When Annabelle White received a large inheritance 12 years ago, she knew she wanted to give money to environmental causes. Having previously sat on the board of her grandmother’s foundation, she was wary of the complexity and attention that running her own foundation would involve. “When you start a foundation, you get pitched a lot,…
This article is an edited version of a paper that was written for the McGill-McConnell Program: Master of Management for National Voluntary Sector Leaders. “It is no longer enough to do nice things with your philanthropy—it is time to do the important things.” – Peter Goldmark, former president, Rockefeller Foundation1 GLOSSARY Charity or public charity: One…
[Editor’s Note: The paper on which this article was based was intended for a legal audience but the issues surrounding donor-restricted charitable gifts must be of some concern to all executives and boards who accept such gifts on behalf of the charitable organizations they serve. So that readers may benefit from access to the full…
This article has been developed and updated by the author (as of July 2003), from a presentation to the 3rd Annual Estates and Trusts Forum of the Law Society of Upper Canada in November 2000. The author would like to thank Johanna Blom, Articling Student, for research and editing assistance in preparing this revised article….
This week: Freeland’s to-do list, recovery ideas from Alberta’s non-profits, pandemic fallout for Indigenous artists, and making summer fundraisers work despite social distancing Charity reform and the new finance minister Senator Ratna Omidvar, who co-chaired the Red Chamber’s committee on charitable reform, is calling on the new Liberal finance minister to move quickly on long-sought…
This article is the second in a series about European philanthropy. The series is published as a collaboration between The Philanthropist and The Lawson Foundation. How do we enhance giving in Canada? Or the positive societal impact of philanthropy? The answers to these questions seem to unite and divide the philanthropy sector. These questions were…
Resolved: Founders and directors will help their foundations have greater impact if they commit their entire endowments during a limited period of time, spending down their resources rather than managing them in perpetuity. Point: Lars Boggild Canadian philanthropic foundations regularly look for ways to be more impactful on the issues they care about. Approaches ranging from…
South Asians, originally from the Asian sub continent—including India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka—are some of the most diverse ethnic minorities in Canada as well as some of the most financially stable. Based on the work of the South Asian Philanthropy Project, this article describes the philanthropic practices of the South Asian diaspora, outlining some…
In 1914, a lawyer banker by the name of Frederick Harris Goff was responsible for creating a new kind of trust, the Cleveland Foundation. He envisaged that it would provide an efficient means for a person of good will who achieves success in a community to leave something behind for the community’s benefit… and this…
Philanthropic Foundations in Canada Landscapes, Indigenous Perspectives and Pathways to Change, ed. Peter R. Elson, Sylvain A. Lefevre and Jean-Marc Fontan, PhiLab, Canada, 2020, 323 pp. “A gift that does nothing to enhance solidarity is a contradiction.” Mary Douglas in her forward to The Gift, Marcel Mauss[1] Philanthropic Foundations in Canada: Landscapes, Indigenous…