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The purpose of this paper is to analyse nonprofit regulation through comparing and contrasting mutual-benefit and public-benefit entities. It ascertains how these entities differ in size, publicness, tax benefits and whether these differences might suggest regulatory costs should be differentiated.

This mixed-methods study utilises financial data, submissions and interviews.

There are stark differences in these two types of regulated nonprofit entities. Members should be the primary monitoring agency/ies for mutual-benefit entities, but financial reports should be understandable to these members. Nevertheless, the availability of tax concessions, combined with the benefits of limited liability, suggest mutual-benefit entities should be regulated and monitored by government in a way sympathetic to their size.

As with most research, a limitation is this study’s focus on a single jurisdiction.

The differences in these entities’ characteristics are important for designing regulation.

Better regulation is likely to require a standard set of financial reporting standards. Government has the right to demand disclosures due to benefits mutual-benefit entities enjoy.

In comparison to studies utilising only public-benefit data, this study uses unique data sets to compare public-benefit and mutual-benefit entities and presents nonprofit sector participant’s perceptions of these differences in context. This enables analysis of how better regulation could be achieved.

This study seeks to illustrate shared obstacles and opportunities that US nonprofit communicators face, broadening the understanding of nonprofit communication management beyond fundraising, donor relations, and social media practices.

A total of 35 nonprofit communicators from across the USA were interviewed. The participants represented a variety of nonprofit sizes that address a variety of issues.

The interviews revealed six common challenges that the participants face: politics, laws and regulations, media attention, evaluation, brand recognition, and employee engagement. The interviews also revealed four common opportunities that the participants face: job satisfaction, collaboration, communication value, and professional development.

The findings illustrate how nonprofit communicators in the USA address some shared experiences. In doing so, the findings lead to nine valuable areas for future research. Given that the findings are limited to the USA, future research is needed to examine nonprofit communicators’ shared experiences in other countries.

The study builds on recent research examining how the environment in which communication management is practiced affects communication practices, thereby contributing to theory development that predicts effective communication practices via sector. In addition, the study serves as a call to action for researchers to address pressing management issues identified by nonprofit communicators.

The study builds on recent research examining how the environment in which communication management is practiced affects communication practices. In addition, the study serves as a call to action for researchers to address pressing management issues identified by nonprofit communicators.

Many changes taking place in the nonprofit sector have created an environment in which organizational learning could be regarded as representing a high-profile notion with strategic importance for nonprofit organizations (NPOs), but its application in the nonprofit sector has not received adequate research attention. The purpose of this paper is to present an empirical test of the relationship between learning orientation and NPO performance.

Literature on organizational learning is briefly reviewed and a marketing-focussed perspective on learning is adopted. Then drawing from resource-based theory and relationship marketing, a conceptual model is developed that links learning orientation to NPO performance, predicting that noneconomic performance would mediate between learning orientation and economic performance. Using Baron and Kenny’s mediation regression procedure, this prediction is subjected to an empirical test with survey data collected on 118 NPOs operating in Ghana.

The paper finds a general support for the view that noneconomic performance is the primary organizational feature that drives economic performance and that learning orientation is an outgrowth of this characteristic.

This study addresses the important question of whether paying attention to their mission helps NPOs acquire critical resources from their funding entities, discussing this issue in the context of organizational learning to respond to RBT scholars’ call for more research that highlight the underlying processes through which strategic resources (such as organizational learning) contribute to the organization’s financial outcomes.

This chapter reviews the contribution of nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) to Africa developmental transformation by exploring key activities around three key areas where NGOs have impacted Africa's development namely environmental, social and economic context. This perspective emphasises the central role of NGOs in triggering developmental changes in Africa. Exploring the complexities of NGOs' management and its impact on the development of Africa through a collective action lens, we discovered that although NGOs have been responsible for developmental growth in Africa, there exists a certain tussle between the NGOs and state actors due to relegation of the state. With recent calls for accountability and transparency, NGOs would have to include more strategies geared towards collaborative partnerships and more inclusion of state in order to maintain sustainable growth. We conclude by reflecting on the socioeconomic impact of NGOs and implications for sustainable development in Africa.

This paper aims to untangle the underlying mechanisms through which reputational signals promote stakeholders' intentions to donate in nonprofit organizations via stakeholder trust.

The authors apply a moderated mediation model using an experimental design with N = 248 business and public management students of France.

The results indicate that both a formal reputational signal (third-party certificate) and an informal reputational signal (self-proclaiming to be social entrepreneurial) affect stakeholder trust and intentions to donate. Stakeholder trust partially mediated the relationship between the formal signal and intentions to donate, and the mediation effect was stronger when an informal signal was present (vs. not present).

Trust is central to the exchange of nonprofit organizations and their external stakeholders. To enhance trust and supportive behavior toward nonprofit organizations, these organizations may consider using formal and informal reputational signaling within their marketing strategies.

This research highlights the pivotal role of formal and informal reputational signals for the enhancing stakeholders' trust and donation behavior in a nonprofit context.

The emergence of Governance practices in the non-governmental organisation (NGO) sector has become associated with increasingly high levels of organisational complexity. In the light of an expanding civil society sector in Chile and the emergence of formalised governance practices, this paper explores the construction of the Executive Director role in Chilean NGOs with reference to organisational functions, organisational dynamics, and external influences.

Grounded theory is used to explore qualitative data derived from a set of N = 39 interviews conducted in Chile These interviews involve NGO founders, funders, Executive Directors, scholars, consultants, and team members.

The findings reveal the pivotal role played by Executive Directors in conducting organisational activities which, in other types of organisations, are often distributed across various organisational functions. The data also highlight complex dynamics involving overt compliance with external regulatory requirements, uncertainties about financial sustainability, the recruitment of Executive Board members, the exercise of power by Executive Directors, and the influence of founders in leadership configurations.

The implications of the study are discussed in relation to the governance and accountability of NGOs, the nature of the Executive Director role, the purpose of Executive Boards in the NGO sector, and the recruitment and training of Board members. It is noted that the study was conducted in the NGO sector in Chile; further research is necessary to establish the generalisability of the findings to other contexts.

This paper addresses the shortage of organisational research on NGOs. It contributes by offering analytical perspectives on organisational processes of Leadership and Governance. This paper highlights the relationship between, and interdependency of, those processes.

As transition countries shift to a mixed welfare system, the accountability of non-government organizations (NGOs) becomes critical to quality services. Yet, poor financial and managerial practices of some NGOs in China have led to distrust from citizens. The purpose of this paper is to use a democratic accountability framework to examine citizen participation in NGOs as an approach to understand an angle of this distrust. Does the Chinese language academic literature about NGO accountability engage with concepts of participation in NGO governance, management and service use?

The method was content analysis of a search of words and concepts relating to NGOs, participation and accountability in the available Chinese language literature on NGO accountability through the newly developed search engine Wenjin Search of the National Library of China.

The analysis found that most Chinese literature only emphasizes problems of accountability, causes and regulatory solutions. When the literature includes participation, it refers to it as a platform for civil society, rather than a process of accountability within an NGO.

Searching by keywords in one search engine may not be exhaustive. The results probably reflect most of the current research of Chinese scholars, considering the depth of the search engine.

Formal NGOs are relatively new in the Chinese political landscape; and government regulations are largely administrative and unenforced. At conceptual and political levels, the absence of discussion about other forms of accountability ignores questions about public dissatisfaction with NGO performance and the public’s willingness to contribute to NGO effectiveness, and civic engagement.

An implication is that until Chinese NGO research also incorporates democratic accountability concepts, it will continue to ignore the internal and external drivers from citizens for NGO change. Transition country NGOs that encourage participation have the potential to engender greater accountability in the organization, community and in state relations.

Social economy organizations (SEOs) are a hybrid model where relations with stakeholders are managed using transparency mechanisms. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the role that online accessibility (which is understood to be a tool to implement transparency) has in raising financial resources and to assess its impact on economic and social achievements. Moreover, the authors study the interaction between online accessibility and external verification.

This study analyzes the behavior of 1,400 SEOs between 2009 and 2012 using a structural equation model and the MPLUS 7.4 software, which is based on covariance analysis.

The results show that transparency, which is understood as online accessibility, assists in raising financial resources and enhances SEO economic and social achievements. The authors also note that external verifications favor the economic achievements of SEOs but do not improve their social achievements.

This research has two limitations: this study refers only to Spanish SEOs and no consensus exists on how to measure economic and social performance. Therefore, the conclusions should be considered with caution in other regulatory and cultural fields. The main implications of this work are the criteria the authors provide to help decision makers decide on the transparency model that SEOs should develop according to their management needs.

This study bridges a gap in the current research by increasing understanding of the role of accessibility as being the most important tool for an organization that strives to embody transparent behavior.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze drivers for the proactive disclosure of information via the web in Colombian non-governmental organizations (NGOs) as a strategy for fostering their legitimacy and responding to the institutional pressure to which they are subjected.

The web sites of 196 NGOs from Colombia have been analyzed, first, via an Online Transparency Index that is consistent with Cronbach α coefficient and later, by performing a Tobit regression analysis.

The proactive online disclosure of information in Colombian NGOs is very low. In spite of the high distrust of the resource management they receive, the financial information is the least aspect disclosed in their web pages. In addition, the larger NGOs are the entities that most disclose information via their web site. Likewise, the factors of “internationalization”, “donations”, “community services” and “dependence on voluntary work” show a positive effect on certain aspects of the online disclosure of information analyzed.

The lack of web use as a strategy for a proactive disclosure of information is clearly observed. Therefore, both obligatory and voluntary accountability mechanisms should be more aware of the need for fostering the benefits of a web site, as being transparent in a proactive manner will increase trust in this sector.

As the majority of the research papers related to online disclosure are focused on the corporate and public sector, this study addresses the issue of the NGO sector and particularly aims to contribute to the scarce literature regarding web use of entities from developing countries.

There has been limited research on why football clubs contribute to charity. This paper examines how football clubs and their charitable conduits report information when discussing their connectedness. In addition, it explores reasons why, and the extent to which, football clubs support altruism via such charitable vehicles.

Case studies of four major football teams (Manchester City/Manchester United in England and AC Milan/Inter Milan in Italy) are discussed, with formal reports of the clubs and their associated charitable conduits being analysed.

Boundaries between the clubs and their charitable conduits are frequently blurred. Evidence suggests that acknowledging the co-existence of different factors may help to understand what is reported by these organisations and address some of the caveats in terms of autonomy and probity of their activities and reporting practices.

The research uses case studies of four major ‘powerhouses’ of the game and their associated charitable spinoffs. While this is innovative and novel, expanding the research to investigate more clubs and their charitable endeavours would allow greater generalisations.

The study provides material that can be used to reflect on the very topical subject of ‘sportswashing’. This has the potential to input to deliberations relating to the future governance of the game.

The paper explores relationships between businesses and charities/nonprofits in a sector so far little investigated from a charitable accountability perspective. It suggests that motives for engaging in charitable activity and highlighting such engagement may extend beyond normal altruism or warm-glow emotions.