Philanthropic Foundations, Public Good and Public Policy

This book discusses a series of related but independent challenges faced by philanthropic foundations, drawing on international, contemporary and historical data. Throughout the world, private philanthropic foundations spend huge sums of money for public good while the media, policy-makers and the public have little understanding of what they do and why. Diana Leat considers the following questions: Are philanthropic foundations more than warehouses of wealth? Where does foundation money come from, and is there a tension between a foundation’s ongoing sources of income and its pursuit of public good? How are foundations regulated and held accountable in society? Is there any evidence that foundations are effective in what they do? Is it possible to have too much philanthropy? In posing these questions, the book explores some of the key tensions in how foundations work, and their place in democratic societies.

Diana Leat is Visiting Professor at Cass Business School, London, UK, and at the Australian Centre for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Studies, QUT Brisbane, Australia. She is author of over 120 articles and books on the non-profit sector and social policy, and has held research posts in universities and think tanks in the UK, the US and Australia. Diana spent a year with the Carnegie Trust developing the first research centre for philanthropy in the UK, and until its closure in 2013 was a trustee of the Diana, Princess of Wales Memorial Fund.