NOVEMBER 18, 2022 – A statement from Laura García, Global Greengrants Fund CEO & President, reflecting on our recent gift from MacKenzie Scott.
Dear Global Greengrants Fund community,
For 30 years, Greengrants has built a community of grantmaking advisors from 77 countries, staff teams, and organizational and donor partners, all in support of grassroots environmental justice movements. The strength and diversity of our community is what allows us today to use transformational gifts such as this one to continue expanding our capacity to support frontline groups.
We are very glad that Mackenzie Scott is on a philanthropic path that moves away from the prevailing approaches of restricted, controlled, and risk-averse giving. The flexibility and trust that she is modeling is in perfect alignment with our decentralized grantmaking model, which enables Greengrants to meet grassroots environmental justice movements where they are. We know that grassroots movements lead the most effective and lasting solutions to the climate, human rights, and social justice crises. Trust-based philanthropy is a celebration of community solidarity where these solutions can finally have the place they deserve in philanthropy.
On the other hand, as a fund committed to the democratization of resources for frontline communities globally, Greengrants urges philanthropy and MacKenzie Scott to also pay attention to the equally important principles of accountability, accessibility, and transparency in their resourcing work. Activist Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson said: “Fund us like you want us to win.” This is a good reminder that no lasting change will be possible if grassroots movements, particularly those based in the Global South and led by Indigenous Peoples, women and girls, youth, and disability rights activists, continue to be grossly underrepresented and under-resourced in philanthropy.
The continued inequality in access to resources is a key contributor to our current climate crisis, and philanthropy is structurally embedded in this system. While this is an important political contradiction that we must continue to address, Greengrants also acknowledges the value of transforming that wealth into resources that nourish the brilliance of grassroots movements. In her announcement this week, Scott mentions that funds help spread funding to a more vast and diverse community. We agree, and we hope to see many more funds, particularly those based in the Global South, as beneficiaries of this type of philanthropic giving. Funds play an incredibly valuable role in the philanthropic ecosystem because of their ability to accompany movements, redistribute giving, and shift the structural inequalities that keep philanthropy in a place that reinforces colonialist structures.
Greengrants funds approximately 1,000 grassroots organizations annually in their efforts to protect the planet and the rights of people. Moreover, we know that if we continue to be trusted and supported by donors, Greengrants and its community of allied grassroots funders can contribute to even more, because more is needed. We see this gift as a step towards a transformation where many other funders and institutions commit to more unrestricted, long-term funding, while we also commit to continuing to expand a representational, diverse, and decentralized network of grassroots giving to environmental justice.
This gift is a tribute to our community of advisors, grantee partners, long-term donors, staff, board, and allies who are the daily oxygen to our heart. Thank you for making this dream possible.
In solidarity,
Laura García
President & CEO, Global Greengrants Fund