The interaction between a voluntary nonprofit social service organization and its financial environment: A case study of Chinese Children's Fund in Taiwan

Voluntary nonprofit organizations (NPOs) are ubiquitous in the modern world. Among them social service organizations have been playing the primary role in satisfying a variety of human needs resulted from the failure of the market and the government. For this type of NPOs the most critical issue is to acquire necessary financial resources from external environments in order to survive. To understand how NPOs respond to their financial environments, the researcher chose Chinese Children's Fund in Taiwan (CCF-Taiwan) as a unique case to investigate the dynamic interactions between CCF-Taiwan and the components within its task environment, including individuals, organizations, and governments that contribute resources and service recipients. CCF-Taiwan's responsive strategies and measures are thoroughly analyzed.Three macro organizational theories are adopted to serve as the theoretical base. Political-economy perspective is emphasized in dissecting CCF-Taiwan's internal management and its relationships with all resource contributors. Thirty-three in-depth interviews were conducted with thirty-one informants. To triangulate the source of data, the researcher also collected CCF-Taiwan's board meeting minutes, publications, audit reports, and relevant archives. Qualitative data analysis techniques were used to analyze the bulk fieldnotes and literature.This research found that the nature of CCF-Taiwan's financial environment changed from stable to turbulent in the mid-1970s, and has become stable but dispersed after the early 1980s. CCF-Taiwan has had both successful and unsuccessful experiences in responding to the unique political-economy of the Taiwanese society. Those successful strategies help CCF-Taiwan make its way through the risk of survival and ensure its successive prosperity; while those unsuccessful measures deterred CCF-Taiwan's resource acquisition. The most successful measures were localization of Family Helper Projects, diversification of service programs and sources of financial resources, and demonstration of accountability. CCF-Taiwan's continuing difficulties in dealing with the changing financial environment, includes a difficult relationship with the government and inadequate public relations. This research also raised internal and external management issues confronting the organization that are important for adaptation to its changing financial environment. Implications to other voluntary NPOs and limitations of the study were also identified.U of I OnlyETDs are only available to UIUC Users without author permissio