Social movements are grappling with a deepening crisis — one measured not only in lost funding, but in the collective emotional toll of watching philanthropy quietly walk back promises to Black and brown communities. Much of this retreat stems from a chilling effect across the philanthropic sector, as foundations and funders grow increasingly fearful of political backlash and legal challenges targeting DEI-focused grantmaking and other initiatives.
As Susan Taylor Batten, CEO of the Association of Black Foundation Executives (ABFE) states in an important study released by ABFE and Candide, “This retrenchment is not just a sector challenge; it is a profound moral crisis. Funders must step up with sustained, values-driven support that respects these organizations’ identities instead of forcing them to hide or water down who they are.”
Luckily, there are still foundations and donors who refuse to abandon their commitments to communities they serve. They are meeting this moment with courage and determination to find alternative ways to provide stability and bring more resources to advance equity and justice.
Women’s Foundation California (WFC) is a statewide, power-building public foundation, originally founded in 1979 by a group of women activists and community organizers who faced challenges in funding feminist organizations. Today, WFC focuses on building a feminist future where everyone can flourish in health, safety, and prosperity. Through their grantmaking and programmatic work, WFC amplifies the voices and experiences of community leaders, redistributes knowledge, power, and resources, and mobilizes communities and funders to advance justice for all.
As the foundation moved forward with carrying out its Theory of the Future, the staff, board members, and supporters wanted to reexamine how the foundation thought about its capital holistically: grantmaking dollars, programmatic funds, and short-term and long-term investment funds. Their vision was to steward and activate all WFC’s capital resources in alignment with feminist movements to advance racial, gender, economic and environmental justice.
WFC’s journey is a testament to a growing movement of financial activism in this country and across the globe. While the state of affairs in today’s society is urgent and hard to ignore, more individuals, donors, and activists are seeking alternatives to status quo capitalism. Several WFC staff members participated in fellowships with Just Economy Institute (JEI), an organization that connects, supports, and educates financial activists who are shifting the flow of capital and power to solve social and environmental problems. (Natural Investments advisors Kate Poole and Tiffany Brown
of Chordata Capital are also past fellows of JEI.) Other funders whom the foundation partnered with in its grantmaking have also revamped their
investment strategies to invest in alignment with their mission.
WFC board and staff worked closely with Natural Investments to produce a new Investment Policy Statement that better articulates the foundation’s desire to reframe the relationship between the foundation and its investees as a mutual partnership, not a one-sided power dynamic. The new statement states explicitly that the foundation is moving beyond traditional investing, which prioritizes financial returns for wealthy investors, toward investments that build community wealth and economic power by and for working class women and gender-expansive communities of color—as well as creating long-term resilience in communities historically harmed by extraction and exclusion, exploitation, and theft.
Another example of financial activism is The Liberated Futures Fund (LFF). The Liberated Futures Fund was created by a Natural Investments client whose family had significant resources sitting in a donor advised fund that were not being spent down. The client worked with advisors at Natural Investments and Full Spectrum Advisors to create a philanthropic strategy that includes multi-year grants and reparative lending to organizations across four thematic pillars — community ownership infrastructure, BIPOC self-determination, gender justice, and ecological stewardship.
The Liberated Futures Fund centers on matriarchal leadership and community wealth building as the primary levers to pivot local and global economies toward a post-capitalist future. It prioritizes channeling patient, flexible capital into a portfolio of visionary organizations working at the intersection of housing, energy, climate, food, health, gender, and economic justice. Although only in its early stage of implementation, the fund is already demonstrating that flexible capital changes the operating posture of organizations. It has helped organizations like RUNWAY stay steady through a sudden funding crisis. Orchid Capital Collective responded to a birth center’s emergency within days. People’s Solar Energy Fund was able to recalibrate when federal resources disappeared. Reimagine Freedom used LFF support to build the legal and governance scaffolding that will
sustain an ecosystem for years to come. They are showing that non-extractive loan capital is proven and ready to scale, that community-led networks
outperform, and democratic governance creates resilience.
The Women’s Foundation of California and the Liberated Futures Fund have demonstrated how to anchor communities in the midst of unsettling change. They offer examples of how to steward capital in a way that grows power, and how communities can make meaningful progress when they have patient, flexible resources behind them. WFC hopes that more peer institutions will activate their capital to move in a similar direction. If you are interested in reviewing WFC’s new Investment Policy Statement or co-investing with WFC or the Liberated Futures Fund, please reach out to us and we will help connect you!