Community-based initiatives (CBIs) are groups of citizens operating as a community in order to provide public goods or services. CBIs can contribute to social change to tackle persistent challenges, but this depends on their encounters with the state. We argue that CBI scholarship lacks the conceptual tools to capture the full scope of these encounters. We position CBIs beyond a public service context as part of a democratic and contested public sphere. From this, we propose a relational understanding of state–CBI encounters as dynamically made up of diverse relationalities, drawing on state–society scholarship from multiple disciplines. Through an integrative literature review, we develop a two-step heuristic that distinguishes between functional, transformational, confrontational, and cohabitative encounters and identifies possibilities for shifts in the encounter. The heuristic aids both scholars and practitioners in understanding state–CBI encounters in relation to change and in navigating encounters in the pursuit of public goals. We conclude with a research agenda for further understanding state–CBI encounters.

Scholarship on volunteering often highlights transformations in civic engagement and their implications for democracy and social cohesion. This article examines one influential perspective—the discourse of change in volunteering—emphasizing declining participation, shifts in organizational preferences, and changing forms of engagement. We critically review this discourse with attention to the Scandinavian context and compare its claims with empirical evidence on formal volunteering in Sweden from 1992 to 2024. Drawing on cross-sectional survey data, we analyze trends in the scope, structure, forms, and values of volunteering. Contrary to narratives of decline or radical transformation, our findings indicate relative stability. To interpret these findings, we apply the theoretical perspective of the “reversed social engine” and argue that resilience offers a valuable yet underexplored lens for understanding civil society. This perspective shifts attention from change to stability as a phenomenon warranting further study.

Crises intensify and affect the work of civil society organizations (CSOs). This paper looks at three moments of crises—austerity and budget cuts, right-wing surge, and the war in the Middle East—and analyzes their impact on CSOs working in the field of anti-discrimination and diversity promotion in Germany. Situating the study within debates on shrinking civic space and the concept of “post-migrant alliances,” the paper demonstrates that multiple crises create a spectrum and complexity of restrictions and reactions. Based on data on 74 CSOs from a longitudinal mixed-methods design carried out between 2020 and 2024, we show that the crises amplify each other. Restrictions are caused by both state- and non-state actors, occur directly as well as indirectly, and latently. The CSO responses range from paralysis to internal coping strategies and the formation of new alliances. The study contributes empirical evidence on shrinking and changing civic space in Western democratic countries. It offers insights into the contested character of post-migrant society, where actors in favor of a pluralist society face growing challenges in a situation where diversity is increasingly challenged.

Faith groups played an important role in initiating and sustaining the movement against Japanese military sexual slavery in Korea. However, individual activists’ experiences related to the connection between their faith and activism have not been extensively discussed, particularly in a transnational context. Given the transnational nature of the issue and the movement, this article explores the role of faith in meaning-making practices through activism, drawing on public narratives of survivor-activists from Korea and Australia and interviews with Korean migrant activists. It identifies the influences of faith on the perceptions and experiences of gender-based violence and related activism, as understood by those engaged in “comfort women” activism. Despite the different focuses and practice contexts of each faith, research participants link their understanding of and response to gender-based violence with religious and spiritual teaching, particularly with human dignity as a common thread. While faith—particularly Christian faith—is widely suggested to be aligned with values such as human rights and social justice, this research also identifies tensions between religious and activist identities, as well as between spiritual teachings and approaches to social change. The potential misalignment in faith and activism, along with the influence of transnational contexts in migrant activism, warrants further investigation.

Food banks (FBs) are perceived as important nonprofit actors in tackling both hunger and food waste, yet their organizational model remains questioned in multiple ways. While digitalization and platformization offer new organizational possibilities, proper analyses of such initiatives over food waste recovery remain marginal. This research analyzes how the current drive toward digitalization in the food waste orbit can address some of its organizational shortcomings that appear as related to a deficit in its pragmatic legitimacy. To address this gap, the paper i) identifies the current institutional and organizational pressures that FBs face; ii) analyzes how digital transformation can address some of these limitations; iii) introduces a sample of digital platforms that seek to overcome the identified deficits through processes of digitalization; and, finally, iv) presents a set of insights for upgrading the organizational model of FBs through digitalization. Our contribution invites a reappraisal of legitimation strategies that prioritize pragmatic legitimacy concerns, particularly in a context where FBs—whether by design or default—are likely to remain indispensable institutional actors for the foreseeable future.

This article makes an original contribution to the study of philanthropy by applying an adaptation of Nancy Fraser’s theoretical framework of social justice to a case study. Fraser’s framework encompasses three dimensions: redistribution, representation and recognition. Drawing on an in-depth case study of a Quebec foundation active since 1990, we demonstrate how these dimensions are hierarchically structured and articulated differently across historical periods, actor profiles and social and political contexts. By identifying three successive configurations—each primarily focusing on redistribution (1990–2000), representation (2001–2021) and recognition (2022–2025)—the article highlights the internal tensions, blind spots and normative evolutions within the philanthropic sector. Our main theoretical contribution is to shed light on how philanthropic practices can integrate and support a vision of social justice, both internally, through the foundation’s operations and team composition, and externally, through its donations, financial investments and public statements. Rather than treating social justice as an abstract ideal, we show how it materializes in governance, funding, relationships and public discourse. This comprehensive framework offers valuable insights for analyzing and supporting foundations seeking to pursue critical emancipation and empowerment.

Changing civil society dynamics are often interpreted as the state’s encroachment upon an autonomous sphere of democratic activity, presumed to be respected by liberal democratic regimes but violated by illiberal ones. The paper argues that such a normative autonomy/encroachment framework overlooks how illiberal civil society configurations are actively shaped by conflicts and structures carried over from liberal regimes. Through a systematic comparison of organization–state relationships across liberal and illiberal periods, using the case of a Hungarian conservative civic organization, the National Association of Large Families, the study uncovers underlying patterns of illiberal civil society. Adopting a longitudinal and historically informed perspective that foregrounds the agency of actors aligned with the illiberal regime, this study develops a typology of changing state–civil society interactions. The analysis demonstrates how Central and Eastern Europe’s distinctive historical experience—marked by the transition from state socialism to liberal democracy, intertwined with neoliberal globalization—continues to shape the strategies of civic actors under illiberal rule, offering insights of global relevance for civil society studies and civic organizations seeking to counter illiberal regimes.

Volunteering, essential to sustaining many social and sporting enterprises, has declined in recent years. Understanding how to cultivate and sustain volunteer labor is critical to ensure their survival and for individuals and wider society to benefit from the positive effects of volunteering. parkrun is a free, weekly, timed 5 km walk/run held in public spaces, which has disseminated widely (operating in 23 countries) and sustained itself over a 20-year period despite being largely reliant on volunteers for its operations. As such, parkrun can offer insights into how to attract and retain a large volunteer workforce. There are over 500 parkrun locations in Australia run by local volunteer teams, supported by a network of volunteer “ambassadors” and a relatively small number of paid employees. Our qualitative study examines whether and why individuals occupying volunteer roles central to event coordination and organizational delivery identify with the organization, and how parkrun cultivates and benefits from identification. We conducted semi-structured interviews with 67 parkrun Australia employees and volunteers who coordinate events. We deductively analyzed interview data against key theoretical concepts of organizational identification. Our findings show a dynamic layering process of identification with local event collectives and the broader parkrun movement, highlighting the organizational benefits of being community-led. parkrun intentionally perpetuates its identity, which volunteers internalize, defend, and enact, drawing in a labor force to sustain the organization. Our findings can inform volunteer initiation and retention strategies for parkrun and other volunteer organizations.

Foundations operate within external influences, requiring contextual factors to comprehensively assess their financial health. Our study investigates how political and economic environments—represented by political connections, accreditation evaluations, and the city of establishment—affect foundations’ financial health, measured by equity adequacy, operating margin, revenue diversification, and administrative cost ratio. We hypothesize that government connections enhance financial health by providing funding stability and regulatory legitimacy. These connections confer legitimacy, reflected in accreditation evaluations, which enhance public trust and attract diverse financial support. Thus, we propose that foundations with higher accreditation evaluations demonstrate stronger financial health. We further expect foundations in economically developed cities to exhibit stronger financial health due to more vibrant markets and networks. We use data on Chinese foundations, a legally defined category of nonprofits in China, alongside social associations (社会团体) and social service organizations (社会服务机构), and comparable to charitable nonprofits in the United States. Our findings reveal that politically connected foundations exhibit stronger equity adequacy, higher operating margins, and greater revenue diversification. Foundations with better accreditation evaluations show greater revenue diversification but weaker net asset accumulation. Foundations in developed cities report lower net asset accumulation and higher administrative costs. These results underscore that financial health cannot be fully understood through financial metrics alone; external political and economic environments provide essential context. Foundations should strategically align their financial and charitable activities with their external environments to achieve sustainable financial health.

Third sector organizations (TSOs) increasingly operate in culturally diverse and politically unequal contexts in which global welfare models intersect with local traditions, knowledge systems, and institutional frameworks. This article develops a postcolonial approach to analyzing these dynamics by conceptualizing TSOs as “Third Spaces” in the sense of Homi K. Bhabha. It brings postcolonial theory into dialogue with approaches to organizational hybridity and argues that TSOs can be understood as hybrid contexts in which cultural, organizational, and political-economic dynamics intersect. Drawing on interdisciplinary literature and illustrative examples from Latin America, Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Europe, the article demonstrates how TSOs mediate between local knowledge and global governance structures, negotiate competing accountability regimes, and produce forms of cultural translation shaped by unequal power relations. The framework contributes to third sector research and highlights practical implications for context-sensitive and culturally grounded social welfare.

Voluntary organizations as well as churches rely heavily on Christian volunteers, yet research on their motivation delivers conflicting answers and limited guidance. This paper applies a comprehensive (2,485 records screened) scoping review-based approach mapping 79 empirical studies (1989–2026) on Christian volunteer motivation across church and civil society projects. Using the UN Volunteers 2020 framework, we analyze (i) study designs, theoretical lenses, instruments, (ii) volunteer populations, and (iii) project settings. We identify three structural barriers to cumulative knowledge: heterogeneous and often implicit motivation concepts; an instrument–phenomenon mismatch that sidelines religious motives (notably through uncritical reliance on the Volunteer Functions Inventory); and systematic underreporting of key participant and context variables. These gaps account for much of the contradictory evidence and restrict its practical use. We outline concrete reporting and measurement standards to integrate religious motives into mainstream volunteering research and to improve evidence-informed management of Christian volunteers.

It is undeniable that nongovernmental organization (NGO) beneficiaries should have their interests protected, especially when investing in and borrowing from a microfinance provider. Yet, prior literature highlights the patchy nature of beneficiary accountability when NGOs prioritize funders’ and donors’ accountability and commercialization. In this longitudinal case study on a large development microfinance NGO, multi-actor collaboration between donors, funders, and regulators to impose accountability requirements helps protect the interests of NGO beneficiaries. New institutional rules and accountability norms were developed to create dialogs between NGOs and their beneficiaries. Coercive mechanisms were established to sanction situations where beneficiary interests were not upheld in a type of surrogate accountability. Our longitudinal study integrates institutional theory and the stakeholder collaboration concept to show how donors and funders can work with government regulators to increase their effectiveness and protect beneficiaries. However, cultural issues limit full surrogate accountability.

Although donating to private charitable organizations has been studied extensively, donating to local governments remains little examined. We advance this literature by applying Bekkers and Wiepking’s prominent theoretical framework of charitable giving drivers. Using nationally representative data from about 9,000 Vietnamese citizens, we test the relevance of some of these drivers in explaining the willingness to donate to local governments for road improvements. Our results largely corroborate previous findings about the roles of awareness of need (perceived issue importance), costs (the requested donation amount), and efficacy (trust in government). We also find support for the roles of altruism (the desire to help fellow citizens) and solicitation (the government’s ask)––two drivers whose application to local government donations was unexplored. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.