Policy Supports for NPOs
by Elizabeth Cham
Thank you for your kind invitation to speak here today.
Firstly, let me explain a little about the organisation I represent. Philanthropy Australia is the peak association of philanthropic bodies in Australia―its members include private, family, corporate and community trusts and foundations whose main activity is grant-making. We also have a Resource Centre, which has amongst its members many grant-seeking organisations. They use our services to find out more about seeking funds and forming partnerships with grant-makers. So while we represent a small portion of the not-for-profit sector, we are in many ways a busy exchange point for the voluntary or community world.
Our members are vitally interested in, engaged in, and partners with the wider not for profit sector in all its variations. The aims and objectives of our members are intertwined with those of the groups, organisations, and institutions they fund and work with. A highly developed, vibrant and effective voluntary sector is a prime concern of those who Philanthropy Australia represents.
NGOs in a Radically Changed Society
To define the sector and determine the best way forward in this new millennium, it is important to first paint a social backdrop.
Over the last fifty years, we have witnessed huge structural changes in society. We cannot underestimate the magnitude of this change, which some social scientists and historians tell us is probably more significant than the changes that accompanied the industrial revolution. For centuries, there were two foundation stones of society, at least in the western world. They were The Family and God or Gods. Many thinkers now suggest that these foundation stones are under enormous stress, and some would say they have already irretrievably cracked.
Since the end of the Second World War, two new foundation stones have been moving into their place. They are Mass Education, and the Communication Revolution.
It can no longer be taken for granted that family will provides the physical and emotional support that people need at various stages of their lives. The point of connectivity between an individual and the wider community often has to be found outside kinship networks. This has made the role of other forms of human association more important.
Similarly the shift in commonly held beliefs, in expressions of spiritual life, and the weakening of strict moral codes based on organised religion, have opened the way for new paths in the search for meaning and ethics. In some ways, this has created new crises to be dealt with, in other ways it has opened new possibilities.
"Community" in one sense or another is a vital component of most human lives. In the increasing absence of familial and congregational structures, and with the powerful tools of global communication and the means to exchange ideas, a diversity of new human connections have been established.
