Going all in on trust.
The Whitman Institute is spending itself out of existence by 2022.
Spending out has expanded our imaginations and enabled us to be more responsive, more strategic, and more impactful. It is the natural extension of our trust-based approach to philanthropy.
As we near our sunset, we are continuing to reflect on and share our trust-based approach, calling in our peers to question perpetuity, and proactively exploring more ways we can reimagine philanthropy to advance social, political, and economic equity.
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Our Story
For over 35 years, TWI has advanced social, political, and economic equity by investing in dialogue, relationship-building, and critical thinking across a multi-issue portfolio spanning civic and community engagement, leadership development, human rights, movement building, and media and journalism.
We have re-evaluated our own practices, leadership, methods, and purpose many times along the way, in order to build toward greater equity, transparency, and trust. In 2011, we made the decision to spend out all our resources by 2022 rather than operate in perpetuity.
Trust-based Philanthropy
Trust-based philanthropy is informed by our decade of experience that funder-grantee relationships are stronger when they are built on the foundation of trust. We believe efforts to create social, political, and economic equity will be more successful if funders proactively work to alleviate power imbalances in the sector by embedding trust, dialogue, and relationship-building in its practices with grantees.
Together, with like-minded funders, we launched the Trust-Based Philanthropy Project in early 2020.
