Black Funding Matters: Donors, Leadership And The Crisis For African American Men

Every smartphone video, every outraged community, and every sadly trending hashtag tells an individual story – an incident that should not have happened, a sign that something is seriously broken in the way the American criminal justice system treats African American men and boys. And while we add #BlackLivesMatter to tweets and t-shirts, some of us who monitor philanthropy and civil society as a profession wonder whether our system of donors, foundations, organizations and advocates is up the task of dealing with what many perceive as a crisis of trust.

A report released by the Foundation Center and the Campaign for Black Male Achievement found encouraging news on the funding front – and some fascinating detail on where philanthropists direct funds aimed at impact in the lives of African American males.

The study finds that in 2012, the latest year for which data was available, 98 foundations made grants worth about $64.6 million “explicitly designed to benefit” African-American men and boys – a figure was up from $40.4 million in the previous year and which “continues an upward trend.” According to the report, more than half of all foundation funding for black males from 2003 to 2012 was distributed in the latest three years.

Read more: Forbes