Eunice Kennedy Shriver - The Human Spirit Initiative

Cultural and social conditions set
the stage
• Rapid societal change escalated the
demands made on society.
• Returning GIs and their families had
significant needs after World War II.
• Great Society programs dealing with
civil rights, poverty, health, housing
and education highlighted unmet
needs.
• Service and voluntarism flourished,
but there were many agencies
soliciting funds and trying to survive.
• Funding sources wanted reassurance
that agencies were doing a good job
in their communities.
• Payroll deduction was conceived for
charitable giving, starting in Detroit
with the automobile companies.
Growing Sophistication
• Movements transformed into
organizations, and organizations
began to ask fundamental questions.
• Organizations recognized the need
for professionalization but had
growing pains.
• Organizations recognized the need
for credibility; they wanted to be
taken seriously.
• New trends began to take shape in
the nonprofit world:
• A new breed of foundation
emerged with entrepreneurs like
7 Oral Interview with Les Silverman, Director Emeritus, McKinsey & Company, 10 March 2010
8 Ibid.
9 Oral interview with Daniel Cardinali, President, Communities in Schools, 2 November 2009
Bill Gates finding ways to make
philanthropy more effective.
• There was more discussion about
the potential of sharing good
information, techniques and
organizational capacity building.
• There was greater availability of
data.
The sector was gaining prominence
by demonstrably improving lives in
our country and elsewhere. 7
•
“Many in the business world lack
an understanding of the challenges many
nonprofit organizations face … building
consensus around vision, not profit, and
reinforcing aspects of performance, other
than financial.” 8
“There was also sophistication around the
funding community. Private foundations like
Ford and Rockefeller had already supported
our work in the street academies in New York
but with a very loose kind of funding strategy.
By the late 1970s, there had been a level of
sophistication introduced into the sector.” 9
“America’s Promise Alliance is
successful, because we try to do a good job
of articulating issues, raising awareness, and
inspiring people to act. Another part of our
success is the ability to be a catalyst and a
convener, to pull multiple sectors in many
organizations together around a common
goal and a common vision.” 10
“In the early1990s, we were forced
by one of our board members to pull back
from running around the country, sit down,
10 Oral interview with Marguerite Kondracke, President and CEO, America’s Promise Alliance, 20 October 2009
America’s Third Great Sector
9