Measuring the non-profit sector cross-nationally: a comparative methodology

As a result in part of the way non-profit institutions are defined and treated in the United Nations System of National Accounts (SNA), little is known about the size, scope, financial base and role of this set of institutions at the international level, even though their importance is increasingly being recognised throughout the world. To remedy this significant lack of systematic information on non-profit institutions cross-nationally, the Johns Hopkins Comparative Nonprofit Sector Project has undertaken a major analysis of the economic role of this sector in twelve countries throughout the world, utilising a more meaningful definition of the sector and an approach that is otherwise consistent with the overall thrust of the SNA system. This paper outlines the basis of the more inclusive definition of the non-profit sector embodied in this project, the classification system formulated to structure data-gathering on this more broadly-defined sector and the data assembly strategy developed to build up key estimates of the scale, structure and revenue sources of the non-profit sector in the project countries. The article concludes with a recommendation to incorporate a similar approach to the assembly of data on the non-profit sector into the ongoing SNA system on a regular basis.Professor Lester Salamon is Director of the Institute for Policy Studies and Director of the Comparative Nonprofit Sector Project at the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland, 21218.Helmut Anheier is Research Scientist at the Institute for Policy Studies at the Johns Hopkins University and Assistant Professor of Sociology at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey, 08903. He is co-editor ofVoluntas.     

The homosexual escort agency: deviance disavowal

This article examines the management of deviance disavowal techniques by a commercial organization. Ball's abortion clinic ethnography (1972:158-86) paved the way for an analysis of the neutralization of disreputable encounters. This study, based on research conducted in London, England during 1981, attempts to explore how stigmatizing sexual liaisons are routinely managed by an escort agency. The article is based on interviews conducted with one homosexual escort agency owner and twenty-eight male escorts and discusses the neutralization of moral approbrium through the organization of names, space and structure.     

The Nonprofit Almanac: what are the issues?

Conclusion Despite the issues raised here, theNonprofit Almanac represents an extremely valuable addition to the source materials on the non-profit sector in the United States. The estimates of some of the key parameters of non-profit finances and employment provided in theAlmanac represent an important contribution to research and information in this field. In addition, theAlmanac does a good job of pulling together its own research findings with those already available and presenting them within the confines of a single, coherent volume.At the same time, however, theAlmanac buries, or at least neglects to surface clearly enough, a number of very significant issues that could affect how the document is interpreted and used. As we have seen, some of these involve lack of clarity about methods and procedures and could presumably be remedied fairly easily. Others are more substantive. Whatever the source, however, it is important that these issues be clearly understood so that this extraordinary document can be put to its most effective use.     

Foundations as investment managers part II: The performance

Foundations divide roughly into two groups in their investment behavior. Most follow an inactive, risk-averse style, focusing on income maximization rather than total return. Another, smaller group of foundations are more activist and aggressive, focusing on total return. This article analyzes the investment performance associated with these different approaches, showing that while a significant number of foundations are performing well, many others lag in their investment returns.     

Social Origins of Civil Society: Explaining the Nonprofit Sector Cross-Nationally

Recent research has usefully documented the contribution that nonprofit organizations make to social capital and to the economic and political development it seems to foster. Because of a gross lack of basic comparative data, however, the question of what it is that allows such organizations to develop remains far from settled. This article seeks to remedy this by testing five existing theories of the nonprofit sector against data assembled on eight countries as part of the Johns Hopkins Comparative Nonprofit Sector Project. The five theories are: (a) government failure/market failure theory; (b) supply-side theory; (c) trust theories; (d) welfare state theory; and (e) interdependence theory. The article finds none of these theories adequate to explain the variations among countries in either the size, the composition, or the financing of the nonprofit sector. On this basis it suggests a new theoretical approach to explaining patterns of nonprofit development among countries—the social origins approach—which focuses on broader social, political, and economic relationships. Using this theory, the article identifies four routes of third-sector development (the liberal, the social democratic, the corporatist, and the statist), each associated with a particular constellation of class relationships and pattern of state-society relations. The article then tests this theory against the eight-country data and finds that it helps make sense of anomalies left unexplained by the prevailing theories.     

Is Locally Led Conservation Planning Working? A Farm Town Case Study1

Abstract A qualitative case study of a rural Illinois community whose water supply has been compromised by a farm chemical is used to highlight the social, cultural, and economic factors that shape locally led planning efforts of a type now being advocated by natural resources governmental agencies. The paper answers the question: why did the central Illinois watershed planning effort craft a cooperative rather than a conflictual solution? Trust of and attachment to farmers, both evidence of social capital, helped community members to balance economic, social and health risks. The balance arrived at created a tacit mandate for a farmer-led planning committee to solve the atrazine problem in a way acceptable to farmers and townspeople. The cooperative solution represents a consensus: concerns remain, but people are willing to support the plan. Consensus also demonstrates that planning as a positive action can create new social capital, which can support further planning.