Philanthropy Must Demonstrate Why Community Organizing Matters

The presidential race has made the nature and role of community organizing and civic engagement a central topic of public discourse.

During the campaign, some people have suggested that community organizing does not entail significant responsibilities or relevant experience for government service.

Foundations and other nonprofit organizations know that there is no more important and difficult job than to bring people from diverse backgrounds together with business and government to forge new ways to improve people’s lives.

An effective community organizer must understand how different types of people and institutions function, how to teach people to engage in the democratic process, and how to pursue campaigns that will mobilize people to succeed in winning changes that will improve the lives of people who don’t hold significant power.

Community organizers do the Lord’s work with long hours and low pay. It would be tragic if the current debate over the value of community organizing led anyone — especially foundations and other donors — to devalue this work and direct fewer resources to this important task.

The civic participation that community organizers seek to encourage is part of the process of making government operate better. It is a hopeful sign that all the candidates running for president and vice president this year hold public service in high regard. Whether in the government or by working with community groups, they have all devoted their careers to public service. All of them want to instill more ethics and accountability into the democratic process.

Increasing the involvement of citizens in shaping public policy is one of the best ways to achieve those goals. By giving nonprofit groups and the people they serve a voice at the policy table, governments can become more effective, efficient, and responsive.

The debate over the role of community organizers is important to grant makers and other wealthy donors.

First, many foundations and philanthropists have seen firsthand the benefits of nonprofit advocacy.

They know about the importance of grass-roots organizing in making a real difference in people’s lives. They know that local community groups and other nonprofit organizations are often the organizations that create programs that meet basic human needs. Nonprofit groups therefore often are in the best position to know what works and does not work and to inform solutions. Community voices should be encouraged and welcomed by government officials and all who desire better public policy.

Second, this debate should not obscure the fact that America has a deficit, not a surplus, of philanthropic support for community organizing and nonprofit advocacy. As the Foundation Center’s report in 2005 showed, at best about 11 percent of foundation giving goes to social-justice organizations that seek structural change as part of their work. By all indications, that percentage has not changed much since then.

Since government funds often cannot be used for advocacy — and that money represents a big part of the average nonprofit group’s budget — then foundations and individuals must pick up the slack. This is not an 11-percent solution.

Third, big problems require big solutions. Whether it is low-cost housing, health care, global warming, or any of the other key challenges facing society, it is imperative that more money be provided to efforts to mobilize the public to get involved in crafting ideas for lasting and systemic change.

Many foundation board and staff members, as well as individual donors, continue to fear — and be intimidated by — getting involved in or supporting community organizing and public policy. Some signs of change are encouraging, such as the advocacy work pursued by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to improve American education and to press international governments to fight AIDS and malaria abroad.

Foundations and major donors can ill afford to sit out the public debate over the value of community organizing. This need not — and, for charities and foundations, must not — be a partisan discussion; rather, this is about how the nonprofit world can work with other parts of society to promote positive change.

And as people in the nonprofit world join this discussion, we must be vigilant about not falling into a divide-and-conquer trap. Both direct advocacy and grass-roots efforts are needed to promote change. Direct advocacy may be carried out by nonprofit staff members or consultants, including even those folks called lobbyists (whether paid or nonprofit). It involves making a case directly to elected officials and others who can make change.

Grass-roots advocacy often is carried out by charity staff members and community organizers who are based in local neighborhoods and who bring citizens together to put pressure on institutions resisting change. It’s not either-or in terms of what is needed to create lasting change. It’s both.

Similarly, it’s not direct service versus advocacy that is the measure of which organizations are making the biggest difference to society. It takes both. The most effective nonprofit groups are those that combine their service and advocacy work. The book Forces for Good: the Six Practices of High-Impact Nonprofits identifies advocacy as one of the six practices that help an organization make a difference.

Throughout history, civic participation by ordinary Americans has played a significant role in making our democracy work and expanding civil rights, promoting decent-paying and safe jobs, and protecting our environment.

While direct lobbying is critical, enduring and fundamental change is not possible without mobilizing a mass of Americans to push for change. The United States was founded upon, and ultimately will continue to succeed only if we live up to, the ideal of government of, by, and for the people. It is “we the people” who will strive with the government that is ours to create a “more perfect union.”

Larry Ottinger is president of the Center for Lobbying in the Public Interest in Washington. The views expressed in this article are his own, not necessarily those of the organization.