Reviewed by Robert Huberty, CRC Research Director I benefited by initially reading the very last page of Paul Light's concise report on reforming the management of nonprofits. Light observes that nonprofits are now obsessed with improving their management skills because they feel intense pressures to compete. For-profits poach on their turf, offering social services and education.
Governments privatize and contract-out the provision of services to the lowest bidder.
And nonprofits themselves seek out commercial opportunities to pull in extra cash. These days they sell everything from auto insurance to research patents. The upshot is that nonprofits face a self-imposed crisis of legitimacy. Americans are committed to voluntarism and charity, but nonprofit leaders believe they don't understand what nonprofits have become or want to be. But in the meantime, universities, hospitals, and church groups strike business deals, negotiate government contracts, and purchase political influence.