An excellent rallying cry for the USA – today’s must read.
Also, two slightly less precise articles worth a background read too.
Next week SIBNews will be coming via Russia where I will be chairing a session on financial innovation at the Moscow Open Innovation Forum. Happy to meet any readers who may be there! Meanwhile, have a great weekend and keep up the excellent work creating a better world through SIBs!
Ambrose: ‘Social Income Bonds’ Worth Serious Try In America
Jay Ambrose – Online Athens
Hallelujah, fellow citizens. There’s a relatively new idea trotting about in the land. It offers great hope of addressing persistent, heartrending social problems effectively and without waste, it is backed by conservatives and liberals and it could ultimately replace a system that has provided far too little for far too much.
You’ve seen this old way of doing things all your life. Congress figures it has the final answer to something it clearly knows little about, it then combines political conniving with good intentions and it delivers maybe just a portion of the intended consequences along with some harmful unintended ones. Though the cost is high, even the most obviously fruitless programs often stick around indefinitely because they develop powerful constituencies bolstering them while critics get dismissed as compassionless and mean-spirited.
And the new idea? It is sometimes boringly called “social income bonds,” but is more interestingly identified as Pay for Success. It comes from Britain, has been tried some both here and in Australia, and works like this: A government agency identifies some social dread it wants fixed and then strikes a deal with a nongovernmental organization to fix it. This outfit will then find investors to fund managers who put together ways to tackle the problem. The investors get no money back from the government until an independent entity verifies the goals have been reached in accordance with previously determined criteria.
‘Layered Funding’ Among Top 10 Philanthropic Innovations Needed To Boost UK Giving, Says NPC
Jenna Pudelek – Civil Society
The think tank NPC has highlighted ten philanthropic innovations from around the world that it believes should be replicated in the UK.
The report, 10 Innovations in Global Philanthropy, says the “ground-breaking approaches” have the potential to make the biggest difference to how the philanthropy sector works.
It recommends each is adopted or expanded in the UK to help philanthropists and foundations keep pace with the demand for funds.
NPC’s report says four of the innovations have the most potential to improve giving in this country.
Open data is one such approach, NPC says. The UK is already advanced in open data with the government releasing more data for public use and foundations starting to share grant data, led by the Big Lottery Fund and initiatives like 360 Giving, which is working on a common standard for sharing grant data.
NPC says it would like to see initiatives like WASHfunders.org, an online portal founded in the US that brings together a variety of data, research and tools on water, sanitation and hygiene, replicated across other sectors. The site’s main audience is donors, but it is also used by NGOs, policymakers, researchers and members of the public.
Another example in the report is PoweredbyData, the non-profit arm of the Canadian company Ajah, aims to increase the amount of useful data about the charity sector available worldwide, and make it more widely available.
100% impact investing
NPC recommends a ‘100% impact investing’ approach, where foundations seek to use their entire asset base to achieve varying degrees of social impact.
The report says the UK is a leader in social investment, but accumulated wealth could be put to better use; there is no legal requirement for a particular percentage of a foundation’s assets to be distributed as grants each year, compared to America’s 5% rule.
Social Finance Fair Reveals £1m Key Fund Is Heading To The West Midlands
Bdaily
New £1m social investment fund for the West Midlands has been unveiled today at the biggest Social Finance Fair outside London.
More than 140 delegates at the Social Enterprise West Midlands (SEWM) event heard how the ‘Key Fund’ is expanding into the region for the first time and is now looking to provide a crucial finance offer for social organisations that have been turned away from conventional funders.