How Economic and Political?: Analysis of U.S. and Canadian Philanthropic Foundations’ Educational Grantmaking in Africa

• In Event: Case studies in philanthropy: corporate social responsibility, grant making and technical assistance

Proposal

Philanthropy comprises one of the indispensable sources of funding for contemporary education. Globally, “35 percent of the 28,988 foundations focus at least some of their resources on one or more levels of education” (Johnson, 2018, p.23). Despite this prominence, there remains a lack of clarity on how foundations allocate education grants abroad. Understanding this gap is crucial because biased decision-making and grant allocation may solidify the power imbalance between donors and recipients, thus producing long-term and cyclical educational inequity.

This research explores U.S. and Canadian philanthropic foundations’ education grants to low- and lower-middle-income African countries from 2014 to 2022. It aims to address how the grant amount varies across eleven different education grant categories based on recipient countries' economic and political contexts and thus to unfold underlying patterns in grant distribution.

The theoretical framework of this research draws on organization theory, specifically “organizational homophily.” Organizational homophily refers to the phenomenon that organizations (un)consciously seek and prefer those similar to themselves. Various scholars have raised homophily in the international grantmaking context. Aksartova (2009) mentioned that “donors look for people and organizations that espouse modern values associated with Western democracy and behave in a manner comprehensible to Westerners” (p. 169). Spires (2011) also found that U.S. philanthropic foundations prefer government-enrolled or elite-led recipient organizations to grassroots NGOs in China. These allude to the possibility of biased decision-making and disproportionate allocation of grants abroad, as foundations could provide grants to recipients similar to them in various ways. This framework allowed the research to focus on recipient countries’ economic and political contexts and whether they are associated with the grant amounts provided by U.S. and Canadian philanthropic foundations.

I merged two datasets for the analysis: Foundation Center’s grant data and ETH Zürich's Globalization Index. The economic index combines the country’s cross-border economic flows and restrictions on trade and capital. The political index is a composite measure of a country's diplomatic and global engagement, such as membership in international organizations and the number of treaties signed with other states since 1945. Also, based on the overlapping themes, 173 raw grant categories were grouped into eleven categories, ranging from early childhood to STEM education.

​​Given the structure of my dataset, I employed a crossed random effects model, which is most effective for non-nested (i.e., non-hierarchical) data. In this model, the level 1 variable is the grant amount (the outcome), while the level 2 variables are grant categories, recipient countries, and grantmakers. This approach allowed me to capture the variation across these three components. The crossed random effects model was the most appropriate choice for my analysis, as the grant amount is not nested within countries or grantmakers.

The findings show that, on average, "economically deprived" and "politically active" countries in low- and lower-middle-income countries in Africa are more likely to receive education grants. The results indicate that countries with 1 SD higher economic index are associated with .11 smaller log grant amount in education. In addition, the countries with 1 SD higher political index are associated with a .09 larger log grant amount in education. This reveals that philanthropic foundations give more education grants to “less wealthy” countries but to more “globally engaging” countries. This pattern aligned with ten out of eleven grant categories. However, only the “general” grant category had a different grantmaking pattern; politically marginalized countries tended to receive more general grants. This indicates that unspecified grants may have the potential to challenge the prevalent grantmaking practices by being an outlier.

This original research contributes to the existing scholarship by identifying a clear pattern in which U.S. and Canadian philanthropic grants are allocated to economically marginalized yet politically active low- and lower-middle-income African countries. Philanthropic grantmaking has often been considered an opaque field, largely due to the voluntary nature of grants, resulting in limited research on finding the patterns of educational grant distribution abroad. By both focusing on the economic and political contexts of recipient countries and capturing variations across grant subjects, recipient countries, and grantmakers, this research aims to ensure transparency, address biases, and better serve underprivileged communities.

In addition, this research aligns closely with the CIES 2025 theme by addressing educational inequity, ethics, and the role of driving actors. It examines whether philanthropic grants can serve as a “fair” tool for transforming education, while also highlighting the risk of deepening global inequities due to biased grant allocation. The study also raises ethical concerns about grantmaking processes, focusing on equitable and impartial access within low- and lower-middle-income countries. Lastly, both philanthropic foundations and technological advancements play a critical role in shaping education, while often reinforcing existing educational gaps. This research emphasizes the need to understand recipient contexts to avoid further marginalization and thus ensure impartial educational opportunities.

Author

• Soojung Lee, Harvard University