News

GuideStar International maps out its prospects

Fundraising | Gemma Ware | 1 Oct 2006

The organisation behind GuideStar International has launched a mapping exercise to assess the 'GuideStar readiness' of countries around the world.

Civil Society Systems, which is based in London and New York, has been operating in the UK since 2004 and formally registered as a charity in June this year with the aim of developing public databases of charities throughout the world. Though independent of GuideStar, the organisation has a close working relationship with GuideStar UK and its chief executive is Buzz Schmidt, the founder of GuideStar in the US.

Caroline Neligan, director of programmes at Civil Society Systems, said the map of 'GuideStar readiness' should be completed in the first quarter of 2007 and will allow CSS to "understand the state of play worldwide".

"We'll be asking questions to do with the culture of philanthropy in a country, how large civil society is, what the relationship between government and civil society in a country is, the availability of data on civil society in that country and where it is held," she said.

CSS is already working to launch GuideStar systems in India, South Africa, South Korea, Hungary and Germany and expects websites to go live in three or four of these countries in the first part of 2007. However, Neligan said the websites are likely to be less "polished" than GuideStar UK was when it launched in 2004.

According to Neligan the development phase of a GuideStar system, which is usually done in partnership with a national institution, costs a country about £50,000 and can take between six months and a year. Once it is in place the country will pay CSS a £25,000 licence fee for hosting and managing the system.  Private funders and governments will be expected to cover the estimated annual operating costs of £150,000.

The GuideStar International programme has been funded to date by private funders in the US and by a grant from GuideStar US, but Neligan said CSS was also in the early stages of talks with the UNDP, World Bank, DfID and the European Union about future funding.

Adrian Sargeant, professor of philanthropy at the Indiana Centre for Philanthropy in the US and a strident critic of GuideStar UK, said: "In most countries such investment would be a complete waste of time. As in the UK, the overwhelming majority of donors just aren't interested in published accounts and wouldn't have the knowledge to interpret them, even if they were.

"If grant-making trusts and national governments want to make a difference to giving in their country, they would do better to invest their money in identifying how the biggest uplift in philanthropy could be achieved. I can pretty much guarantee that it won't be through the provision of yet another GuideStar," he added.

Tweet