Civil Society Research Project
The Funding Practice Alliance (FPA), under the auspices of Inyathelo: The South African Institute for Advancement, commissioned a Research Study on Civil Society in South Africa to understand how the civil society sector is resourced and to legitimate the sector as a crucial agent in the South African economy. The research objectives were to: determine where funding to civil society comes from (i.e. funding source); determine where this funding goes to in terms of issue/sector and geography; quantify how much the civil society sector contributes to employment (remunerated employment) as well as to training new graduates (non-remunerated employment/voluntary work); and quantify how much the civil society sector contributes to the South African economy.
A sector scoping exercise and desktop review was conducted to provide an in-depth analysis of the civil society sector and also included the development of three country case studies (Brazil; India; and Kenya) highlighting the impact of vibrant civil society. These countries were selected on the grounds that: each has a large and well-established civil society sector; and, each shares some economic, social and political similarities with South Africa. A list of key stakeholders was drawn from across the various sectors within civil society, covering CEO’s and COO’s of philanthropic organisations, academics, sector experts and government donors and departments working on civil society issues. Key variables employed for the selection and stratification of the research sample were: organisational type; geographic location; and sector focus. The sample frame was based on the Department of Social Development’s (DSD) database of 133,879 registered Non-Profit Organisations (NPOs). This resulted in 500 CSOs being interviewed and 9 focus groups being conducted across the nine provinces.
