GAINING KNOWLEDGE, SHARING INSIGHTS

It's not just about having the right answers, it's also about asking the right questions.

We build our knowledge base on European philanthropy – in partnership with academics, researchers and experts – by surveying the work of philanthropy organisations, and identifying trends and issues affecting them. Our aims are to help inform Philea members' strategic decision-making; connect them with peers and partners; and demonstrate to a range of stakeholders the impact, diversity and scale of the sector. We then amplify this knowledge by sharing it on our website and through our social media channels and newsletters.

Knowledge of and for our membership

Our commitment to understanding and further enhancing member engagement was evident through the membership satisfaction survey and report, the financial information survey, and the development of dashboards tracking membership trends.

We responded to 125 information requests, mostly from our members but also from other key stakeholders, ensuring they had access to critical insights.

Innovating knowledge products

This year, we ventured into new terrain by experimenting with innovative knowledge product formats. Our "how-to" guides, focusing on children and youth participation in philanthropy, provided practical insights tailored to real-world challenges. Interviews with philanthropy practitioners who bridge today with tomorrow’s sustainable cities offered peers both inspiration and concrete ideas. We contributed a chapter to the book, "The Routledge Handbook of Artificial Intelligence and Philanthropy", which explored the evolving role of artificial intelligence across philanthropy organisations, highlighting the crucial role of data infrastructure as an essential asset for foundations. We also worked on a data briefer to present state of the art initiatives related to democratic backsliding and the factors driving it, due for publication in 2025.

To ensure further accuracy, we conducted data validation with country experts throughout the year to update our briefers on public-benefit foundations and country profiles. This process shed light on the philanthropy landscape, offering an updated picture of the number of foundations, their assets and expenditures in European countries.

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Read "The Routledge Handbook of Artificial Intelligence and Philanthropy"

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Expanding dissemination and engagement

Knowledge thrives when shared. In 2024, we contributed significantly to global dialogues through articles on China-Europe philanthropy, AI’s intersection with philanthropy, and power dynamics in monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEL) – among many topics we captured. We also analysed our most popular blogs, drawing insights from what resonated most with our audiences, and we presented emerging trends in various peer-learning events.

Additionally, we conducted specialised data webinars with PIOs, sharing our dashboards and methodologies. These efforts laid the groundwork for a two-day in-person event to take place in February 2025.

Fostering external collaboration and partnerships

Collaboration remained a cornerstone of our work. With ERNOP-Agape, we laid the groundwork for the 2025 safe space initiative, co-designed a session for the Philea Forum 2025, and planned joint data collection efforts. Our partnership with Impact Europe led to a joint data collection plan.

On the editorial front, we continued contributing to the Alliance editorial board. Meanwhile, our collaboration with the University of Geneva advanced an AI pilot project to map foundations in two countries through web scraping.

Telling the story

Whether it is helping people or the planet, philanthropy plays a key role in our lives, from pioneering work in health and research to supporting the arts and creating stronger, more sustainable communities. In times of increasing uncertainty, it is therefore vital that we help tell this positive story by sharing the best case studies, publications and online opinion pieces with the wider world.

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Publications

Our virtual library on the IssueLab platform is a publicly-available, fully-searchable collection of more than 1,000 free-to-download publications that we curate from a range of sources on philanthropy and foundations.

In 2024, we produced the following publications:

Data Science, AI and Data Philanthropy in Foundations: On the Path to Maturity

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Feeling the Heat: How Foundations Can Use their Investments to Curb Climate Change

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Futures Philanthropy: Anticipation for the Common Good

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Removing Obstacles to Cross-Border Philanthropy: The Time Is Now

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Opinion Pieces

Posted on our website, our Opinion pieces are where Philea members give us their thoughts, discuss best practices and share their concerns. Looking at the full spectrum of 2024's Opinion pieces, we see that most authors agreed that the philanthropic sector stands at a crossroads, where evolving societal needs demand bold(er) thinking, greater “moral ambition” and more adaptive approaches. The pieces also provided a valuable snapshot of the sector’s journey over these 12 months, offering a roadmap to where the sector is heading for funders, practitioners and communities alike.

Five core themes emerged, each influencing the future of giving in its own way: