Sustainable funding for the Welsh rural voluntary sector: issues of networks, legitimacy and power

Although the global economic downturn lends urgency to issues of financial sustainability in the voluntary sector, the issue is not new. There is an emerging consensus that voluntary organisations need to pursue financial sustainability through trading and social enterprise activities, government contracts, and a wider grants base. There have been some prominent success stories emerging over the last decade (e.g. Shore 2001, NCVO 2009, Age Concern 2009). This paper however, questions the extent to which these funding strategies may be pursued successfully by rural organisations. There are some significant barriers that remain unacknowledged by those who advocate such approaches. The authors undertook evaluation work for Sustainable Funding Cymru a project sponsored by the Wales Council for Voluntary Action that aimed to develop the funding capacity of voluntary organisations in Wales. Data for this paper derives from case studies, interviews and a focus group of participants in the project who came from voluntary sector charities, nonprofit organisations and social enterprises that deliver a wide range of social and community services. A substantial number of these serve rural communities. A Unique Context The sustainable funding of the Welsh voluntary sector (and especially its rural areas) is set within three important aspects of its contemporary policy context. Firstly, Wales achieved a degree of independence from the centralised UK state in 1997 and established a separate legislature. The enabling legislation required the new government to partner representatives of the voluntary sector to design and implement policy (OPSI 1998). What has emerged, however, is a set of institutional arrangements that focuses more on representative governance than on service delivery partnerships (Entwistle, 2006). Local public authorities remain the primary service providers for local communities although there is a certain amount of contracting out as in England (Bahle 2003). Secondly, whilst traditional funding sources for the voluntary sector have come from donations and individual giving (NCVO 2009), the current trend is toward public sector funding, which is administered centrally. Additionally, Wales has received some £3 billion in development funding from the European Union (EU), which is set to expire in 2013. This that helping voluntary organisations to prepare for post-EU funding is a priority. There are indications that the sector in Wales fares less well compared to other parts of the UK and that it is more dependent on government sources (local, national or EU). These account for nearly 45% of the current funding of the Welsh voluntary sector (National Assembly for Wales, 2008compared with 36% for the entire UK (including Wales) (NCVO, 2009). Thirdly, rural policy in Wales must be viewed in the context of a changing rural economic landscape. Much of Wales is relatively isolated and poorly served by public transport. It has suffered the devastation of its traditional industries. The decline of the coal and steel industries in particular has brought severe hardship to many communities (Chaney 2002). Thus emerging from the evaluation data and a review of the institutional arrangements derived from political-historical context, is a picture of critical challenges and issues for Welsh rural organisations related to the organisation and their representative actors. Developing Theoretical Linkages In order to gain resources, rural voluntary organisations must engage with some highly complex network relationships. They need to interact both vertically within a mandated set of institutional relations and cultivate horizontal relationships both within their own sector and the public sector to be financially sustainable (Entwistle, 2006). Benson (1975) suggests that ways in which organisations manage relationships both this internal network and with their external linkages will impact on their ability to achieve legitimacy and obtain resources. In Wales these partnerships are proving difficult to implement. Negotiating the fierce competition for public service contracts and strong institutional arrangements for local partnerships make it difficult for rural organisations to achieve the legitimacy and power needed to move beyond the established funding resources (Benson 1975). The paper suggests that in the competition for funding, rural organisations in Wales encounter a number of difficulties. Being embedded in their communities means they are constrained by geography. They are unable to compete with larger UK-wide agencies who have more freedom about where they operate. Also their networks become blocked as they are unable to overcome particularistic local power politics. They lack the people, the organisational capacity and infrastructure to identify, mobilise and secure funding. We suggest that national policies often ignore these rural realities and therefore urge strategies for funding sustainability that are very difficult to achieve for the majority of organisations. References Age Concern (2009) Products and Services website http://www.ageconcern.org.uk/AgeConcern/all_products.asp Bahle, T. (2003). The changing institutionalization of social services in England and Wales, France and Germany: Is the welfare state on the retreat? Journal of European Social Policy, 13 (1), 5-20. Benson, J.K (1975), "The interorganizational network as a political economy", Administrative Science Quarterly, 20, 229-49. Chaney, P. (2002). Social capital and the participation of marginalized groups in government: A study of the statutory partnership between the third sector and devolved government in Wales. Public Policy and Administration, 17 (4), 20-38. Entwistle, T (2006). The distinctiveness of the Welsh partnership agenda. International Journal of Public Service Management, 19 (3), 228-237. Keating, M, & Stevenson, L (2006). Rural policy in Scotland after devolution. Regional Studies, 40.3, 397-407. Murdoch, J. (2000). Networks – a new paradigm of rural development. Journal of Rural Studies, 16, 407-419. National Assembly for Wales, Communities and Culture Committee (May 2008). The funding of voluntary sector organisations in Wales. Cardiff, Wales: Author. National Council for Voluntary Organisations (2009). The UK civil society almanac 2009: Executive Summary. London, England: Author. National Council for Voluntary Organisations (2009), Sustainable Funding Project Case studies http://www.ncvo-vol.org.uk/sfp/?id=2102 Office for Public Sector Information (1998) Government of Wales Act, London OPSI http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts1998/ukpga_19980038_en_1 Shore, B. (2001) The Cathedral Within, Random House, New Yor

The funding game: a case study of voluntary statutory relationships

This thesis is a study of the process of negotiating funding by a voluntary organisation from statutory sources. It is a case study which focuses on one organisation's attempts to obtain resources for a supported accommodation project for people with a mental handicap. This is approached from a focus on the inter-organisational network as a political economy. This view observes that in such networks, organisations are competing to gain two scarce resources, authority to operate in a domain and money to fund those operations. Thus the funding relationships have to be viewed in a broader policy context. The methodological approach is qualitative and relies mainly on unstructured interviews and documentary evidence in offering an account of the process of negotiation.In the case study, four stages in the process of securing funding are examined: firstly, the establishment of the organisation and the way it gained legitimacy: secondly, the development of the idea of the project through attempts to achieve the organisation's objective through other agencies: thirdly, the attempt to secure funding from central government through Urban Aid, where the fit between the objectives of the funding programme and those of the project was tenuous. Finally, the successful application for Support Finance from a health board is examined. This highlights the complexity of the environment with which a voluntary organisation has to negotiate. It seems that ultimately success was more dependent on the alliance between a number of agencies to obtain the commitment of both the health authority and central government to the principle of community care, than on the efforts of any one organisation alone

Assessing 'wicked competencies' at a distance

How do teachers assess collaborative work and research skills in a way that is both motivational and engaging for business studies students? This paper describes an approach at the Open University Business School that proved to be highly effective and engaging for both students and tutors

Non-profit management education: international trends and issues

Published without an abstract

The governance of the voluntary and community sector - the starting point

This report on governance provides a framework for thinking about how policy makers, funders, regulators and advisers can all work with Board members and staff to enhance the effectiveness of nonprofit organisations. It was commissioned by the Active Community Unit (ACU) of the Home Office, in parallel with other reviews designed to improve the capacity of the voluntary and community sector, at a time when the sector plays an increasingly important role in the delivery of services using public funds. That role has recently been investigated in two Government reports, the Cross Cutting Review carried out by the Treasury, and the Strategy Unit review of charities and nonprofits. Our report proposes actions of three types: some that can be taken immediately, some that require further discussion with key interests, and some integration with the other ACU reviews. Taken together they provide the starting point for an evolving strategy to improve governance across the sector. We recommend ACU chairs a group charged with the responsibility for planning and implementing this. Our focus is on governance as “the systems and processes concerned with ensuring the overall direction, supervision and accountability of an organisation”. This is often taken to mean the way that a Board, management committee or other governing body steers the overall development of an organisation, where day-to-day management is in the hands of staff or volunteers. Sometimes, of course, the committee and volunteers are the same. They – like all governing bodies – have to balance the interests of the organisation and those they are trying to serve, while being conscious of financial and legal responsibilities, and the requirements of funders and other supporters