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May-July 2006
Resources & Links
Activities, Web sites and other cutting-edge information for global givers
Alliance unveils new look; June issue spotlights donors and learning
The June 2006 issue of Alliance (www.alliancemagazine.org) introduces the magazine's redesigned format as well as several new features: an opinion column by Bruce Sievers and commentary by David Bonbright on selected articles in each issue. With a special theme of "donors as learning organizations" guest editors Jenny Hyatt and Allan Kaplan set out their ideal of a learning organization and suggest that many funders are failing to live up to it. In response, a number of donors describe the ways in which their organizations seek to benefit from their experiences. Contributors include the Bernard Van Leer Foundation, the Carpathian Foundation, South Africa's Social Change Assistance Trust, Oxfam and IBM.
Another contributor to the June issue, Elizabeth (Lizzie) Eder Zobel, founder of the Philippine Sa Aklat Sisikat Foundation (www.readerstransform.com), shares her insights on learning from the grantee's point of view. Established in 2001, the foundation aims to improve literacy and instill a love of reading among primary grade students in the Philippines. Zobel, an entrepreneur, civic leader and member of Synergos' Global Philanthropists Circle, explains to Alliance that the continuing success of her foundation depends on constant self-questioning and a willingness to learn about the needs of its beneficiaries and to "re-engineer" itself to meet them. This attitude, she believes, is one that donors would do well to imitate.
The benefits of home-grown CSR in Latin America
The tools and methodology of corporate social responsibility (CSR), created in the global North, are not always a good fit for the challenges facing business and society in Latin America, observes Stephan Schmidheiny, founder and honorary chairman of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development. "CSR's foreign roots mean it is not as appropriate for the region as it could and should be," said Schmidheiny, writing in the Spring 2006 issue of The Journal of Corporate Citizenship. "Wealthy Northerners look southwards and see rainforests and biodiversity [as CSR issues]; thoughtful Southerners look around them and see poverty, poor education, bad housing, scarce healthcare and all the rest of that grim list," he said. His views are based on his experience with the Latin American holding company he created, Grupo Nueva. Schmidheiny recently placed all of the company's stock in a trust fund so that he could promote sustainable development in the region.
The key challenge for the region, and the developing world in general, is the creation of a "home-grown, meaningful form of CSR that addresses local issues and improves society, while also strengthening government's capacity." While noting a growing interest in CSR on the part of Latin American companies, Schmidheiny said few were "walking the talk" by publishing sustainability or corporate citizenship reports, or submitting to external verification. A notable exception is found in Brazil, the "regional powerhouse of CSR" where CSR leader Ethos Institute (www.ethos.org.br) has published CSR reporting guidelines followed by some 500 Brazilian companies. Experience has shown that companies that are socially engaged in Latin America are seeing a range of benefits, from greater productivity, efficiency and morale, to the acquisition of improved business intelligence.
The next frontier is the establishment of a business-enabling environment by government so that companies can play a development role in the South as they have in the North. Schmidheiny's article is available at www.wbcsd.org.
© 2006 The Synergos Institute
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