NCRP launches the second phase of our Climate Justice and Just Transition campaign: holding climate funders accountable for their continued underfunding of these necessary frontline organizations with this special 2-part blog. Look out for part 2, where NCRP will dig further into CWF’s grantmaking data, including the increase in overlapped funding for non-frontline organizations between ClimateWorks and their funders. NCRP will also look more closely at the ClimateWorks ecosystem and other programs within the organization that amplify their influence in this field.
For years, billionaires and multimillionaires have privatized government services, lionized their wealth, and told us that the charity they direct – not the solidarity and organizing that movements lead – will solve the biggest systemic issues of our time.
We are living through the dire consequences of putting wealth on a pedestal at the expense of working-class Black, brown and Indigenous communities, who are forced to fight for pennies to resource their work. Despite having proven solutions, frontline, grassroots organizations are stretching themselves thin to move projects forward while also fighting back against dangerous opposition. They should not have to choose.
Today, with that in mind, NCRP launches the second phase of our Climate Justice and Just Transition campaign: holding climate funders accountable for their continued underfunding of these necessary frontline organizations. We’re doing so by spotlighting ClimateWorks Foundation (CWF), a prominent intermediary and influential force in the climate funding ecosystem.
At a time when the federal government is attacking nonprofits focused on climate and equity, NCRP stands with both funders and grantees in the crosshairs. But at moments like these, it is even more important that ClimateWorks stand in greater solidarity with frontline groups and share in the risk that communities on the ground face on a much deeper level.
And, while moving more money to the frontlines is NCRP’s ultimate goal, we also want to focus on who and what influences funders to continually under-resource these communities in the first place. Without shifting the power imbalance behind funding decisions, the act of moving the money becomes surface level lip service instead of a cultural change that transforms the way philanthropy operates.
In this opening part one of a two-part series, NCRP will explore the ClimateWorks Foundation (CWF) leadership and governance, pointing out the gaps in what CWF considers to be expertise in the climate funding space. In part two, NCRP will examine the echo chamber in CWF’s grantmaking, including both the overall lack of frontline representation among its grantees and the overlap of grant recipients between