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Strategies for Philanthropy

Recommendations from Bay Area AFN’s Inaugural Inclusive Economic and Immigrant Rights Summit

The leaders who gathered at the Inclusive Economic and Immigrant Rights Summit didn’t mince words about what philanthropy must do—and become—to meet the challenges we face. Throughout the Summit, speakers offered direct guidance to funders—not just on what to fund, but on how philanthropy itself must transform. Their message carried urgency: we are in a period of crisis — and of unusual opportunity. Communities are mobilizing, workers are organizing, and philanthropic investment can be genuinely decisive. The recommendations below reflect the collective wisdom of movement leaders, scholars, and practitioners.

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Fund the fight. Fund the organizers. Fund the movement. Funders, we have to be bold.

Julián Castro, Latino Community Foundation

Call to Action: Fund Paradigm Change

Ultimately, philanthropy is being asked not merely to fund different programs, but to fund the paradigm shift itself—to invest in the movements, narratives, and power-building that shift the common sense of how our economy and society works.

This is a both/and proposition. Philanthropy must resource the transformation—funding organizers, movements, and infrastructure at scale, over time, and through failure. And philanthropy must undergo transformation—examining its own practices, shifting how resources move to the field, and operating in authentic solidarity with the communities leading this work.

The evidence backs this up. As Anat Shenker-Osorio presented, analyzing 35 cases of democratic backsliding from 1991–2021, researchers found that the presence of a civil resistance movement — the organizing, narrative change, and solidarity infrastructure that this Summit was designed to strengthen — is the single greatest predictor of whether democratic backsliding is stopped. Without a civil resistance movement, the probability of stopping democratic backsliding is 7.5%. With one, it rises to 51.7% (Pinckney & Trilling, 2024). It is making the investment that history shows will matter — and that the leaders who gathered at this Summit are asking philanthropy to make.

This is not a passing crisis. It is a paradigm shift in what communities are living and facing. Philanthropy has a choice—to continue with business as usual, or to answer the call.

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Be catalytic in your purpose and in your commitment to paradigm change. Use your resources to be catalytic in building movement so that we can get paradigm change.

Dr. Darrick Hamilton, The New School

THE WHY — Understand How We Got Here

Economic Precarity Creates Conditions for Authoritarianism

The rise of authoritarianism didn’t emerge from nowhere. As speakers throughout the Summit emphasized, we must understand the deep roots of this crisis—or we will blame it on a single individual or event rather than the disease of fascism that sits inside this country.

“We’ve been left vulnerable to the lure of fascism and the cheap lure of relative identity status distractions by an economy that has systematically deprived people of the necessary resources they need to thrive.

Dr. Darrick Hamilton, The New School

Dr. Darrick Hamilton explained that when people are systematically deprived of the resources they need to thrive—dignified work, housing, health care, among other guarantees—they become vulnerable to politicians who offer them something else instead: the appeal of feeling superior to another group. This is what Hamilton calls the “cheap lure” of relative status, a concept rooted in the work of W.E.B. Du Bois, classical sociologists like Herbert Blumer, and critical race theorists like Cheryl Harris. The greater the economic despair, the greater the appeal of division and scapegoating.

Dr. Manuel Pastor placed this crisis in historical context: The 2008-2009 financial crash decimated so many people’s livelihoods and put them on the edge of financial insecurity, particularly Black and Latino people. He described COVID as a disease that revealed our illnesses as a society: a racial wealth gap so sharp that some had no cushion with which to survive, a healthcare system broken in terms of providing assistance, and an immigration system that people often label broken but is in fact doing exactly what it’s designed to do—marginalize newcomers and prevent them from being able to succeed.

As Anat Shenker-Osorio made clear at the Summit, this is not accidental — it is strategic. Throughout history, a powerful few have tried to control the many by selecting a scapegoat to shame and blame. In this era, that means vilifying and harming immigrants and other marginalized communities to advance an authoritarian agenda. The opposition deliberately converts economic anxiety into division through racially-coded and gendered speech and imagery, designed to sow discord and undermine support for government and shared prosperity. The greater the economic despair, the more potent the dog whistle. Avoiding conversations about race and gender plays directly into this strategy — and economic populism that does not explicitly name race or gender cannot withstand it.

The Antidote: Authentic Solidarity and Inclusive Economic Rights

In an era of brutal, authorized state violence against people based on who we are—the color of our skin, the language we speak, where we work—solidarity and rights offer a powerful antidote.

Authentic solidarity means recognizing our interdependence across race, gender, and class—that the flourishing of immigrant communities is foundational to collective prosperity, and that attacks on immigrant communities are attacks on all of us. It means refusing to be divided by racially-coded and gendered speech designed to pit us against each other, and building instead the cross-racial and gender solidarity that fuels the desire for a government that serves us all.

When we speak affirmatively about race and gender—embracing the strength that stems from acknowledging our differences and honoring what we have in common—we strengthen our ability to mobilize our base, persuade those who toggle between conflicting ideas, and challenge our opposition’s worldview. Authentic solidarity links shared economic prosperity directly to racial and gender justice. It is both the antidote to division and the foundation for collective power.

Inclusive economic rights defang authoritarianism at its root. These rights guarantee housing, healthcare, family care, debt-free college, dignified work, an income floor, an inheritance, and responsible financial services—in intentionally inclusive ways. When people have what they need to thrive, the appeal of scapegoating and division loses its power.

Together, authentic solidarity and inclusive economic rights address both the immediate threat and the underlying conditions of authoritarianism. Solidarity builds the collective power to protect one another now; inclusive economic rights create the structural conditions where fascism loses its appeal.

An Intersectional Approach and Analysis is Required

Understanding this harmful era requires recognizing—as Dr. Darrick Hamilton put it—that race, economics, and politics have never been separable. If we’re not looking at all three in an intertwined way all the time, our approach will be limited. The exploitation of immigrant workers and the exclusion of communities of color from economic protections is not accidental—it is by design.

As Brenda Muñoz of UC Berkeley Labor Center explained: “Low wages are a legacy of racism, sexism, and xenophobia that has plagued our country. For example, the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act granted protections to some workers but excluded domestic workers, who were predominantly Black women, and agricultural workers. It wasn’t a mistake; it was by design that these workers were excluded.”

Today, these exclusions persist—and an intersectional approach is required to dismantle them. This means refusing to treat economic justice and immigrant rights as separate issues, and recognizing that attacks on immigrant communities are simultaneously attacks on labor rights, racial justice, and economic prosperity for all. For funders, it means resisting the pull to organize grantmaking into siloed portfolios that fragment the lived experience of communities — and resisting the temptation to fund color-blind or gender-neutral programs out of perceived risk.

This Summit was designed to model that intersectional approach. As Julián Castro framed it in his opening remarks, the Summit was an invitation to “get in formation”—moving together with intention because operating in silos isn’t an option in these times. The targeting of immigrant people is an attack on all of us—on our freedoms, on our families, and on our futures. An intersectional approach recognizes that we rise or fall together.

THE WHAT — What’s Required from Funders

Be Brave and Bold

It’s natural to feel fear in this moment. But how we respond to that fear matters. The typical fear responses are fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. At the Summit, Julián Castro named a fifth option—one especially urgent for those of us in philanthropy: Fund.

Fund the fight. Fund the organizers. Fund the movement. Funders, we have to be bold.

The fear philanthropy feels pales in comparison to the fear that families on the front lines feel every day—families so afraid they won’t leave their homes except for absolute necessities. Those of us in philanthropy must match this moment with extraordinary action.

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This moment calls us to be brave, to step boldly and courageously with and on behalf of those whose lives are in the balance. It is not the time to be afraid and retreat. This is the time for philanthropy to bravely use their financial power to support the impacted communities, the people who are being threatened on a daily basis in a very meaningful way to move past the state of surviving into thriving. It is brave of us to stand against injustice and invest in a better world for all.

Guerline Jozef, Haitian Bridge Alliance

Practice Authentic Solidarity

Trust communities to lead. Trust organizers to build cross-racial, cross-status solidarity through direct relationship-building.

For funders, practicing authentic solidarity means using whatever position you hold within philanthropy to stand with communities under attack. It means trusting grantees when they pivot—when showing up at an immigrant rights march becomes more important than completing a deliverable. As Manuel Pastor observed, “The best work your grantees do is the stuff they sneak past you.” Authentic solidarity means they shouldn’t have to sneak.

“It is not a moment that’s going to pass. It is a paradigm shift in what we are living and what our communities are facing. And I am here wholeheartedly because I believe that people in philanthropy—whatever position, whatever level of power in your foundation—has some level of power and voice you can exercise to be in authentic solidarity with the most impacted communities.

Shaw San Liu, Chinese Progressive Association

Reckon with Philanthropy’s Own Paradigm Shift

Traditional philanthropy often replicates the very dynamics that movement leaders are working to transform. As funders, how might we examine our own practices?

• Are we managing grantees or investing in movements based on our values? The current political economy treats people as if they need to be managed, rather than invested in and resourced to thrive. Does our grantmaking mirror this approach? What might it look like to invest in an organization’s most treasured resources: their people?
• Are we intentional about the language we use? Do we talk about “undocumented immigrants” or “undocumented Californians”—people deeply enmeshed in our families, faith institutions, and workplaces?
• What’s getting in the way of doing what we already know we ought to do? Most funders understand the need for multi-year, general operating support. Yet philanthropy continues to offer fragmented, short-term, restricted grants. What institutional barriers—board policies, risk aversion, inertia—prevent us from acting on what we know?

“What’s the paradigm shift that needs to happen even in this moment of pain?

Manuel Pastor, USC Equity Research Institute

THE HOW – How to Fund the Paradigm Shift

Fund at Scale, Over Time, Through Failure

Several front-line leaders noted the need to be funded at scale, over time, and through failure. Such an approach is in contrast to their current setup of receiving fragmented, short-term, restricted grants with expectations of immediate, measurable success.

If philanthropy is serious about building the power necessary to shift paradigms—not just fund individual grantmaking strategies—this asymmetry must change. Transformational change requires transformational investment.

The Framework:

“We are experiencing generational losses, and what we need is generational support. Multi-year needs to mean five, seven, ten years—not one and two years.

Geraldine Alcid, Filipino Advocates for Justice

Fund Both Blocking and Building

Funders must support both urgent defense (blocking) AND long-term transformation (building). This is not an either/or. Both are needed now.

Blocking includes rapid response, legal defense, Know Your Rights training, and immediate protection for communities under attack.

Building includes worker organizing, worker ownership, policy advocacy, narrative change, and leadership development—the long-term power that transforms our economy from the ground up.

Both blocking and building require organizations with backbone. Philanthropy must be willing to fund organizations that take clear, values-based stands — even when that feels institutionally risky. Funders who pressure grantees toward cautious messaging to protect their own institutional relationships may be undermining the campaigns they intend to support. As Anat Shenker-Osorio put it at the Summit: a large tent needs a pole (backbone); otherwise it’s just a wet tarp.

“We are a multicultural, multiracial, multilingual worker center organizing at the intersection of economic and immigrant rights. Most of our members are low wage workers—workers who are hyper-exploited. We pivoted to rapid response and the blocking, but we never stopped building: political education, collective power, workers representing themselves in the workplace.

Alejo, Trabajadores Unidos Workers United

Fund Relationship-Building, Interconnections, and Ecosystems

The rapid coordination that Bay Area communities demonstrated in response to threats of invasion didn’t happen spontaneously. It was the product of years of relationship-building and coalition infrastructure—all of which require sustained investment and an ecosystem funding approach. This means funding cross-movement partnerships, rewarding organizations for their interconnected work, and investing in the infrastructure necessary for collective action—now and beyond this crisis.

This ecosystem approach extends to building narrative power — the ability to tell stories that shift mental models and cultural mindsets. That kind of power requires a strong narrative infrastructure: the network of relationships and organizational systems needed to create dominant narratives. It doesn’t emerge from a single organization or campaign. And it is stronger when it spans movements and sectors — economic justice, immigrant rights, labor, racial justice, gender justice, and beyond. A diverse, intersectional narrative ecosystem reaches further, resonates more deeply, and moves more people.

“If you want to fund one organization, great. If you want to fund coalitions, collectives, and collaboratives, that’s also great—because we need them all. What we cannot afford is organizations put in positions where they have to fight each other for resources.

Huy Tran, SIREN