Conference Explores Philanthropy's Potential Impact on Public Policy

Gara LaMarche, a senior fellow at NYU Wagner, was the recent co-sponsor of a highly successful conference at New York University on philanthropy and the new, post-2012 election landscape of policymaking and politics.

Foundation executives, individual donors, and civic leaders came together to examine what philanthropy’s evolving relationship with public policy and government means in the context of the rapidly changing political scene. Participants engaged on such issues as K-12 education, health care reform, and poverty. Among the questions examined were:

- How is America’s polarized political culture changing philanthropy?

- How has the political culture shaped the types of projects we fund, demands on grantees and partnerships with government?

- How successful or challenging have philanthropy’s investments been in the realm of policy change and with government? At the start of this new political cycle, what should we do now (or not do) given the ongoing polarization?

The Feb. 12 event was titled “Money and Power in Post-Election America: Where is Philanthropy?” It was co-hosted by NYU, Duke, and Philanthropy New York.