Theory and Concepts of the Nonprofit Sector I

Catalog description

Theory and Concepts of the Nonprofit Sector Part I: including theories of the nonprofit sector, history of the sector, key concepts, and sub-sectors The first semester presents the general characteristics of the nonprofit sector, a description of the sub-sectors or industries within the sector, theories of why nonprofit organizations are created related to the general characteristics of different societies and theories of market and government failures, its history before the Twentieth Century including religious and moral foundations and its relationship to early social service organizations, its history in the Twentieth Century including its relationship to tax law and the way the War on Poverty stimulated an explosion in the number of nonprofits, the concept of civil society, concepts of the ways nonprofit organizations relate to government policy making (the idea of political pluralism), relationships of nonprofit organizations to communities, how nonprofits are created and how they evolve as organizations, how nonprofits relate to social justice values and how social movement organizations are similar and different from formally structured nonprofits, how nonprofits vary internationally including ways international NGOs differ from U.S. nonprofits and ways the UN defines and relates to nonprofits within its system. Throughout the semester, there will be a discussion of what it means to theorize, how one can identify and critique the theoretical elements of research papers, and what different types or kinds of theories are used for different research purposes. Students will be asked to write several short (5 pp.) theoretical critiques of research papers related to the topical areas covered in the course. The purpose of these assignments is for students to examine how theories are presented in papers, how the theories relate to and motivate empirical data in the…