A Paradigm Shift in Third Sector Theory and Practice

Abstract

For the past quarter-century, the field of voluntary action/nonprofit organization/third sector research has been dominated by a paradigm that focuses on organizations certified as tax exempt by the IRS and subject to an inability to distribute economic assets. This definition has facilitated large-scale empirical research but has dropped from visibility a wide range of important community-based voluntary and nonprofit organizations, including in the United States some 9 million grassroots organizations and a wide range of cooperative and mutual benefit organizations. In recent years, a critical literature has developed that challenges this dominant conception. This perspective has taken form under the leadership of the EMES European Research Network and employs a more expansive conception of the third sector than does the conventional American view. That conception is explored and refined in this article, the argument being that the value of the third sector far exceeds the contributions of tax-certified nonprofit organizations.