Journal of Philanthropy and Marketing最新文献

The general sentiment of the charitable community toward the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017 at the time of its passing seemed despondent. Due to individual income tax changes, the TCJA was set to produce tens of billions of projected charitable donation losses. Interestingly, current data show that total individual giving is on track with amounts before the TCJA's implementation, and overall giving has exceeded pre-TCJA levels, setting records along the way. This study attempts to explore this phenomenon and more by broadly analyzing how individual income taxation, itemization, donors, and donations changed during the TCJA's tenure. Researchers, lawmakers, and charitable leaders may use this study to be better prepared in their decision making when new tax legislation is enacted.

Over the course of nearly a decade, a strong body of academic research has emerged showing that the benefits of personal crowdfunding via GoFundMe and similar platforms are neither as easily attained nor as evenly distributed among users as many would hope. In this response to Lukk et al.'s (2025) article “Disrupting Philanthropy? A Reality Check for Digital Crowdfunding,” I extend the authors' discussion of the harmful effects of the for-profit crowdfunding industry on equality, campaigner/beneficiary autonomy, and the spread of misinformation by examining how crowdfunding has shifted the meaning(s) ascribed to “philanthropy” in Western societies.

Lincoln, M. 2025. “The Revolution Will Not Be Crowdfunded: Alternative Philanthropy's Politics.” Journal of Philanthropy 30, no. 4: e70040. https://doi.org/10.1002/nvsm.70040.

This article was mistakenly included in the Journal of Philanthropy November 2025 issue.

This article should be considered as part of the Dialogues collection, “Crowdfunding: A Productive Disruption, Failed Revolution, or an Evolution of ‘Traditional’ Giving Practices?” published in this November 2025 supplement issue. Below is the abstract excerpt to the article for a quick reference:

This commentary on “Disrupting Philanthropy?: A Reality Check for Digital Crowdfunding” examines the self-contradictory moral economy of crowdfunding, noting its misleading characterization of its own politics. It discusses the limits of crowdfunding as continuous with the limits of philanthropy and charity. Noting the typically patrician inflection of the term “philanthropy,” it suggests the class conflicts that the project of “disrupting philanthropy” engenders (or pretends to). Extending the authors’ close reading of discourse about crowdfunding, the essay offers a complementary critique of this new form of finance. It suggests that in trading on rhetoric about disruption, democratization, revolution, and the power of “crowds,” crowdfunding justifies its de facto status as a substitute for social entitlements. Finally, it suggests opportunities for further research that examines the utility of crowdfunding’s material failures and its actual accomplishments.

The publisher apologises for this error.

Like all forms of philanthropic and charitable practice directed towards people with health needs, crowdfunding does not occur in isolation, but is always entangled with other aspects of health subjectivities and health citizenship. I focus my response to the claims about crowdfunding investigated in this article by advocating for more attention to nationally situated and culturally situated aspects of both the technology and the neoliberal logics that drive it. I also discuss the question of autonomy, and whether crowdfunding can truly ‘empower users’, by pointing out the difference between whether it empowers users as beneficiaries or as health citizens. I suggest moving beyond a dichotomy (i.e., of whether it is empowering or undermining autonomy) to instead consider what opportunities, engagements, or affordances it may provide for health citizens in various national and local contexts, as well as for distinct patient, disability, or health communities. As such, I highlight the overall need for a more reflexive and comparative approach, to avoid the risk of theorising features of crowdfunding as universal without sufficient attention to situated or sociocultural factors; opening the possibility of more plural answers to core questions about what crowdfunding is and does.

Crowdfunding promised to revolutionize philanthropy by using digital technology to make charitable giving cheaper, easier, and more accessible. Has this been realized in practice? We highlight three crucial questions for charity professionals and academic researchers to consider regarding crowdfunding's “disruptive” capacity, and we answer them in light of nearly a decade of research on crowdfunding for health care and related personal costs. We argue that crowdfunding's benefits have been largely overstated. Instead of offering a radically novel approach, it puts a digital spin on an outdated charity model. While potentially empowering fundraising recipients, it can significantly undermine their autonomy in practice. And although crowdfunding is commonly used to support health and medical costs, it promotes values and practices that ultimately harm public health systems. Our synthesis highlights the considerable progress scholars have made in understanding this extremely popular, if flawed, approach to charity, and we call for more critical analyses of crowdfunding as it continues to evolve, alongside research into alternative approaches to charitable giving.