Topic: Race
Funding a Social Movement: The Ford Foundation and Civil Rights, 1965-1970
A story recounting many accusations, from rigged elections to the meddling of big private money in grassroots organizing.
New Research: Black Conservatives, Climate Policy, African Universities, and Aid to Intellectuals
Research reports drawing on several Rockefeller Archive Center collections span continents, disciplines, and eras.
Black Education and Rockefeller Philanthropy from the Jim Crow South to the Civil Rights Era
Applying a vast fortune to the American race problem, but with decades of false assumptions and well-intended approaches that fell short.
In Brief: The South African Institute of Race Relations
How did a US foundation manage to work under apartheid?
Who Belongs in the Boy Scouts? Philanthropy’s Support for Black Scouting
How a new foundation helped one of America’s oldest youth organizations become more racially inclusive.
In Brief: James Baldwin’s Creative Writer’s Fellowship
How a foundation provided the final ingredient to an era-defining novel.
Ted Watkins and the Rockefeller Foundation: An Unlikely Partnership
How a charismatic community activist from Watts challenged a foundation’s civil rights strategy through a jobs training program.
Photo Essay: Supporting Minority Enterprise in the late 1960s
In 1968, the Ford Foundation began to make social investments using a new tool borrowed from the for-profit world, the Program-Related Investment.
The Origins of the Rockefeller Foundation Equal Opportunity Program
How a simple grant request seeded the launch of a full program addressing inequality.
Can Data Drive Social Change? Tackling School Segregation with Numbers
In the years before Brown v. Board, a philanthropic fund hoped research and data would turn the tide on attitudes toward segregation.