Who We Are

We are a community of almost 500 donors, foundation officers, trustees and advisors in more than 40 countries, passionately engaged in local, national and international grantmaking within 130 diverse institutions with differing priorities and strategies, but a shared belief that equity and justice are critical to furthering sustainable, global well-being.

Membership is based on support for our mission and values, and is open to grantmaking foundations and programs as well as to individual major donors and staff, trustees and advisors with philanthropic and other institutions, whose purpose is to provide funds to promote the public good.

Our community funds greater equity and sustainable practice today, while exploring and supporting strategies that address systemic challenges and contribute to transformational change over the long term.

Our Mission

EDGE Funders Alliance supports the broader global movement to dismantle extractive funding systems while working to align resources with the priorities and visions of social movements to drive systemic change and justice.

We do this by organizing and implementing spaces for learning and facilitating action that create systemic change within the philanthropy community.

  1. ORGANIZE FUNDERS globally to foster trust and collaborate with each other, so that they can disrupt the power dynamics inherent in philanthropy and create new systemic and anti-extractive funding practices.
  2. IMPLEMENT SPACES for learning and taking actions by highlighting the voices, visions, and priorities of movement leaders and move towards the goal of systemic change.

In order to pursue our mission, we:

  • FACILITATE SYSTEMIC SHIFTS

    • Hold spaces to support collective sensemaking & develop strategies among EDGE members
    • Create spaces for exchange among funders and for peer to peer learning
    • Focus on concrete action and ways to implement practices working concretely towards the dismantling of extractive grantmaking practice and developing the alternatives

  • CENTERING SOCIAL JUSTICE MOVEMENTS′ VISION AND PRIORITIES

    • Influencing funding priorities and moving resources to systemic alternatives
    • Advocating for systemic change philanthropy in traditional funder spaces
    • Creating meaningful relationship with movement networks to center their priorities and create bridges with the philanthropic sector

  • INFLUENCING THE ECOSYSTEM OF PHILANTHROPY

    • Creating and disseminating knowledge building resources on radical philanthropic practices
    • Expanding membership to include different actors in philanthropy both geographically as well as different kind of institutions
    • Advocating strategically across partners within the ecosystem to shift resources and change philanthropic practices

Why EDGE?