The Obamas launched Let Girls Learn during Obama’s presidency, and are now continuing the work through their own foundation’s program, Global Girls Alliance. (Photo Credit: Global Girls Alliance.)
When we last checked in at the newly formed Obama Foundation, the former First Lady Michelle Obama and her husband, President Barack Obama were laying the groundwork for cultivating a new coalition of organizations focused on girls globally.
Through a collaboration with GoFundMe, the Obama Foundation has established the Global Girls Alliance Fund, helping to raise funds for grassroots organizations to make more headway with educating girls. The initiative accepts applications from eligible nonprofits already working to increase educational opportunities for girls.
Sweden’s feminist foreign policy is helping to define key strategies for addressing gender equality worldwide.
In 2014, Sweden made waves by becoming the first country across the globe to adopt an explicitly feminist foreign policy. Drawing both controversy and acclaim, the foreign policy was the first of its kind to focus so pointedly on international gender equality across every level of government. Since Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven was confirmed to a second term on Jan. 18, 2019, activists have called for even more emphasis on continuing the successes of the feminist foreign policy.
But what exactly is a feminist foreign policy? In Sweden’s case, the policy focused on funding initiatives across the three “Rs” in which women tend to be underserved and neglected: resources, representation, and rights. Donors who are interested in promoting gender equality through their efforts and outreach can look to the Swedish model of feminist foreign policy to know where to begin.
Katherine Pease, Managing Director and Head of Impact Strategies for Cornerstone Capital, shares her expertise on the growing use of Donor Advised Funds by women’s funds and giving circles.
“There’s a time and place just for grants, and there’s a time and place for gender lens investing, but if you can find that sweet spot where they come together, that’s what gets me going,” says Katherine Pease, Managing Director and Head of Impact Strategies for Cornerstone Capital.
For Pease, the two strategies of gender lens grantmaking and gender lens investing can play a complementary role, particularly when using the Donor Advised Fund (DAF) as an investment vehicle. For women’s funds and foundations, Pease sees an expanding use of DAFs to create new ways to reach women at all levels of society with resources to grow their power.
Linda Davis Taylor, CEO of Clifford Swan Investment Counselors, shares her vision of the growing influence of women in philanthropy and finance.
If there’s one thing Linda Davis Taylor thinks there’s too much of, it’s women taking concessions in salary negotiations. As the CEO and Chairman of Clifford Swan Investment Counselors, Taylor is calling on all women to create a culture where women ask for what they deserve at their jobs.
“I still hear so many women say they don’t know how to negotiate their salary, even women in top leadership positions,” said Taylor, in a recent interview with Philanthropy Women. She wants to see women get much more comfortable with having those difficult conversations that ensure equal pay and benefits for work at all levels and in all industries. She also wants to find more ways to ensure that “we start early enough in encouraging women to understand their role in salary negotiation.”
Prince Charles announced the launch of a new $100 million fund to support women and girls in South Asia at Buckingham Palace. (Photo courtesy Clarendon House)
The Prince of Wales, Prince Charles, announced this week the launch of a new $100 million fund that aims to reach half a million women and girls in South Asia with education and professional opportunities in five years.
“The sustainable development goals endorsed by 193 member states at the United Nations cannot be achieved unless radical new approaches are developed,” said Prince Charles, upon unveiling the new fund. “I am very proud that the British Asian Trust is at the forefront of developing such innovations.”
British Asian Trust (BAT) will act as the investment banker for this project, raising capital and implementing the project, and will seek funding for new project from the big bank foundations for the initial risk investment. Added funding will be sought from national governments and other big donors.
The British Asian Trust was founded in 2007 at the suggestion of Prince Charles and is one of the Prince’s 20 charities. For this $100 million investment in women and girls, BAT’s plan is to combine venture capital funding with options contracts that are paid when certain social goals of investment are made.
This “pay for success” type funding innovation has become increasingly popular, as investors look for ways to get a return on their money and also fulfill corporate social responsibility targets.
Prince Charles’ announcement of the new activity for BAT comes at a time when donors are increasingly recognizing the value of both a social and financial return on their investments. Women donors, in particular, may want to be alerted to this new venture impacting the lives of women and girls in South Asia.
Prince Charles referred to the new project as BAT’s “most ambitious to date.” As gender lens investing and gender lens grantmaking continue to evolve, we expect to see much more activity like this announcement from the Prince of Wales.
ReflectUS is a bipartisan coalition of leaders working to get more women elected to public office.
One of the largest public women’s foundations in the country is hosting a convening of leaders in Dallas to address the lack of gender equality in local government.
The Texas Women’s Foundation will host 60 women leaders from diverse backgrounds to work on getting more women elected to public office in Dallas County. On February 6, these leaders will come from many organizations we have talked about here at Philanthropy Women, including IGNITE, Vote Run Lead, and She Should Run.
All of these organizations are part of a larger network called ReflectUS. Reflect.US is a nonpartisan coalition of seven leading women’s organizations: Represent Women, She Should Run, Empowered Women, Women’s Public Leadership Network, IGNITE, Vote Run Lead and Latinas Represent.
Guests on tomorrow evening’s Virtual Happy Hour with Gloria Feldt include Reshma Gopaldas, Mira Lowe, and Amy Emmerich.
Tomorrow evening’s Take the Lead Virtual Happy Hour will feature an exciting group of women talking about one of my favorite topics: journalism. Tomorrow’s event is called The Real Story: Women in Journalism Finding Fair Solutions.
The web call will discuss ways to promote change that will make for more equal representation and pay of women journalists. Given that Philanthropy Women is a journalism endeavor, I am planning to be on that call to see what I can learn for my work, and to discuss philanthropy’s current and future impact on these issues.
Here is more information about what is happening tomorrow night at 6:30 ET:
The Real Story: Women in Journalism Find Fair Solutions
Impact Alpha is a digital media company that describes its mission as “redefining business journalism around social and environmental value.”
Recently, I listened in on a call hosted by Catalyst at Large Suzanne Biegel, and author David Bank of Impact Alpha. Guests on the call included Luisamaria Ruiz Carlile of Veris Wealth Partners, which specializes in gender lens investing and research.
The call provided fascinating insights into the world of gender lens investing. Though in its early formative years, gender lens investing is a growing area of financial investment that is destined for big things.
Biegel began the call by giving an overview of both the expanding language and the expanding financial investments in the gender lens investing sector. “Gender lens investing is still small in the relative scheme of things, but it’s so much bigger than it was,” said Biegel. She shared the latest statistics from Project SAGE at the Wharton School of Business Social Impact, which turned up a record 87 funds that are now investing with a gender lens, with 46 of those funds being new creations that occurred between 2017 and 2018.
Biegel described how these funds are more geographically diverse than ever, and also semantically diverse. Along with gender lens investing, the terms used to described this evolving market have branched out with “gender effect, gender smart, and gender alpha,” and the range of approaches being used have also expanded, with the number of different strategies being used going form 12 in 2017 to 35 in 2018. Across all strategies that include at least one factor of gender analysis, VERIS wealth partners are reporting an estimated $843 billion in money manager assets being devoted to gender-based investing.
Luisamaria Ruiz Carlile of Veris Wealth Partners joined the conversation by recognizing that “we are early on in trying to capture the gender alpha” since the investment sector is so young. Carlile suggested that as more prominent pension funds take on forms of gender lens investing, this could be an important signal to the market that these funds are growing in value and mainstream influence. She gave the example of State Street’s signaling when they unveiled the fearless girl statue on Wall Street as they announced the new ticker for their gender lens ETF.
Carlile talked about how funds managers are listening more to women on the ground running successful businesses, and this is adding to the ability of women to function more powerfully as business owners. To expand on this point, Sharron McPherson joined the conversation and talked about the organization that she helped co-found — Winde (Women in Infrastructure, Development, and Energy) — a collective of 2,000 women construction and real estate professionals in Africa.
The call also highlighted the importance of gender lens public initiatives such as the one taking place in the New York City Economic Development Corporation under the leadership of Eric Clement. This initiative is providing $10 million to back women entrepreneurs in New York City and help build a more gender diverse procurement pipeline for public sector projects.
While gender lens grantmaking and gender lens investing are separate areas of feminist activity, it’s important to recognize that the two have some overlapping purposes. Biegel emphasized how gender alpha investing provides a value dividend across multiple domains — by growing women’s leadership in government and business, for example, while also addressing issues that disparately affect women and girls such as education and health care, or women’s leadership in steering efforts that address water access and climate change.
This is just a quick post before taking a few days off to enjoy time with family and friends. We will be covering several important events in upcoming posts, including a fascinating call on Gender Alpha with Suzanne Biegel and David Bank, where they discussed how “Gender Alpha” is all about identifying the specific dividends that gender lens investing yields. Biegel and Bank are co-producers of November’s Gender-Smart Investing Summit in London. Guests on the call included Luisamaria Ruiz Carlile of Veris Wealth Partners, which specializes in gender lens investing and research.
And one other quick note to acknowledge the significance of the recent elections, where voter turnout was higher than it has been in 104 years. That’s right — the last time voter turnout was as high as it was in 2018 was in 1914, before women even had the right to vote. Now that women and millennials are getting into the driver’s seat with social change, we hope to see even better voter turnout in 2020. I don’t know about you, but I am mighty thankful that people are finally getting the message (it seems!) about the importance of civic engagement. That could mean in 2020 we elect a President that gets us back on track in terms of valuing safety, diversity, and systems change to address inequality.
Women, and particularly women of color, made historic gains in the 2018 elections. Much of this new political activity was driven by progressive women donors.
The election of Donald Trump has sparked a wave of political activism never seen before, particularly among progressive donors.
According to the Center for Responsive Politic’s data, the top 154 donors spent a combined total of over $700 million this election cycle, with Democrats and progressives spending an estimated total of $327 million in this election, and Republicans and conservatives spending an estimated $350 million.
While the Center for Responsive Politics is reporting that this year’s midterms were by far the most expensive in history, with a large share of that spending coming from the right, another large share of that spending involved progressive women donors opening their wallets to fund the protection of key civil liberties including reproductive rights, health care, and social inclusion.
Taking the most recent data from the Center for Responsive Politics, I’ve parsed out the top women donors to progressive causes and candidates. Most of these women gave with their partners, so their decisions to give to progressive causes likely ranged in terms of how much the giving was driven by one or the other in the partnership. The important point here is that women are getting more influential in political giving, both within couples and independently, and in no other election cycle has that been more evident. Women donated an estimated 36% of the funds that fueled the 2018 midterm elections, and yes, that is a big deal.
TOP 5 WOMEN DONORS TO DEMOCRATIC AND PROGRESSIVE CAUSES AND CANDIDATES
1. Katherine A. Taylor (Kat Steyer): Along with husband Tom Steyer, Kat Steyer contributed over $50.7 million in combined hard and soft money going to Democratic and liberal causes and candidates. Tom and Kat Steyer are the founders of the TomKat Foundation, which focuses heavily on financial inclusion (they also run one of the most progressive banks in the nation lending to those who might not otherwise be able to get capital). Kat Steyer also focuses on food and nutrition and funds FoodCorp, which goes into public schools across the nation to help them improve food quality and teach about nutrition and healthy eating habits.
2. Marilyn Simons: In partnership with her husband, James Simons, Marilyn Simons contributed $18.9 million to progressives and Democrats this election cycle. In their foundation work, Jim and Marilyn Simons focus on science and math as well as issues related to Autism (they have family members who have struggled with Autism).
3. Deborah J. Simon: Ms. Simon gave $8.9 million to Democrats and liberal causes for the midterm elections. The daughter of a real estate company magnate, Ms. Simon chairs the Simon Youth Foundation (www.syf.org), a public charity that operating in 13 states to help at-risk high school students stay in school. Ms. Simon is also the founder of The Deborah Joy Simon Foundation, a private foundation making grants for religious, charitable, scientific, literary, and educational purposes.
4. Cari Tuna: Along with partner Dustin Moskovitz (co-founder of Facebook), Cari Tuna made $6.3 million in donations to Democrats and liberal causes for the midterm elections. Tuna and Moskovitz are the co-founders of Good Ventures, where Tuna oversees the Open Philanthropy Project, which seeks to improve grantmaking with more effectiveness.
5. Marsha Z. Laufer: Along with spouse Henry, Marsha Laufer contributed $5.68 million to progressive causes and candidates in the midterm elections. According to Open Secrets, the Laufers have recently made many large donations to women’s election causes, including $100,000 to Women Vote! in September of this year. According to Forbes, Marsha Laufer and her husband Henry contributed an estimated $2 million to Hillary Clinton’s recent campaign for President.
The full list is here, so you can do more research to discover who the women are behind the big bump in political giving this election cycle.
From my parsed data, here are the top Democratic/progressive givers:
And here are the top Republican/conservative givers:
