Different types of nonprofit organizations including human service nonprofits like homeless shelters, public broadcasting organizations, and the like thrive on donations. Effective fundraising techniques are essential to a nonprofit’s existence. This research study explored a revised theory of planned behavior to include guilt and convenience in order to understand whether these factors are important in donors’ intentions to give. This study also examined the impact of two different kinds of guilt; anticipated guilt and existential guilt to determine if there was any difference between the types of guilt and the roles that they play as predicting factors in a revised TPB model. This study also explored how human service nonprofits and public broadcasting organizations compare in the factors that help better predict their donating intentions. An online survey was administered to a convenience sample, and hierarchical regression analysis was used to determine significant predicting factors within each revised TPB model. This study confirmed that the standard theory of planned behavior model was a significant predictor of intentions to donate for donors of both human service nonprofits and public broadcasting organizations. However, in both contexts, not all traditional factors of the TPB model contributed to the donation intentions. This study also provides further evidence that guilt can increase the predictive value of the standard TPB model for both types of nonprofits. Anticipated guilt more specifically, was a significant predicting factor for donors’ intentions to give to public broadcasting organizations. In contrast, convenience did not affect the explanatory power of the TPB model in either context. The TPB models for the two nonprofits are compared and theoretical and practical explanations are discussed.

The longstanding framing of accountability in principal-agent terms has encouraged adversarial and oppositional interactions and ways of thinking amongst nonprofit and funding agency practitioners within government-nonprofit relationships. These interactions are deeply rooted in the accountability claims made by government funders and responded to by nonprofit practitioners. This dissertation outlines the implications of nonprofit-government contracting for participating nonprofit organizations and explores various strategies practitioners in those institutions utilize to respond to the challenges raised by their relationship to public funders. To understand the tensions surrounding government accountability claims, I provide an overview of the emergence of the contracting regime and an exploration of the understanding of accountability that has attended its evolution. Through an in-depth qualitative case study, constructed on the basis of interviews, observation, and document analysis and following a grounded theory approach to analysis, I explore various nonprofit manager responses to the norms and pressures of the contracting regime. I chronicle nonprofit practitioners\' responses to contracting regime pressures, including accepting those norms, even when arguably inimical to their organization\'s mission, ignoring them in favor of serving clients, or leaving the employ of organizations altogether. I also explore examples of practitioner efforts to navigate outside of the contracting regime\'s antagonistic framing and engage both with powerful stakeholders and others in their organizations to negotiate changes. Drawing on the theoretical lens of agonism, I examine the context and characteristics of those responses to provide insights into how nonprofit managers might move beyond antagonistic accountability frames. / Ph. D.

This study explores the role of religious service organizations in social welfare provision by examining the activities of six social service/action agencies of the Diocese of Richmond, Virginia. It compares Diocesan agency operations with a profile drawn from existing knowledge of secular nonprofits and finds similarities. In particular, these religious service providers evidence degrees of marketization and dependence upon public and private funds. An empirical portrait of the purposes, organization, funding, programs and scope of delivery, target populations, advocacy role, and influence of the bishop reveals that these agencies provide many different services to a limited number of recipients. Agency leaders argued strongly that their organizations are already functioning at their maximum capacity. Agency directors interviewed believe that their organizations cannot significantly increase their current service capacity and analysis of their funding bases supports their claims. The study concludes with an analysis of the mediating role of these agencies in Virginia’s social welfare system. Two mediation theories, by Tocqueville (1840) and Berger and Neuhaus (1977) are tested. The Diocesan agencies are found to vary individually as mediating structures suggesting that religious organizations play diverse roles in social welfare provision in Virginia. / Master of Urban and Regional Planning

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Determining the best way for evaluating organizational performance is a complex problem as it involves assessment of indicators in multiple dimensions. In the case of nonprofit social service provision this evaluation needs to consider also the outcomes of the service. This research develops a performance measurement system that collects performance indicators, evaluates them and provides concrete performance improvement recommendations to decision-makers in the nonprofit sector. Three dimensions of performance are identified for social services: effectiveness or outcome achievement, service quality and efficiency. A framework for measuring performance in four stages or nodes is advanced. The nodes represent the most important production functions for nonprofit organizations dedicated to social services. These are: (a) financial (fundraising or income generation activities); (b) capacity creation; (c) service delivery; and, (d) effectiveness. Survey instruments were developed to collect service quality and effectiveness indicators for the last two nodes. Effectiveness measures were identified following a well-structured 7-step approach to develop outcome-based objectives. To effectively deal with this problem, the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) formulation was adapted to evaluate performance at each node. DEA computes performance scores, optimal target performance levels, and the performance frontier for different branches, units, or other comparable decision-making units (DMUs). Two basic formulations were developed for this framework as follows: Model I as a four stage formulation that carries the actual values of output variables of one node to the successive node, and Model II as a formulation that carries the projections — i.e. the recommended targets' from one node to the other. This last formulation assumes that the DMUs have undergone a reengineering effort and that their indicators are set at their maximum potential. Several environmental factors affecting social service provision were included in the analysis. Additionally, variable selection recommendations were developed for DEA analysis and DEA graphical reports produced. It was concluded that decision makers could use Model I to identify performance improvement targets in each production node. The results from Model II can be used for resource planning after the targets are achieved. Finally, this performance measurement framework is being implemented at one of largest national social service agencies in the United States. / Ph. D.