Does Government Financing have a Detrimental Effect on the Autonomy of Voluntary Associations?

At first glance, the answer to this question seems all too obvious: The greater the share of government finances the greater the loss of autonomy. But from a resource-dependency and institutional approach, three more influential factors come to mind: the association’s counterinfluence, the calculations of the governmental agencies (their alternatives, costs and benefits); and cultural factors. The paper presents evidence from a German survey in which 397 registered associations of four widely differing types were investigated with the aid of a standardized questionnaire: sport clubs in comparison with philanthropic associations, interest associations and self-help groups. The findings support the importance of the perspective of the government agencies, whereas the association’s counterinfluence seems to be to small to limit a loss of autonomy. Last but not least, the results support the reasonable assumption that cultural factors might be of importance which restrict governmental interference. It’s an often neglected fact that government resources are one of the most important sources of financing for voluntary associations in most advance