Giving Compass' Take:

• The Rockefeller Brothers Fund wrote in its annual review about the importance of staying civically active and not being discouraged in the face of political volatility.

• The main upshot is that true change requires patience, but also bold action. Are we willing to take big risks for the causes we're most passionate about?

• Here's more about creating effective philanthropy in an increasingly divisive world.

The political divides that President Obama promised to heal have instead widened to a chasm, leaving many Americans feeling dispirited and helpless about the state of our country.

The Rockefeller Brothers Fund is not immune to the effects of this backsliding. The Fund and its grantees had been working toward a global climate agreement for more than two decades when President Trump announced the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Accord in 2017. With the Iran Project and others, we had helped lay the groundwork for the nuclear agreement with Iran, which now hangs in the balance. Despite our fervent efforts, the insidious phenomenon of voter suppression is gaining legitimacy at the highest levels of our judiciary. Each new day, it seems, reveals the carnage of another decade of hard work unraveled overnight.

But I have not lost hope. In each of these cases, we at the Fund have tried to analyze what went wrong and quickly regroup  —  we have not given up, but rather revised our strategies, thought about the reasons for our losses, and developed new approaches to overcome them. Below are three points of reflection that guide us in this moment of political crisis.

Social change does not happen overnight. It does not happen quickly, and it does not happen as a result of a fixed set of strategies.

  • Fundamental social change does not happen in a linear fashion
  • But taking a long view of social change means risking failure in the short term
  • While audacious in ambition, we must be humble in approach

Read the full article about imperfect arcs of progress by Rockefeller Brothers Fund, via Philanthropy for Active Civic Engagement (PACE) at medium.com.