Women-led philanthropy will improve the act of giving

livemint.com:

Philanthropy has been practised by Indian companies for more than a century. Over the last few decades, some of it came to be led by women spouses of business leaders through corporate foundations, often with corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities playing a supportive role. But today, women in India and overseas are playing independent and impactful roles of leadership in philanthropy, bringing to their work distinctive styles and refreshingly innovative approaches.

A few days back, Melinda French announced that she will be disengaging from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation following a lag of three years after her divorce with Bill Gates in 2021. She will now be the recipient of $12.5 billion, which she would like to deploy on causes like gender development that she has been passionate about. After divorcing Gates, she founded the non-profit Pivotal Philanthropies Foundation.

Analysts have said it is possible that a part of Melinda’s future philanthropy will take on a political colour at some point. MacKenzie Scott, former wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, received a 4% stake in the online retailer after her divorce with him in 2019. In the last five years, MacKenzie has distributed 49% of her shares in Amazon worth $16.6 billion to over 2,000 non-profit organizations (NGOs) worldwide through a ‘no strings attached’ giving policy.

This is revolutionary because the NGOs that received this money had full control over how, when and to whom benefits would be given. This was radically different from the traditional practice of putting in place detailed systems and processes to track and review the impact of funds awarded. Today, she is the poster-child of a new era in global philanthropy.