Transcript Slide 1

The Future of Research on Nonprofits:
Major Challenges for Academic and
Practitioners
IDEEL ARENA and the Swedish Research
Council
Stockholm
February 10, 2011
Dennis R. Young
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Outline of my presentation
 How has nonprofit research developed in the U.S. and
elsewhere? Dimensions, drivers and issues.
 What are the challenges and opportunities for
nonprofit research driven by the needs of practice?
 ARNOVA and the Gates Foundation: attempting to
craft a pragmatic research agenda addressed to
nonprofits and public policy
 Summary observations and possible futures for
nonprofit research
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Evolution of nonprofit sector
research
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Pre-history of the field, pre-1970s
Organizing of the field, 1970s and ’80s
Seminal contributions, ’70s, ’80s, ’90s
Maturing and flowering of the field, ’90s
– present
 Alternative futures
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Pre-history
 Study of voluntary behavior: AVAS and JVAR
 Study of social movements, e.g., Zald
 Study of collective action and political interest groups, e.g.,
Olson
 Study of public bureaucracy, e.g.,Niskanen
 Study of policy, organizational and management issues, and
service effectiveness within subsectors: e.g., health, education,
social services, the arts
 Organizational studies, e.g., YMCA (Zald), March of Dimes
(Sills)
 Overall, much nonprofit-related research existed, albeit in
fragmented, uncoordinated, unfocused and not specifically
identified as “nonprofit”
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Seminal
events
Peterson and Filer commissions (1970s)
Establishment of PONPO (1977)
Establishment of Independent Sector/research division and spring
research forums (1980s)
Establishment of the NCCS/IRS and other data bases (1990s -present)
Transformation of AVAS to ARNOVA and JVAR to NVSQ (1990)
Establishment of ISTR, EMES, JANPORA and other research
associations (1990s)
Johns Hopkins Comparative Sector Project (1990s)
Proliferation of academic centers in U.S., Canada, Europe, Japan,
Australia, Israel and elsewhere (1990s - present)
Establishment of new scholarly journals: NML, Voluntas , Journal of
Civil Society Studies, Voluntary Sector Review, Nonprofit Policy
Forum, Nonprofit Review and others(1990s – present)
Seminal compendia: Yale Handbook, Nonprofit Almanac, Jossey-Bass
Handbook of Nonprofit Leadership and Management (1980s – present)
Pioneering book series: Yale series, IS Conference books, Johns
Hopkins Series, Elgar Handbooks and others (1980s – present)
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The early “big issues”: addressing
Filer’s “terra incognita”
 What exactly is a nonprofit organization?
 What is the size, scope, significance of the
nonprofit or third sector?
 In what functions, services and activities do
nonprofit organizations engage?
 Why do nonprofit organizations exist in a market
economy and democratic society?
 How do nonprofits behave? How are they
different from for-profit or governmental
organizations?
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Pioneering contributions
 Establishing an empirical data base: Independent
Sector, Urban Institute, Johns Hopkins Project
 Formulating theories of existence: Weisbrod,
Hansmann, Salamon, Ben-Ner
 Formulating theories of behavior: James, Young,
Weisbrod, Andreoni
 Providing historical context: Hall, Hammack,
McCarthy
 Providing international context: Salamon,
Anheier, Defourney, Borzaga, many others
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Early conundrums
 Sector as an economic concept; not a precise fit with generic
approaches of other disciplines such as sociology, political
science and psychology
 Legal forms and political and cultural traditions differ from
country to country; difficulty in defining universal
characteristics of so-called third sector organizations
 Non-distribution constraint
 Governance arrangements
 Relationships to government and business
 Incompatibility and incompleteness of available data
 Do certain sub-sectors really think of themselves as part of a
larger third sector? e.g., the arts, higher education in the U.S.
 Should certain (commercialized or gov’t dominated)
subsectors be included? e.g., hospitals in U.S.
 Difficulties of obtaining information on religious institutions,
given constitutional issues of church and state
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What have been the driving forces
behind nonprofit research ?
 Political/governmental antagonism (U.S.)
 Private foundation support (U.S.)
 Devolution and privatization; government support
(Europe)
 Expansion of democracy and market societies (e.g.,
Eastern and Central Europe, developing countries)
 Academic entrepreneurship and intellectual interest
 Needs of teaching and practice (especially growth of
graduate programs in nonprofit management)
 Not government funding (unfortunately?)
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Digression on Current Funding for Nonprofit
Research: Quick survey of NACC members
 Survey of 50 NACC members/10 responses – 9 US centers and 1
Canadian
 9 centers had sponsored (funded) research/8 US centers
 4 centers received gov’t funding for research/3 US centers
 Average % of gov’t funding for those with gov’t supported
research was 31%/38% for US centers
 Federal gov’t was most common source of gov’t funds
 Other sources of research funding included foundations,
nonprofit associations, corporations, private donors, internal
university funds and endowments
 Overall: nonprofit research funding in the U.S. is fragmented and
government is not the dominant funder
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Opportunities and Challenges of
a “Needs based” Research Agenda
 Not impossible for academics and practitioners
to collaborate on research, despite different
motivations and goals
 Necessary to develop more effective and
efficient management practices and public
policies
 Can be academically rewarding, especially in
stretching the boundaries of traditional
disciplinary research
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Academics and Practitioners
 Academics seek opportunities for rigorous, generalizeable
research that can be published in peer reviewed journals and used
for classroom teaching
 Practitioners want useable results, expressed in plain language
and clear formats, that can lead to improvements in policies and
practices
 Collaboration requires mutual respect and understanding of each
others’ needs and aspirations
 Many practitioners are genuinely interested in relevant quality
research clearly presented, and many academics are motivated to
learn from the experiences of practitioners and their
organizations.
 Quality research can require substantial (external) resources for
faculty and student time, acquisition, cleaning and processing of
good data and maintaining of research infrastructure
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Some contemporary nonprofit research questions
of mutual interest to academia and practice:
 Governance – what governing board structures and policies lead
to more effective organizations in different contexts and
circumstances?
 Finance – what sources and mixes of income are mostly likely to
support nonprofit organizations with various missions and in
different stages of development? How do endowed organizations
differ from nonendowed organizations in their performance and
stability? What factors influence giving and volunteering?
 Performance – how is organizational effectiveness and financial
health and sustainability best measured for various kinds of
nonprofits?
 Growth – what are the ways in which effective nonprofits can
“go to scale” and achieve greater societal impact?
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More research issues of mutual
interest to academic and practice
 Strategy – how and when should nonprofits seek to coordinate or
partner with other organizations? When and it what ways should
they be allowed to compete?
 Policy Advocacy –What structures, policies and practices best
accommodate the tensions between service delivery and public
policy advocacy? What strategies allow nonprofits to be most
effective in the policy arena?
 Human Resources –What are the most effective deployments and
mixes of paid staff and volunteers? What compensation structures
work best for paid staff at various levels in nonprofit organizations?
 Public Policy – How are nonprofits effectively regulated and held
accountable for their performance? In what ways should they be
subsidized or exempt from taxes? In what fields should they be
allowed to compete? What government services are most effectively
outsourced to nonprofits?
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The ARNOVA-Gates Conference:
fleshing out a research agenda
 October 4-5, 2010 in Baltimore
 30 scholars and nonprofit leaders
 Goal to create a research agenda to study
how public policy affects nonprofits in
the U.S.
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Key questions addressed
 What are the most critical policy issues presently facing the
nonprofit sector?
 What do we really know, from rigorous research, about the
positive or negative impacts of past, current, and prospective
policies.
 What are the gaps in our knowledge—not just research, but basic
data—about the interaction of public policies and nonprofits?
 What kinds of research might be framed to generate new insights
of immediate utility to nonprofits and policy makers that would
elevate the quality and hopefully the results of the nonprofit
public policy discourse?
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Research agenda emerging from
the conference (broad themes)
 What are the different forms of funding available to the
nonprofit sector and how do their impacts differ ?
 How does government funding impact how nonprofits
operate?
 How do regulatory and tax policies support or hinder the
nonprofit sector and the benefits it can deliver?
 What are the challenges and opportunities from “emerging
organizational forms”?
 What are the civic roles of the nonprofit sector?
 What is the value proposition for the nonprofit sector?
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Observations about the U.S.
academic/practitioner dialogue
 Consensus around need for more data and description
of how things actually work
 Strong mutual interest in impacts of policy on
nonprofits and nonprofits on society
 Fundamental questioning of the role of nonprofit
organizations and what their roles, privileges and
obligations are and should be
 Positive, empirical research and analysis as the
common ground between practitioners’ desires for
facts and actionable results and academics’ sometimes
more esoteric interests in theory , models and
relationships
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An overall assessment of the current
state of nonprofit research
Success in establishing a recognizable field of scholarship with fuzzy borders
An interdisciplinary field with greater progress in some disciplines than
others
Considerable progress in creating useful data bases
Considerable progress in international comparative research – Johns
Hopkins, EMES network, etc.
Considerable progress in creating publications outlets through new journals,
book series and mainline publication in disciplinary journals
Some progress with multi-disciplinary research efforts, especially through
coordinated book projects:
 Yale Handbooks
 Urban Institute books on Nonprofit/Government and
Nonprofit/Business Relations
 Other multidisciplinary book projects such as Powell and Clemens,
Private Action and the Public Good
 Various Handbook projects – e.g., Jossey-Bass; Edward Elgar
Large scale or truly interdisciplinary projects are rare
Lots of opportunities for new, cutting edge work
Not yet entirely clear that the field is correctly defined or framed
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Some alternative futures for the field of nonprofit
research
 Continued progress within the defined framework of not-forprofit organizations, along disciplinary lines
 Integration across disciplines within the current framework
 Broadening of the nonprofit framework to include
cooperatives, limited-profit enterprises and other
manifestations of social purpose organization
 Reframing of the field in terms of other integrative concepts
such as social enterprise , social economy or civil society
 Broadening of attention from formal organizations, subsectors
and sectors, to more fully embrace (at the bottom) less formal
voluntary organizations and (at the top) transnational
nonprofit organizations, associations and movements
 Refocusing of attention from nonprofits per se to
“hybridization” of the economy/integration of nonprofit,
business and government – networks, partnerships and mixed
forms of enterprise
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Final thoughts
 I congratulate you on your dialogue and encourage your
development of a robust funded research agenda of mutual
interest to academia and practice
 Government funding is important (the U.S. model not
withstanding). Private funding can add diversity, innovation and
stimulus.
 Needs-driven research can be both practical and useful, and
intellectually compelling and academically rewarding
 The appropriate research agenda will differ from country to
country. Sweden and the U.S. differ substantially in the roles and
functioning of nonprofits and civil society organizations. Hence
our research agendas will necessary differ.
 We can learn much from each other!
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Some useful references
 Walter W. Powell and Richard Steinberg (eds.), The
Nonprofit Sector: A Research Handbook, 2nd edition,
Yale University Press, 2006
 David O. Renz (ed.) and Associates, The Jossey-Bass
Handbook of Nonprofit Leadership and Management,
Jossey-Bass Publishers, 2010
 Bruce A. Seaman and Dennis R. Young (eds.),
Handbook of Research on Nonprofit Economics and
Management, Edward Elgar, 2010
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