This article is the first in a series of articles about Community Led Philanthropy, co-hosted by GlobalGiving. The conversation explores the ways philanthropy can support community-led change. 

Now more than ever, philanthropy and development practitioners are asking, ‘how might we shift decision-making power closer to communities?’ In the wake of the pandemic, the writing is on the wall that strong, dynamic communities are essential to long-term, sustainable change, and external actors need to rapidly adapt.

We’re thrilled to host this Alliance series on community-led philanthropy to explore the ways philanthropy can support and enable community-led change.

Philanthropists of all kinds are now waking up to the notion that locally-led approaches offer a better pathway to sustained, durable change. The central question being asked now is, ‘ok, so what should we do differently?’ With many smart, experienced people in development organisations, recommendations and ‘best practices’ are plentiful. However, we posited that the missing voices were conversations with and among those on the margins of mainstream development.

We partnered with the Global Fund for Community Foundations and community leaders in six countries—India, Mexico, Nepal, Russia, Vietnam, and Zambia—to co-design a process for: identifying community-led approaches, gathering evidence of such approaches and their long-term impact, learning how funders’ policies and practices promote or inhibit community led-ness.

Here’s what we’ve learned so far:

  • Community-led initiatives are effective, and the process of being community-led itself is impactful.
  • Community led-ness is centered around relationships, and at its heart, it’s about how we treat one another.
  • Funders can help or hurt community-led approaches.

Of course, community‐led initiatives face challenges, some of which are inherent in collective organizing and some of which are a result of historical, political, and/or cultural contexts. It’s up to us to learn from diverse communities about what helps and hurts.

Read the full article about supporting community-led change by Alison Carlman at Alliance Magazine.