The innovative capacity of voluntary organizations has become a touchstone for their role in providing public services. Across the world there are increasing pressures on voluntary organizations to improve the quality and effectiveness of public services through innovation and change. This volume uses original research to assess the innovative capacity of voluntary organizations. It provides:

* a conceptual framework for understanding the innovative capacity of voluntary organizations
* empirical evidence detailing the nature and extent of innovation
* an analysis of...

The nonprofit sector occupies an ever more central role in economic and social policies, from the redesign of welfare system in the U.S. or UK, to fostering democracy in Central and Eastern Europe. At the same time, non-profit organizations face increased public scrutiny, and calls for more 'efficiency' and greater 'accountability'. Against this background, this revealing book explore keys policy issues such as:

* Is the nonprofit sector in crisis?
* What are the common themes and patterns in current policy debates concerning the future of the nonprofit sector?
* What policy...

This volume provides new perspectives on assessing the performance of non-profit organizations while meeting the information needs of decision-makers, both internal, such as resource-providers and clients, and external including boards and staff.

The voluntary sector contains over 50,000 organizations, 320,000 paid staff, and 3 million volunteers. The accounting and financial management of organizations in this sector poses as many difficulties as that of major for-profit organizations, if not more so, given the absence of the profit motive upon which much traditional accounting, finance practice and theory has been developed.

This book explores the unique environmental, managerial and philosophical aspects of voluntary organizations as well as the technical specialist characteristics of financial accounting, auditing and...

What are the characteristics of social enterprises? What are the future prospects for social enterprises? What do social enterprises contribute?

Analyzing social enterprises in fifteen different countries, The Emergence of Social Enterprise seeks to answer these important questions while investigating the remarkable growth in the 'third sector'.

Using the social enterprises as case-studies, theory and practice is combined in a compelling argument to support the concept of an 'emergence' of social enterprise. Written by leading academics, in an accessible yet...

Charity shops are now significant occupiers of the UK high street and are becoming familiar sites of consumption in the USA, Australia, Canada and Ireland. This volume provides an overview of the history and development of the charity shop. Material is drawn from a variety of disciplines, including marketing, retailing, cultural studies and social geography.

Governing boards play a crucial role in ensuring that public and non-profit organizations are publicly accountable and perform well. Until now, there have been relatively few detailed empirical studies of what boards do in practice, but this book fills that gap by bringing together analyses based upon some of the best recent empirical studies.

Using a new theoretical framework that highlights the paradoxical nature of governance, the book throws light on the questions at the heart of recent debates about non-profit boards:

• are boards publicly accountable or is there a...

In this detailed presentation of the leading creative figures in a richly innovative and dynamic period of Czech theatre, the author provides portraits of the directors K.H. Hilar, E.F. Burian and Alfred Radok, of the famous Voskovec and Werich cabaret duo, of the scenographers Josef Svoboda, Otomar Krejca, and of the playwright, now President of the Czech republic, Vaclav Havel. The author, a Czech-American theatre scholar and practitioner, has been a frequent on-site observer of Czech theatre since 1965. He is directly acquainted with many of the major artists and the most notable...

The role of the Third Sector within European society is an extremely topical subject, as both governments and the EU continue to consider the role these organizations can play in providing essential public services. This book presents contemporary research into this emerging area, exploring the contribution of this important sector to European society as well as the key challenges that the sector and its components organizations face in making this contribution.

This volume brings together for the first time a range of challenging perspectives upon the role and import of the...

This is the first book of its kind to bring together the microeconomic insights on the functioning of non-profit organizations, complementing the wide range of books on the management of non-profit organizations by instead focusing on both theoretical and empirical work.

Jegers begins by considering definitions of non-profit organizations before examining the economic rationale behind their existence, the demand for them and its implications on their functioning. The final chapters look at the economic idiosyncrasies of the non-profit organizations, focusing on the fields...