Global Philanthropy : Does Institutional Context Matter for Charitable Giving?

In this article, we examine whether and how the institutional context matters when understanding individuals' giving to philanthropic organizations. We posit that both the individuals' propensity to give and the amounts given are higher in countries with a stronger institutional context for philanthropy. We examine key factors of formal and informal institutional contexts for philanthropy at both the organizational and societal levels, including regulatory and legislative frameworks, professional standards, and social practices. Our results show that while aggregate levels of giving are higher in countries with stronger institutionalization, multilevel analyses of 118,788 individuals in 19 countries show limited support for the hypothesized relationships between institutional context and philanthropy. The findings suggest the need for better comparative data to understand the complex and dynamic influences of institutional contexts on charitable giving. This, in turn, would support the development of evidence-based practices and policies in the field of global philanthropy.Peer reviewe

George Thomas: Virginian for the Union

George Thomas was one of the Civil War\u27s most prominent Southern Unionists, known for his heroic leadership at Mill Springs, Chickamauga, and Nashville. A slave owner before the war, he commanded African American soldiers at the Battle of Nashville and the experience transformed him into a stalwart defender of Civil Rights. During Reconstruction, he led the fight against the Ku Klux Klan as the commander of U.S. army troops in Kentucky and Tennessee

Daily Spiritual Experiences and Prosocial Behavior

This paper examines how the Daily Spiritual Experiences Scale (DSES) relates to range of prosocial behaviors, using a large, nationally representative U.S. data set. It finds that daily spiritual experiences are a statistically and substantively significant predictor of volunteering, charitable giving, and helping individuals one knows personally. Daily spiritual experiences better predict helping to distant others than to friends and family, indicating that they may motivate helping by fostering an extensive definition of one’s moral community. The relationship between the DSES and helping is not moderated by sympathy and is robust to the inclusion of most religiosity measures. However, the relationship becomes non-significant for most helping behaviors when measures of meditation, prayer, and mindfulness are included in a regression equation. The DSES is particularly effective in predicting helping behaviors among people who do not belong to a religious congregation, indicating that it may measure spiritual motivations for helping among people who are not conventionally religious

Gender Differences in the Correlates of Volunteering and Charitable Giving

Psychological research has found that women score higher on most measures of the traits, motivations, and values that predict helping others, and women are more likely to help family and friends. However, sex differences in the institutional helping behaviors of volunteering and charitable giving are small. This paper seeks to explain this apparent contradiction with the hypotheses that men have more resources and more social capital than women, which compensates for their lower level of motivation. The paper tests these hypotheses using data from the 1995 Midlife in the United States (MIDUS) survey. The data show partial support for these hypotheses, as men score higher on measures of income, education, trust, and secular social networks. However, women have broader social networks through religious participation

Explaining Abu Ghraib: A Review Essay

Four books written by social scientists and published in 2007 are reviewed: The Trials of Abu Ghraib: An Expert Witness Account of Shame and Honor, by Stjepan Mestrovic; The Lucifer Effect, by Philip Zimbardo; Torture and the Twilight of Empire : From Algiers to Baghdad, by Marnia Lazreg; and Torture and Democracy, by Darius Rejali. Prior research on torture has left unsettled the question of the importance of training and direct orders as causes of torture, and the role of liberal democratic institutions in preventing torture. The four books demonstrate that the Abu Ghraib torturers did not act on their initiative, but were encouraged to commit torture by their superior officers and by the effects of their social environment. The torturers did not receive formal training in methods, but did receive informal instruction from CIA and Guantanamo interrogators. While democratic states use torture less frequently than non-democratic ones, they nevertheless do use torture sometimes when faced with severe threats to security. Of the four books, Rejali’s Torture and Democracy stands out for its depth of research and quality of analysis

Religion and Helping Others: The Role of Values, Ideas, and Language

This study used life narrative interview data from the Midlife in the United States (MIDUS) study to examine how religious values, ideas, and language motivate prosocial behaviors. Open coding of eighty-eight in-depth interviews revealed six themes: defining morality in religious terms, considering religion an important aspect of one’s identity, feeling that one’s life involves carrying out God’s mission, making an increased commitment to religion over time, drawing an explicit connection between religion and helping others, and, for Christian respondents, finding inspiration for helping in Jesus’ teaching, example, and sacrifice. Using ratings from independent coders, statistically significant relationships were found between most of the themes and prosocial behaviors, particularly for respondents who engaged in multiple helping behaviors. In addition to documenting the relationship between religious ideas and values and helping behaviors, the study demonstrates how language mediates the relationship between the social and personal aspects of religion