Understanding diaspora philanthropy
Howard Lake | 13 June 2008 | Blogs
Last month the Asia Pacific Philanthropy Consortium held a conference in Hanoi, Vietnam, on the subject of diaspora philanthropy. The specific focus is on giving by Asians to Asia. An excellent overview paper by Mark Sidel, and individual country papers, can now be downloaded from:
http://www.asiapacificphilanthropy.org/
As Sidel notes ‘strategic philanthropy’ is still pretty rare amongst these donors – most diaspora giving is not focused on addressing issues of inequality or longterm development. But interest is growing. NGOs working internationally have a role to play in helping channel more of this giving – which is huge – into social justice programmes.
Understanding the scale of diaspora giving, and the mechanisms through which it is channeled, is a good starting point and these papers are a good introduction.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.