The Business of Hope: Professional Fundraising in Neoliberal Canada

It investigates the rise of neoliberalism in Canada through the perspective of professional fundraising in the 1990s and 2000s, interviewing 50 high-ranking fundraisers about changes they witnessed. Fundraising was booming due to the devolution of state responsibility, and fundraisers became products and promoters of neoliberal politics and culture.

Format: Hardback
Length: 120 pages
Publication date: 25 April 2023
Publisher: Springer International Publishing AG

It contributes to research on the rise of neoliberalism in Canada through the perspective of professional fundraising in the 1990s and 2000s. Fifty high-ranking fundraisers from across Canada were interviewed through 2008 and 2009 about the changes they had witnessed since starting their careers. Fundraising as an occupation was flourishing in this period due to the devolution of state responsibility across the major domains of nonprofit activity: education, health care, social services, the arts, recreation, overseas humanitarian activities, and environmental protection. Welfare state retrenchment left the nonprofit and voluntary sector competing for private sources of funding with the help of these newly hired expert staff. As fundraisers worked to instill a culture of philanthropy, while targeting the ultra-rich and advocating for tax-favorable treatment of major gifts, they became both products and promoters of the neoliberal political and cultural reconstruction of Canadian society.

This is an open access book. It contributes to research on the rise of neoliberalism in Canada through the perspective of professional fundraising in the 1990s and 2000s. Fifty high-ranking fundraisers from across Canada were interviewed through 2008 and 2009 about the changes they had witnessed since starting their careers. Fundraising as an occupation was flourishing in this period due to the devolution of state responsibility across the major domains of nonprofit activity: education, health care, social services, the arts, recreation, overseas humanitarian activities, and environmental protection. Welfare state retrenchment left the nonprofit and voluntary sector competing for private sources of funding with the help of these newly hired expert staff. As fundraisers worked to instill a culture of philanthropy, while targeting the ultra-rich and advocating for tax-favorable treatment of major gifts, they became both products and promoters of the neoliberal political and cultural reconstruction of Canadian society.

Weight: 322g
Dimension: 210 x 148 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9783031188367
Edition number: 1st ed. 2023