Nila Kartika Wati
Philanthropy has long positioned itself as a primary vehicle for addressing global inequality, yet the traditional architecture of charitable giving often mirrors the very hierarchies it seeks to dismantle. In conventional models, individuals with significant financial resources dictate which societal problems deserve attention, forcing nonprofit organizations to compete for funding based on externally defined priorities. This structure frequently requires affected communities to prove their worthiness through metrics of "impact" designed by those outside their lived experiences. However, a transformative movement led by feminist funds and women-led philanthropic organizations is challenging this paradigm, arguing that the fundamental issue is not merely a funding gap, but a power gap. By shifting the focus from who receives funding to who decides how that funding is allocated, these organizations are testing whether power-sharing can be integrated into the operational systems of global giving.
The Evolution of Participatory Grantmaking and Trust-Based Philanthropy
The shift toward more equitable philanthropy is grounded in two primary frameworks: participatory grantmaking and trust-based philanthropy. While often used interchangeably, they represent distinct shifts in institutional design. Participatory grantmaking involves bringing the communities a funder serves directly into the decision-making process regarding grant allocations. According to the Women’s Funding Network (WFN) 2025 member survey, 51 percent of responding women’s funds reported utilizing a participatory framework, a significant increase from 38 percent in 2022. Furthermore, 23 percent of organizations indicated a strong interest in adopting such models in the near future.
Trust-based philanthropy, conversely, focuses on the nature of the relationship between the funder and the grantee. This approach emphasizes multi-year unrestricted support, streamlined reporting requirements, and the removal of administrative hurdles that often stifle grassroots innovation. The WFN survey highlighted a rapid acceleration in this practice, with 69 percent of respondents reporting the use of trust-based philanthropy in 2025, compared to just 39 percent in 2022. These statistics suggest a broader systemic shift toward ceding institutional control in favor of community-led expertise.
A Chronology of the Feminist Philanthropic Movement
The roots of this movement can be traced back to the mid-20th century, though its formalization within institutional philanthropy has accelerated over the last two decades.
- 1970s–1980s: The emergence of the first women’s funds, such as the Ms. Foundation for Women and the Boston Women’s Fund, established a precedent for focusing on the specific needs of women and girls, often ignored by mainstream foundations.
- 1985: The formation of the Women’s Funding Network provided a global infrastructure for these funds to collaborate and share best practices.
- 2010–2012: The founding of FRIDA | Young Feminist Fund signaled a shift toward "by and for" models, where young activists were positioned as the primary decision-makers rather than passive recipients.
- 2020–2022: The global pandemic and social justice movements accelerated the adoption of trust-based models as funders recognized the need for rapid, flexible resource deployment.
- 2024–2025: Current data reflects a majority adoption of these practices among feminist organizations, moving from experimental "pilot" programs to core operating philosophies.
Case Studies in Power Redistribution: From Boston to Global Networks
To understand how power-sharing functions as a design choice, analysts point to four distinct organizational models that vary in scale and geographic reach.
Boston Women’s Fund: Redefining Expertise
The Boston Women’s Fund (BWF) operates an Allocations Committee that serves as a primary example of domestic participatory grantmaking. The committee is composed of community members, including those with no prior background in professional philanthropy. These individuals commit to a rigorous 40-to-45-hour process that involves researching nominated organizations, interviewing community leaders, and participating in consensus-driven sessions to select grant recipients. By providing a modest stipend for this labor, BWF acknowledges that community knowledge is a form of professional expertise. This model challenges the assumption that only those with institutional tenure are qualified to assess the efficacy of social programs.
New York Women’s Foundation: Scaling Trust
The New York Women’s Foundation (NYWF) demonstrates how participatory principles can be scaled within a large urban institution. NYWF integrates participatory grantmaking with trust-based practices, explicitly stating its goal to cede decision-making power to the communities it supports. This involves moving away from project-specific funding toward general operating support. For grantees, this means the difference between a high-stakes annual reapplication process and a stable, multi-year partnership that allows for long-term strategic planning.
FRIDA | Young Feminist Fund: Global Movement Governance
On a global scale, FRIDA has institutionalized the principle that young feminist organizers should be the architects of their own funding. Since its inception, FRIDA has seen exponential growth in its reach. Between 2012 and 2014, the fund distributed approximately $437,000 to 57 organizations. By 2024, that figure rose to over $2.97 million, supporting 203 grantee partners across 103 countries. Despite this growth, FRIDA has remained self-critical. Its "Resourcing Connections" audit revealed that while participatory models foster high levels of trust, they also require significant infrastructure. The organization has had to continuously revise its processes to ensure that the time-intensive nature of participation does not become a barrier for the very groups it intends to serve.
Fenomenal Funds: Shared Governance Models
Perhaps the most ambitious experiment in this sector is Fenomenal Funds, a collaboration within the Prospera International Network of Women’s Funds. This model moved beyond grant review into shared governance, where four private foundations and four women’s funds held equal decision-making power over strategy and resource distribution. This structure ensured that the organizations receiving resources were involved in setting the overarching strategy from the outset. However, evaluations by the KIT Institute noted that formal equality does not always translate to equal influence. Factors such as financial security, donor relationships, and fluency in philanthropic jargon can create "invisible hierarchies" even within a shared governance framework.
Analysis of the Operational Costs of Equity
While the benefits of participatory philanthropy are increasingly documented, the transition involves significant institutional costs. Shifting power is not a simple administrative adjustment; it is an expensive and time-consuming redesign of organizational behavior.
- Temporal Costs: Consensus-based decision-making inherently takes longer than top-down executive approval. The recruitment, training, and facilitation of community committees require months of preparation.
- Infrastructure Requirements: Organizations like Fenomenal Funds require dedicated staff for program management, learning, and evaluation to maintain a participatory structure. This often necessitates the use of fiscal sponsors to handle complex HR and legal frameworks.
- Financial Investment: Meaningful participation requires compensating community members for their time and expertise. Without stipends, participatory models risk excluding those who cannot afford to volunteer their labor, thereby replicating the exclusions of traditional philanthropy.
- Risk Management: Trust-based philanthropy requires funders to accept a higher degree of uncertainty. By providing unrestricted funds, foundations must move away from rigid "theories of change" and allow organizations the flexibility to pivot when strategies do not yield expected results.
Broader Implications and Global Responses
The shift toward feminist philanthropic models has sparked a broader conversation about the future of global development. A study published by Cambridge University Press regarding participatory philanthropy in Sub-Saharan Africa found that while these models successfully shift visible power, they are still often constrained by "back-donor" requirements—the rules set by the original sources of wealth. This highlights a persistent tension: even the most progressive funds must often navigate the conservative legal and financial requirements of the global banking and tax systems.
Sociologists, including Susan Ostrander, have noted that when funders build less hierarchical relationships with grantees, the funders themselves undergo a transformation. The organizations become more responsive to community-organizing methods and less focused on arbitrary metrics. This "feminist intervention" is increasingly seen not just as a way to empower women, but as a way to improve the efficacy of philanthropy as a whole.
Conclusion: The Future of Institutional Power
The significance of feminist philanthropy lies not in the gender of those in leadership, but in the questioning of why leadership positions carry such unilateral authority. The models provided by the Boston Women’s Fund, NYWF, FRIDA, and Fenomenal Funds suggest that the "who decides" question is the most critical design element of any social impact initiative.
For the broader nonprofit sector, these developments offer a roadmap for internal reform. Nonprofit boards are increasingly being encouraged to ask their funders about decision-making transparency and reporting flexibility. For donors, the challenge is to view the loss of control not as a risk, but as a necessary step toward genuine social equity. As the data from 2025 suggests, the movement toward participatory and trust-based models is no longer a niche experiment; it is becoming a benchmark for institutional legitimacy in the 21st century. The goal, as framed by these feminist pioneers, is to move toward a system where power is visible, shared, and ultimately answerable to the people who live with the consequences of philanthropic decisions.
