Editors’ Note: Pablo Eisenberg provides a first-hand account of the improbable creation of the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy out of the Filer Commission on Private and Public Needs. In retrospect, it seems surprising that the Filer Commission on Private Philanthropy and Public Needs, established in 1973, the most prestigious study of its kind in … Continue reading
Author Archives: HistPhil
Philanthropy and the State: Divisions of Labor and Authority
Editors’ Note: For the last weeks, HistPhil has hosted a forum on the Green Revolution and we thank its contributors: Gary Toenniessen, Marci Baranski, Helen Anne Curry, Gilbert Levine, Ruth Levine, Tore Olsson, and Jonathan Harwood. With the below piece, Emma Saunders-Hastings launches the new forum on philanthropy & the state. She argues that the distribution of public authority (rather than division of labor) should … Continue reading
Tata Philanthropy and the Making of Modern India
Editors’ Note: Scholars have often engaged the rise of modern philanthropy in the developing world through the tensions between indigenous traditions and cosmopolitan practices. Mircea Raianu explores the place of Tata philanthropy in modern India to complicate that dichotomy. What is the relationship between corporate philanthropy and the modern nation-state? Or, to put it another way, … Continue reading
The Social Benefits of Philanthropy & Charity
Editors’ Note: Below, Rhodri Davies discusses his new book, Public Good by Private Means: How philanthropy shapes Britain (2016). It is easy to take for granted the idea of charity as an accepted public good and to picture the not-for-profit sector as having incrementally yet inevitably developed towards its current form. However, my new book, Public Good by … Continue reading
Dialoging with Indiana’s Past: Philanthropy in a State-wide Context
Editors’ Note: Gregory Witkowski introduces the Hoosier Philanthropy Conference, which will take place February 18-19. The Hoosier Philanthropy Conference: Understanding the Past, Planning the Future (follow us February 18-19 on Twitter at #INPHIL200) aims to integrate practice and scholarship, providing an avenue for a constructive exchange between scholars and philanthropy and nonprofit professionals throughout the … Continue reading
Historical Context to $2.1 Million Grant to Women’s Philanthropy Institute
Editors’ Note: In early January, Inside Philanthropy announced that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation had gifted $2.1 million to the Women’s Philanthropy Institute at Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy. Below, the Institute’s Director Debra Mesch and Associate Director Andrea Pactor provide some historical perspective to the grant. While the history of women’s activism through philanthropy is … Continue reading
A Practitioner’s History of the Green Revolution
Editors’ Note: Gary Toenniessen, who worked for more than four decades on agricultural policy for the Rockefeller Foundation, continues HistPhil’s forum on the Green Revolution. When I joined the Rockefeller Foundation in 1971, I quickly learned from my experienced colleagues the value of history as a resource for program development. The Foundation’s cooperative work in Mexico was … Continue reading
Let Down at the Ford Foundation
Editors’ Note: Against the backdrop of Ford Foundation President Darren Walker’s announced efforts to address inequalities on the global stage, HistPhil hosted a conversation this past August on the ability of philanthropy to address societal-wide inequities. At the Ford Foundation offices in NYC earlier this month, Walker discussed further his vision for the organization with Stanford political scientist Rob Reich (The … Continue reading
Why Wheat? Borlaug and his Cosmopolitan Wheat Varieties in the Green Revolution
Editors’ Note: In the latest post in HistPhil’s forum on the Green Revolution, Marci Baranski explains the special place wheat played within the Green Revolution, and why that history might not necessarily work as a model for future programs of agricultural development. Very recently, wheat overtook rice as the highest acreage food crop in the … Continue reading
Raising Yields and Losing Genes
Editors’ Note: Helen Anne Curry continues HistPhil‘s forum on the Green Revolution. Here, she argues that the history of the Rockefeller Foundation’s involvement in the conservation of crop biodiversity offers insight into how the foundation navigated the science and politics of a problem that it had itself contributed significantly to generating. In 1943, the Rockefeller Foundation … Continue reading
Ford Tackles Inequality?
Editors’ Note: Against the backdrop of Ford Foundation President Darren Walker’s announced efforts to address inequalities on the global stage, HistPhil hosted a conversation this past August on the ability of philanthropy to address societal-wide inequities. At the Ford Foundation offices in NYC earlier this month, Walker discussed further his vision for the organization with Stanford political scientist Rob Reich … Continue reading
Can Philanthropy Feed the World?: A Review of David Rieff’s The Reproach of Hunger
Editors’ Note: HistPhil continues its forum on the Green Revolution with this review of David Rieff’s The Reproach of Hunger from Gilbert Levine and Ruth Levine. The world has done a remarkable job of feeding itself. Despite population growth, the Food and Agriculture Organization reports that the prevalence of hunger in most parts of the developing world … Continue reading
To be Young, Rich, and Philanthropic
A few weeks ago, on the NCRP blog, Ryan Schlegel wrote an insightful post pushing back against some of the breathless celebration that had surrounded the promotion of “hacker philanthropy,” the term that Sean Parker coined in a Wall Street Journal op-ed to describe the giving of his tech mogul peers. Philanthropic “hackers,” according to … Continue reading
Philanthropy at the AALS Conference
For those interested, on Saturday (January 9), at the annual Association of American Law Schools conference in New York, from 8:30 AM to 10:15 AM, there will be a panel on “The Philanthropic Sector and Radical Reform.” Here is a brief description: “Reforming the philanthropic sector is always in the news. Most legal proposals, however, are … Continue reading
U.S. Regionalism and the Many Histories of the Green Revolution
Editors’ Note: Tore Olsson continues HistPhil’s forum on the Green Revolution. The reach of U.S. philanthropy has rarely been contained by national boundaries, and in the twentieth century, this was especially true. Readers of this blog are likely familiar with the vast global footprint left by institutions such as the Ford, Rockefeller, and Carnegie endowments, … Continue reading
Was the Green Revolution a Humanitarian Undertaking?
Editors’ Note: With this post from Jonathan Harwood, HistPhil begins a forum on the Green Revolution. The GR is often touted as one of the greatest achievements of twentieth century philanthropy, but perhaps with no other initiative is the gap between assessment of its impact and significance by scholars and practitioners so wide. With this … Continue reading
Philanthropy at the Upcoming AHA Meeting
This upcoming Jan. 7-10th, the annual meeting of the American Historical Association will take place in Atlanta; and in anticipation of the event, I have culled a list of panels that might be of interest to HistPhil readers. We hope to see you there! Of course, please let me know if I missed any panels, and please also reach … Continue reading
A Review of 2015 & Looking to 2016
Thinking back over this year, many thanks to the 500 Twitter followers, 300 email subscribers, and over forty contributors who have made this site an exciting place for conversations on the history of philanthropy. Fellow HistPhil co-founders Stanley N. Katz, Benjamin Soskis, and I launched the website this past summer with the dual purpose of strengthening … Continue reading
Confronting a Philanthropic Past: A Review of Rosenfield’s A World of Giving
Editors’ Note: Benjamin Coates reviews Patricia Rosenfield’s A World of Giving: Carnegie Corporation of New York – A Century of International Philanthropy. As a pioneer of modern philanthropy, Andrew Carnegie was among the first millionaires to face criticism not for his stinginess, but for his largesse. Why should society admire a man for giving away wealth … Continue reading
The Salvation Army and the Balance between faith-based ministry and philanthropy
Editors’ Note: HistPhil’s forum on the split between philanthropy and charity continues with this post from the Salvation Army’s Jennifer Byrd. On street corners, in front of shopping centers and businesses all across the United States, the yearly Christmas season ritual of The Salvation Army’s red kettles and bell ringers stands as one of society’s … Continue reading
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