Non-Profit Skills for Social Justice

Catalog description

This course explores the practices, strategies, and tactics in which nonprofit organizations and social movements engage to create and sustain social justice efforts in varied, diverse communities. Students will study the function of nonprofit governance, philanthropy and fundraising, marketing and the role of social media messaging, strategic planning and volunteer recruitment in the practice and professionalization of social justice efforts. Based on critical feminist studies of nonprofits, students will consider how socio-cultural, economic, and political structures of power intersect with notions of ‘doing good’ in public life. Topics will include: nonprofit industrial complex; institutional racism and nonprofits; the white savior complex in fundraising and philanthropy; BIPOC organizations and leadership; feminist politics in the nonprofit world; decolonizing wealth; gender and global development; representational politics and voice; forms of organized resistance; and building transformative visions of justice, among others. This class counts for the Nonprofit Studies undergraduate minor and will prepare students for advanced courses in WS, PJS, and other disciplines including graduate work in the Public Administration program. All references to pre-professional skills are approached from feminist, anti-racist, and decolonial perspectives, and will not include nonprofit management.