Developmental Dynamics in Nonprofit-Sector Federations

This article explores developmental processes in community-based issue domains and the effects of such processes on the federated referent organizations (FROs) that emerge to address problematic issues. Such organizations mobilize resources and serve as focal points for collective strategies. FROs encounter developmental tensions as they oscillate between adaptation to their environments and construction of new contexts. The way these tensions are resolved suggests three possible response scenarios: reorientation, replacement, or demise. Likely conditions for each scenario are explored. A case study of a federation of over 200 nonprofit organizations in a metropolitan region in the United States is used to illustrate the argument, and implications for similar types of organizations are indicated.