Abstract
Philanthropy plays an important but often invisible role in conserving rivers. We examine the influence of philanthropy on collective action and collaborative governance within the Colorado River Basin, a region where philanthropic support has been growing to achieve conservation objectives. Our short communication combines financial data, interviews, and documentary evidence to capture the opportunities and risks associated with philanthropy's increasing role. Financial expenditures are substantial, averaging $30.8 million USD per year from six large foundations (2013-2019). This funding has enabled collective action, particularly at the basin level, by strengthening or creating new forums for collaboration and investing in technical expertise to equip a broader range of voices in decision-making. It has also favoured market-based strategies and discourses, created dependencies for smaller organisations, and, in some instances, reinforced structural barriers to participation. We recommend transparent reporting of philanthropic spending related to collective action and conservation governance, and argue that foundations should explicitly consider and address legacies of exclusion for marginalised actors and groups.
Highlights
Philanthropy has a growing profile in conservation governance with multiple channels of influence that affect conservation priorities, public discourse, and policy choices (Farley 2018; Holmes 2012)
Philanthropy is providing funds to facilitate collective action by building the capacity of key actors to engage in basin-level processes
Four of the analysed foundations are associated with the Water Funder Initiative (WFI) (WFF, Bechtel Foundation, Hewlett Foundation, and Pisces Foundation)
Summary
Philanthropy has a growing profile in conservation governance with multiple channels of influence that affect conservation priorities, public discourse, and policy choices (Farley 2018; Holmes 2012). Climate change, and structural imbalances between supply and demand, “conflict has given way to collaboration as the strategy of choice in addressing water issues” (Karambelkar and Gerlak 2020: 1) In this period of unprecedented collaboration (Gerlak et al 2013; Fleck 2016), the CRB has become a test bed for experiments in collaborative governance and benefit sharing (Koebele 2020). These trends respond to system-wide, large-scale collective action challenges associated with upstream-downstream and inter-sectoral competition that require cooperation and conflict resolution at the basin level (Garrick 2015)
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