News

Barack Obama has overtaken Mitt Romney in advertising in 14 of the top 15 media markets in the country, according to analysis recently released by the Wesleyan Media Project, an RBF grantee. The report also examines the tone in advertising by the favored candidate during presidential election campaigns since 2000.

Charting Our Progress is an annual report of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund’s activities over a three-year period. This year's cover story, in the form of two videos, highlights the New York City program's Charles E. Culpeper Arts and Culture Grants. The arts and culture grants account for approximately one half of the New York City portfolio and is a prominent aspect of program offerings at The Pocantico Center.

Introducing an Emissions Control Area, like those established in Europe and North America is a necessary action for China's Pearl River Delta, according to a new report released by Civic Exchange and the University of Hong Kong. The report is designed to assist policymakers in regulating toxic exhaust emissions from marine vessels.

Issues around natural resources in Afghanistan are a major driver of conflict in the country, according to a new study published by Afghanistan Watch, an RBF grantee. The report details situations involving land, water, mining, and timber. According to the report author, Renard Sexton, the natural resources sector has been overlooked as a driver of conflict, and policymakers should focus on allocating the division of these resources to help stabilize Afghanistan.

While U.S. military action would damage Iran's major nuclear facilities and weaken its military capabilities, consequences include direct and indirect retaliation against the United States and Israel, which would potentially lead to all-out regional war, according to an assessment by The Iran Project.

Rockefeller Brothers Fund trustee Justin Rockefeller is part of a new generation of philanthropists leading a shift toward socially responsible investing, according to an article in Institutional Investor. This transition is changing the country's wealth management industry, as Millennials, those born between 1978 and 2000, embrace impact investing, the idea that financial and social interests should go hand-in-hand.

The New York Times offered a stark assessment of New York City's preparedness for serious flooding, which would have a crippling impact on its 520 miles of coast. In the article, executive director Eddie Bautista of the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance, Inc., an RBF grantee, highlighted the urgency of preparing industrial areas on the waterfront, where many low-income residents live.

Four of the Fund’s Charles E. Culpeper Arts and Culture grantees—Creative Time, Gallim Dance, Spanish Theatre Repertory Company, and The Jazz Gallery—are featured in the videos, which take the viewer from behind the scenes to actual performances.

Doreen Wang, program assistant for the Rockefeller Brothers Fund’s New York City and Southern China programs, reflects on her experience of discovering that “those random, fenced in strips of land in New York City, that that have been empty and abandoned for years” were brownfields.

The Story of Brownfields, written by Anita Nager, a recognized leader in the environmental field, documents the Rockefeller Brothers Fund’s 14-year history of brownfield grantmaking and presents a narrative of the foundation’s choices, against a timeline its grantees’ activities and the brownfield remediation and redevelopment efforts of New York City and New York state.