue reading
This week, HistPhil begins a new forum on philanthropy, archives, and knowledge management. In some respects, the forum will likely cover ground already tilled by the many debates surrounding the issues of accountability and transparency occurring now within the sector. This forum, like those other discussions, will address the extent to which philanthropy opens itself … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: Fabrice Jaumont contributes a post based on his new book, Unequal Partners: American Foundations and Higher Education Development in Africa (Palgrave-MacMillan, 2016). At a time when higher education is once again recognized as a driver of development and income growth, when knowledge economies requiring additional levels of education are displacing economies predicated on manufacturing, … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: HistPhil’s Maribel Morey reviews Tiffany Willoughby-Herard’s new book, Waste of a White Skin: The Carnegie Corporation and the Racial Logic of White Vulnerability (University of California Press, 2015). In a 1914 editorial titled “World War and the Color Line,” African American historian W.E.B. Du Bois explained to Black readers of the NAACP’s Crisis why they should … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: Journalist Lisa Napoli, who has recently published the first biography of McDonald’s heiress Joan Kroc, offers a fascinating portrait of Kroc’s philanthropy. Kroc is a figure who defies easy categorization. She was, in one sense, a traditional funder; one of her largest gifts was to a social service organization, the Salvation Army. But she also … Continue reading
Editors’ Note: We’ve been on a brief hiatus while working on some history of philanthropy manuscripts, and at the same time, internalizing the U.S. presidential election results. On the latter topic, fellow HistPhil co-editor Benjamin Soskis published a piece for The Chronicle of Philanthropy earlier this month. Two weeks ago at ARNOVA, I presented some initial thoughts on philanthropy, American race … Continue reading
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