News

Democratic Practice Program Director Benjamin Shute, Jr. discusses the need for campaign finance reform, especially as the concentration of wealth among fewer Americans increases, and unemployment soars. Those who can most easily afford to make large donations to candidates are having a disproportionate effect on public policy, he says, and more and more people believe that the government doesn’t work for them.

In an opinion piece published in The Chronicle of Philanthropy, Paul Connolly advises that the best grantmakers must achieve balance between passion and rationality in order to make the biggest impact through giving.

RBF President Stephen Heintz is among the honorees of this year's NonProfit Times Power & Influence Top 50. Recognized for encouraging others in the nonprofit field to be risk-takers, and noting that limited grant dollars should be triggering big impacts, this is the third consecutive year Heintz has been named to the list.

The Rockefeller Brothers Fund has made revisions to the Global Governance portion of its Democratic Practice program guidelines. The changes reflect the evolution of the Global Governance portfolio, and aim to better communicate the Fund's interest in promising approaches to enhancing the vitality of democracy in global governance.

Most Albanian business leaders believe philanthropy helps to make their companies more successful, with 62 percent of the nearly 150 companies surveyed active in giving. Partners Albania, Center for Change and Conflict Management conducted a survey of philanthropic activity by Albanian enterprises. It recommends better tax incentives, more public recognition, and educating the public about corporate social responsibility to bolster giving.

In March 2011, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund’s board of trustees approved the new direction of the Peacebuilding program (formerly known as Peace and Security). This paper served as the foundation for the program’s new framework and funding guidelines, and was the basis of discussion at the March 2011 board meeting.

How do you define affected communities when, arguably, an entire country or even all of human kind will benefit? To answer this question, the RBF is piloting a project to gather data on diversity, equity, and inclusion in our grantmaking. This follows on the our foundation-wide effort to assess and improve diversity and inclusion in its operations and grantmaking.

RBF President and chair of the Center for Effective Philanthropy's (CEP) board Stephen Heintz, moderated a conversation with Michael J. Fox and Debi Brooks at the CEP's 2011 conference in Boston in May. Fox and Brooks, cofounders of the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research discussed the intricacies of establishing their foundation in 2000, and centering their mission around addressing the urgency of Parkinson's research.

Ariadne Papagapitos, program officer of the RBF's Peacebuilding program, reveals how the the revised guidelines came about, and discusses the future of the program's grantmaking.

The Campaign Finance Institute (CFI) has published a report, which confirms that a public campaign finance policy would improve election participation. The new report is based on analysis of public financing in six Midwestern states during the elections of 2006-2010.