An area to tread carefully – for editors and funders alike
Caroline Hartnell

An area to tread carefully – for editors and funders alike

Caroline Hartnell
01 December 2011
Alliance magazine

Guest editors invariably bring a huge amount to each Alliance special feature – specialist knowledge, experience, contacts. I find it hard to imagine producing an issue of Alliance without one. In the case of the special feature on ‘Responding to the hopes of the Arab Spring’, I can say that having an expert guest editor was, literally, indispensable.
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Undermining the foundations of non-accountability?
Caroline Hartnell

Undermining the foundations of non-accountability?

Caroline Hartnell
01 September 2011
Alliance magazine

It’s a truism that foundations lack accountability – unlike (democratic) governments and companies, which are at least in theory accountable to voters and shareholders. The justification for this – in the eyes of the philanthropy world, and presumably the wider world – is the assumption that foundations probably do quite a lot of good, and almost certainly don’t do any harm. Click here to read ...


Lighting up the night
Caroline Hartnell

Lighting up the night

Caroline Hartnell
1 June 2011
Alliance magazine

Having visited the Indian state of Bihar at the end of March, the experience of driving through the countryside as it gets dark is fresh in my memory. It is beautiful, fertile country – fields of ripening wheat with palm trees here and there and little villages nestling along the roadside. But as dusk approaches, and then night, complete darkness falls across the landscape, the little villages lost from sight. Click here to read ...


Covers we didn’t choose ...
Caroline Hartnell

Covers we didn’t choose ...

Caroline Hartnell
1 March 2011
Alliance magazine

Searching for a cover photo for an Alliance special feature can be an illuminating experience in itself. When thinking about collaboration, we turned first to the natural world. Ants and bees spring immediately to mind, but the photos are unappealing, a mass of insects crawling together in an undifferentiated whole. Click here to read ...


A matter of rights
Caroline Hartnell

A matter of rights

Caroline Hartnell
1 December 2010
Alliance magazine

I’m going to admit it, this has been a difficult issue to edit, mainly because most of the articles in the special feature went through several iterations. Why was this? Was it because the contributors were somehow less competent than usual? Of course not! I think it was because they were trying to pin down what exactly distinguishes social justice philanthropy from ‘other’ philanthropy, and this is no easy task. Click here to read ...


Pledging for what?
Caroline Hartnell

Pledging for what?

Caroline Hartnell
1 September 2010
Alliance magazine

The backdrop to putting this issue of Alliance to bed is the Gates-Buffett Giving Pledge, described on the Pledge website as ‘an effort to invite the wealthiest individuals and families in America to commit to giving the majority of their wealth to the philanthropic causes and charitable organizations of their choice either during their lifetime or after their death’. At the time of writing, 40 American billionaires had already signed up; Fortune magazine estimates the Pledge could generate as much as $600 billion in charitable giving. Click here to read ...


Seeking scale
Caroline Hartnell

Seeking scale

Caroline Hartnell
1 June 2010
Alliance magazine

I have long admired the work of the Mumbai NGO SPARC, led by the wonderful Sheela Patel. Working with India’s National Federation of Slum Dwellers, and in negotiation with state governments and the World Bank, they seem to offer almost a ‘third way’ between state and private provision of services. Last year, at a Skoll World Forum session organized by Volans, I heard Nancy Kete of EMBARQ talking and was blown away by her story of how they have revolutionized public transport in some of the world’s biggest cities. Click here to read ...


Entering a whole new world

1 March 2010
Alliance magazine

A few days ago (8 February), I read an article in the New York Times by Susan Dominus about the Secret Society for Creative Philanthropy. Five years ago, Courtney Martin, a Brooklyn-based writer, was shocked to find herself in possession of a six-figure book advance. She wanted to give a chunk of it away, but was not sure how. So she chose nine thoughtful friends, gave them each $100, and told them they would be expected to account for what they had done with it at a gathering a month later. Click here to read ...


A mixed bag of motives
Caroline Hartnell

A mixed bag of motives

Caroline Hartnell
1 Decemeber 2009
Alliance magazine

A recently published book, The Art of Giving: Where the soul meets a business plan, by Charles Bronfman and Jeffrey Solomon, has given rise to a good deal of discussion in the US blogosphere about why people give. The focus on the end user as the primary beneficiary in the ‘social benefit supply chain’ does not capture ‘the intrinsic return to the funders’, say the authors, who see understanding why you give as a step towards more committed and successful giving. Click here to read ...


A bad case of Obama mania?
Caroline Hartnell

A bad case of Obama mania?

Caroline Hartnell
1 September 2009
Alliance magazine

How did it happen that this issue of Alliance has no less than three separate images of Barack Obama? Are we at Alliance suffering from a serious case of the Obama mania that Barry Gaberman cautions against in his column? Click here to read ...


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