Glimpses of Civil Society's Evolution: Insights from the dark and shadowy place of civil society’s closures and other endings
Three patterns of closure - "ending hotspots" - that offer valuable insights into the complexities of organisational sustainability and impact, and the need for adequately designed and funded endings.
As The Decelerator marks its six-month milestone, we’ve been reflecting on how our journey into the all-too-often dark and shadowy realm of civil society's endings offers a window into some profound micro and macro shifts. From founders grappling with succession planning to trustees strategising wind-down approaches, the 50+ conversations we’ve had on our Decelerator Hotline since September paint a vivid picture of civil society's trajectories. We are getting glimpses of the precariousness of organisations’ individual contexts and challenges (more about these in our previous post here) as well as the broader patterns and opportunities shaping the sector at this time of mounting polycrisis (aka the quagmire of intersecting economic, social, cultural, political and environmental pressures).
In our monthly team reflection conversations we’ve returned time and again to three patterns of closure - "ending hotspots" - that offer valuable insights into the complexities of organisational sustainability and impact. These hotspots also reveal the pressing need to build the confidence and capacity of leaders, trustees, funders and all stakeholders to know when to let go and steward a good ending to unlock legacy, maximise learning and reckon with what is being lost or left behind.
Hotspot 1: What if we’re not just witnessing short term financial pain, but an existential breakdown of nonprofit business models?
First, wherever you look in civil society right now, there is talk of funding crises. But there is lots more going on than ever really makes the headlines. One area we hear people talk about on the hotline is the existential challenge posed by the decoupling of government funding for commissioned services, and nonprofit business models reliant on this source of funding for their survival. As government funding becomes even more scarce, questions arise about the purpose and sustainability of the organisations and sectors who have become deeply entwined in the business models of outsourced government service delivery. This is even more pressing in a context where there is unlikely to be any medium or long term turnaround in government funding fortunes, and local authorities are rumoured to be close to hitting the buffers (aka section 114) up and down the country. And where does this leave philanthropy organisations whose commitment is often to leave clear blue water between government funding and their own?
Children England’s Kathy Evans raised these and many more questions as that organisation came to the end of its 80 year journey at the end of last year. This theme is not new to the sector, but with no possibility of funding from any future government on the other side of an election whenever it happens this year, could the wheels be coming off thousands of organisations and more broadly a significant civil society-wide business model once and for all? If so, committing to closing organisations in ways that distribute learning and seed alternative models for the future isn’t just important, it’s essential.
Hotspot 2: What if specific sectors or issues are seemingly not fundable or workable in the short term, but their loss (both planned and unplanned) will cook up more complex problems for all our futures?
Secondly, national organisations tackling issues of loneliness and social isolation seem to be an example of an issue-specific sector facing significant challenges. Despite the heightened awareness of the profound role of loneliness on our personal and public health brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic, organisations for whom loneliness or social connection is a key focus are struggling for attention and resources. In the final quarter of 2023, The Cares Family, The Campaign to End Loneliness, the What Works Centre for Wellbeing, not to mention countless local organisations (eg. Care Home Volunteers), all closed their doors. Perhaps these changes are a result of cost-saving decisions as funders seek to meet demands for funding for issues which are perceived to be more urgent or important? There have been echoes of these themes rippling through the arts and culture sector for years now, and possibly reaching an existential crescendo. Of course there are also questions to be asked about whether organisations in the lean, relatively emergent loneliness sector have had the quality of core investment and leadership needed to grow deep roots and tall branches. But whatever you think the reasons might be, there’s no hope in hell of real lessons being learnt when organisations like The Cares Family disappear overnight in a puff of insolvency smoke leaving no opportunity for collective understanding, reflection and processing.
Hotspot 3: What can infrastructure organisation closures teach us about the future of collaboration and collective action?
Thirdly, infrastructure organisations of all shapes and sizes - from Children England to the Cornwall Museums Partnership to the House of St Barnabas - are all victims of the long-talked-of ‘infrastructure doesn’t seem to work anymore’ pattern. The traditional infrastructure model has long been critiqued: membership fees don’t generate enough income to cover the needs, funders prioritise frontline work over infrastructure and digital technology seems to compete with more manual approaches to networking and broadcast communications. All of this has led to an almost continual calling into question of the relevance and adaptability of traditional approaches to infrastructure. In a resource-scarce landscape at a time of mounting and complex needs in all sorts of corners of civil society, the role of infrastructure in catalysing collective action and collaboration has never been more important. Now is the time to ensure that infrastructure organisations who are forced to close do so with enough time and funding to share their learning, find new homes for vital assets and convene sectors to ask ‘where next for infrastructure from here?’
So what…
There are plenty of places where these (and many other) arguments are being rehearsed in order to make the case that issues, organisations or sectors need to be urgently “saved” or “rescued” to avoid their untimely demise. At The Decelerator we think there’s another layer to the argument that’s all too rarely considered. We see endings as an inevitable part of organisational life cycles. Sometimes tragic, sometimes timely, often chaotic, but always rich with opportunities for learning and legacy. Moments when it falls on all who are involved or affected to ask: “what needs to be taken forward, and what should be left behind?”
Of course there are cases where organisations need to be supported to weather short term shocks - we are glad to hear from these sorts of organisations regularly on the Decelerator Hotline. But we also see how when an ending is needed, good endings enable assets to be re-homed on where they can be, beneficiaries to be supported through the loss, and learnings to be generated to inform future practice. Bad endings with little time and money do the opposite of all these things. By dedicating time, money and care to design organisational endings, opportunities open up to ask direct and honest questions about the causes and effects of these endings - not to attribute blame - but so that we all stand a chance at navigating more effectively towards an impactful transformation in the years and decades ahead.
It’s only through supporting leaders to do endings better, boards to steward them more confidently, funders funding their true potential and the regulator enabling them as a force for positive transformation, that civil society will come through and beyond the coming upheavals strong, resilient and impactful.
That said, The Decelerator isn’t offering a panacea or miracle cure. We are living through times that call us to face up to what is being lost that can’t be rehoused, distributed or passed on. Community assets, physical spaces, networks, service capacity, learnt wisdom, lived wisdom and much more. To quote Kathy Evans: ‘some of what we currently know to be civil society was built at a time when the world was different’. Funding was different, the opportunities were different, the needs were different, perhaps even we were different. For good and for bad. Our work is rooted in the hunch that we’re in a time of great change and loss, not just short term glitches. We regularly witness the loss of an organisation, a service or a project that has been relied on and that isn’t being adequately replaced or re-homed. Alongside The Decelerator’s practical work is the acknowledgement that it is crucial to honour these losses and support those involved to navigate them as best they can, however unimaginable they might seem. In these times we aim to accompany organisations through a process of hospicing, much like a palliative care nurse tends to their patient: with humanity, care and respect.
Got you thinking?
If you are a civil society organisation and reading this has made you wonder if an ending could be on your cards and don’t know where to start - The Decelerator Hotline is available for people just like you.
