| Abstract: | Increasingly, women are emerging as major donors in their own right. For example in May 1998, five women with Harvard ties, in partnership with the University, established a $15m matching fund to encourage other women to make significant gifts to the University. There are three major economic reasons for targeting women seriously for an organisation's fundraising efforts: women have increasing economic power; women outlive men; women have a new awareness of the power of the dollars they control. Research done in both the United States (Martha Taylor and Sandra Shaw) and the United Kingdom (Stephen Pidgeon and Pauline Lockier) demonstrates that women and men have different ‘philanthropic triggers’. Many women have tended to contribute significant volunteer time and service to the institutions about which they care rather than significant gifts of money. Often, women are interested in not only how their gift benefits a specific institution, but also how it benefits society in general. Women often rely not on formal relationships with institutions, but on their perceived value of the institution's goals and impact. This paper provides a context for looking at women as donors. |
