November 18, 1999 | Read Time: 5 minutes
Charities, corporations, and governments that want to be as effective as possible must be aware of how economic, political, and social forces are transforming the way they operate. This is particularly true in the current era, when many of the same forces are at work around the world.
With the support of many foundations, independent research organizations in the United States traditionally have helped to shape public policy. They have done that by studying critical topics and by providing a neutral venue for policy makers, non-profit organizations, and corporations to meet informally to hash out issues as they arise.
Yet the future of the smaller, non-partisan think tank is uncertain as grant makers devote a greater share of their limited resources to programs and institutions that provide direct services to those in need — and as support for policy research becomes overwhelmingly focused on a few large organizations and universities. The end result could compromise the public debate on a range of issues related to our nation’s global interests.
To be sure, support for the work of social- and direct-service organizations is critically important and provides donors with the visible, quantifiable results they seek. However, support for good international public policies can prevent social problems from becoming acute, which in turn can lessen the demands placed on charities.
Indeed, charities that deal with domestic problems increasingly recognize that they cannot afford to neglect the international aspects of their issues. In matters such as alleviating poverty, protecting the environment, and dealing with global economic forces, what is local has become global, and vice versa, making independent international policy research critical to providing the context that governments and charities need to be effective.
Growing anecdotal evidence, however, suggests that the universe of private philanthropies and corporations that support such research has contracted in recent years. Indeed, many major foundations and corporations have turned their backs on independent international-affairs research altogether.
Foundation support for international policy research has not disappeared, of course. University-based researchers and organizations that have a clearly identifiable conservative ideological bent or particular thematic niche — the environment, for example, or women’s rights — have had notable success in raising funds.
Yet university research often is concerned with analyzing policy issues largely for knowledge’s sake. The theoretical and historical viewpoints raised through this analysis seldom are rooted in the “realpolitik” of the world, where decisions are made based on complex — and sometimes conflicting — social, economic, political, and cultural considerations. What’s more, there is a well-recognized conflict at many academic institutions between studying policy and gaining tenure.
As a result of the decline in the availability of private funds for public-policy analysis, the importance of government funds for research has been increasing. However, government resources — themselves limited and in high demand — often are explicitly tied to specific outcomes or political agendas, thus leaving the grantee vulnerable to charges of bias.
Unlike government agencies and academic institutions, independent policy-research organizations are not constrained by party loyalty, nor are they interested mostly in theory. When decisions have to be made and the debate becomes public, such organizations can provide essential objective context that informs the discussion and identifies policy options that may enable governments, businesses, and charities to achieve their goals.
Two grant-making trends further compound the problem of the decline in private funds for independent organizations that focus on international policy: foundations’ preference for financing specific projects rather than providing their grantees with general operating support, and the fact that more and more foundations, rather than leaving the technical expertise to their grantees, are expanding their own professional staffs and are willing to support policy research only if they can play a role in setting the research agenda of their grantees. Both trends make it extremely difficult for private, non-partisan policy-research institutions to raise the unrestricted funds that they need to operate, define their own research priorities, and preserve their independent voice.
The situation is even worse in other parts of the world, where philanthropic support for independent international-policy research is practically non-existent. In Western Europe, for example, such research generally emanates from universities or is financed by the state or political parties — often with very obvious ideological strings attached.
Independent policy research conducted in industrial countries like the United States faces a peculiar additional challenge: Grant makers there generally prefer to support think tanks in emerging markets and less-developed countries, mistakenly viewing research organizations in industrial countries to be less in need of private financial support. In reality, independent international-policy research worldwide is struggling to survive.
Without question, think tanks must do a better job of making clearer the links between research and action. They must stake out positions and form relationships with charities, governments, and other partners that can help turn their research into real policy change.
Yet if the rich diversity of views that has always been the hallmark of the national public debate is to be preserved and protected, donors must recognize that private support for independent international policy research is essential. Without regular philanthropic backing for a broad spectrum of independent think tanks, an essential and irreplaceable source of independent thinking and debate will be severely compromised, and the quality of policy choices will be diminished.
Kenneth Giunta is senior director of corporate resources development and marketing, and secretary to the Board of Directors, at the Overseas Development Council, in Washington.
