The paradox of charity and racial concerns: a critical examination
Charitable organisations serve as spaces for moral action where selfless acts of kindness and generosity of benefactors are interwoven with the pro-social behaviours of workers and managers for societal benefit.
Yet, such spaces may replicate and reinforce wider social dynamics and structures of inequality and oppression in society, including racial concerns.
In this project, you’ll seek to examine how racial issues, including disparities and discrimination, and efforts to address them are playing-out in the charity sector. You’ll be encouraged to embrace and integrate a multi-dimensional approach to explore race in an accountability context that focuses attention on the power dynamics between different actors in organisational settings. Moreover, given the plethora of different strands for research (a focus on international non-governmental organisations and the global South-North power dynamic, or localised charities focusing on local communities of colour), you’ll have the opportunity to navigate your studies – informed by your interests, prior experiences and education.
During your studentship, you’ll be working with a team in the Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Accounting Research Group (IPARG) at Cardiff Business School, with an interest in accountability. The team’s strong connections with the sector may also offer scope to direct your research to inform practice.
Summary
The charity sector in the UK, as in many countries elsewhere, is woven into the fabric of society. Underpinned by a moral basis to do good for society, sector activities seek to contribute significantly to the welfare of society and the planet, both locally and internationally in a myriad of different ways.
Following many years of government efforts to peel away from activities traditionally provided by the public sector, charities have flourished and become increasingly professionalised. Within this more managerialised context, there are growing concerns in critical scholarship that organisational practices may reinforce forms of inequality and oppression found in wider in society. Studies have, for example, noted how unequal power dynamics between organisations and their constituents may: serve the interests of their upward funders rather than their downward stakeholders, that is, the communities they seek to assist; result in gender discrimination and abuse in the sector; and allow the misuse of the concept of trust in charity.
Similar practices of power and oppression manifest in the context of race as depicted in a small but emergent literature. Examples include:
- a majority white leadership that fails to adequately understand its service-user base, resulting in decision making that unintentionally not only fails to achieve the desired change but can cause harm
- differential (reduced) funding opportunities and outcomes by funders for people of colour and for charities run by people of colour
- contradictions between humanitarian principles and human rights principles that normatively guide practices of humanitarian organisations, and the continued ‘othering’ of the communities they work with
- microaggressions experienced by colleagues of colour in their everyday practices, that replicate race-related structural disadvantages witnessed in society
Recent events such as the resurrection of the Black Lives Matter movement have turned the lens on race issues in the sector, and sector members, champions and regulators have sought to respond to this attention. Concepts such as decolonisation and anti-racism have filtered into the sector and mechanisms of accountability such as the Racial Equity Index and Funders for Race Equality have emerged to initiate change.
Aims
The aim of this project is to add to the small but emergent critical research into charity practices with a focus on race – looking specifically at current positions and practices, and remedial solutions through an accountability lens.
The breadth of the proposed project means that you’ll have scope to determine the direction of their project. The supervisory team has expertise in accountability and multidisciplinary perspectives, and also qualitative and quantitative research – supporting further your direction of choice. There may also be scope to work with industry partners and engage in research questions that help inform practice, through the team’s external connections.
Research questions
Specific research questions to be addressed will be determined by your research interests but align with themes including:
- The play-out and consequences of the decolonial project amongst humanitarian organisations on the constituents these organisations work with, focusing on communication and representational practices and/or engagement with communities.
- Manifestations and consequences of equality, diversity and inclusion and anti-racist practices in charitable organisations.
- Critical examination of emerging mechanisms of accountability – assessing the development processes of these mechanisms and their effectiveness in practice.
