A development agenda, the donor dollar and voluntary failure

Abstract

This paper examines the success and failure of a once pre-eminent New Zealand charity – the Council of Organisations for Relief Service Overseas (CORSO). Delivering aid for government was a factor in its success in its early years, as was its broad membership base. Voluntary failure occurred when CORSO lost government support. It also lost donor support when international charities established a competitive donor ‘market’. Its supporters’ unwillingness to ‘buy-in’ to its mission change to focus on local poverty was another factor in its collapse. This case study employs a framework which extends Salamon's (1987) to consider the influence of competition on voluntary failure.

Keywords:

• voluntary failure
• charitable organisations
• CORSO
• development history

Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful for the advice of Peter Kitchenman during his time at Victoria University, Wellington; feedback from participants at the Asia-Pacific Economic and Business History Conference, at Queensland in February 2006 and the Financial Reporting and Business Communication Conference, Cardiff, July 2007. We also appreciate the very beneficial comments of joint-editor J.R. Edwards, Professor Sue Newberry and the anonymous reviewer.

Notes

CORSO's financial statements as early as 1962 included detailed expenditure, and included depreciation.

When considering philanthropy in the New Zealand context, it may be instructive to consider the ‘social democratic consensus’ that formed New Zealand's social policy from 1935 to 1966. Armstrong (1994) notes that the ensuing state intervention through social welfare was very paternalistic, targeting the ‘deserving poor’. With this in mind, it is available to interpret the ‘emergency aid only’ as a response to adverse exigent circumstances, where development, on a puritanical view, implies a fundamental failing on the part of recipients under normal conditions. Tentatively, this may offer some explanation for New Zealand's reluctance to embrace the evolving international appreciation of the need for development.

The Harawira name and its links with Māori activism are well-known in the local community; and it was principally through Harawira that CORSO became more involved in Māori activism.

These were detailed in the Statement of Source and Application of Funds and Schedule of Cash Grants – reporting formats CORSO used from 1980 onwards.