Abstract
The paper examines the explanatory potential of the social origins theory advanced by L. Salamon and H. Anheier. This examination follows two tracks. The first track is a comparative investigation of the conceptual affinity between the social origins, on one hand, and the theories of welfare regimes and varieties of capitalism, on the other. We argue that the conceptual affinity between these three theories lies in the fact that they explore what could be referred to as vertical and horizontal interactions between state and market. Vertical interactions are based on the legitimate coercion by government authorities, while horizontal relations develop at the initiative of their autonomous members. The social origins approach introduces yet another essential dimension, that of civic self-organization, into the analysis of vertical and horizontal interactions embodied in state/market relationships. Similarity of underlying conceptual foundations might suggest that all three theories would generate similarly strong academic interest in reexamining their analytical tools and applying their approaches to the diversity of new social and economic realities. The literature indicates that both the welfare regimes and varieties of capitalism have generated robust academic discussions, whereas the conceptual and analytical potential of the social origins remains relatively less explored. It has become particularly evident in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic which gave rise to a number of studies that apply the frameworks of the welfare regimes and varieties of capitalism to examine cross-country differences in government social welfare policies. However, the social origins theory seems not to have generated comparably rich research testing its explanatory power in the new conditions triggered by the pandemic challenges. To address this gap, the paper follows a second track which investigates pandemic-induced transformations in nonprofit sectors of Germany, Austria, UK and USA – countries representing three “basic” nonprofit regimes immediately corresponding to Esping-Andersen’s welfare state typology: welfare partnership, social democratic and liberal. Applying the analytical lens of the social origins approach, we look at how the impact of the pandemic moved the measurable parameters of nonprofit sectors: the scope of the third sector, the volunteer share of the workforce, the extent of nonprofits’ engagement in the provision of social services, and the share of government financial support for the sector. We further look at the pandemic-induced changes in the composition of the “tool kit” employed in government-nonprofit cooperation. Thus, testing the explanatory potential of the social origins approach, we observe that responses to pandemic challenges have contributed to a degree of convergence of both liberal and social democratic nonprofit regimes with the welfare partnership pattern. However, path dependency, which is suggested by the regimes’ “moorings” embedded in the social origins approach, remains strong enough to explain the observed viability of the core features typical of “basic” nonprofit regimes in times of the pandemic crisis.
1 Introduction
The social origins of civil society theory (SOT) advanced by Lester M. Salamon and Helmut K. Anheier in 1998 and further developed by its founders (Anheier 2014; Salamon, Sokolowski, and Haddock 2017) belongs to the core of the contemporary comparative third sector research. For the first time in the history of this field of study SOT made it possible to measure and document the size and scope of the third sector across multiple nations (Steinberg and Young 1998). It remains the most widely cited theoretical construct in this field and the most influential theory of how historical events explain present-day variation in the nonprofit sector across countries (Einolf 2015, 510).
The theory was inspired by the need to explain an unprecedented scope and variety of the cross-national data on the nonprofit sector size and composition revealed under the Johns Hopkins Comparative Nonprofit Sector Project (Salamon and Anheier 1996) guided by Lester Salamon as its permanent director (1991–2017). The authors of SOT explained nonprofit country variations by the sector’s embeddedness in broader social, political, and economic realities, since “nonprofit organizations do not float freely in social space, they are embedded in prevailing social and economic structures” (Salamon and Anheier 1998, 227).
The SOT approach was conceptualized in the nonprofit typology based on civil society dimensions shaped by power relations among different social groupings and institutions (Salamon et al. 2017, 79). The typology initially included four models. The liberal model is characterized by a low level of government welfare spending and a relatively large nonprofit sector (for example, the USA, Australia, Canada). In the social democratic model, state-sponsored welfare protection is quite extensive, the scale of the nonprofit sector, and particularly, its service-providing segment, is quite limited (Austria and Scandinavian countries). The corporatist model that the authors of the theory later termed ‘welfare partnership model’ demonstrates a close working relationship between the state and voluntary organizations, the coexistence of extensive government social welfare spending and a sizable nonprofit sector (Germany, France, Belgium, the Netherlands). In the statist model, both government social welfare protection and nonprofit activity remain constrained (Japan, Brazil). Later Salamon (Salamon, Sokolowski, and Haddock 2017) added a fifth model, the traditional one, associated with the dominance of the nobility and landed elites, who exercise hegemonic influence over the life of a society or country (Kenya, Pakistan) This model is characterized by a small civil society workforce, a relatively large share of volunteers, a large share of nonprofits in service activities, and a low share of government support in nonprofits’ revenue.
The authors of this article argue that the SOT literature has considerable room for development. Ironically, for all the abundance of publications that pay tribute to SOT, relatively few papers provide critical analysis of the SOT approach, or test the applicability of SOT framework in the changing realities of state-society relations. Two other influential strands of thought that reveal parallels with SOT, are based on comparative cross-national studies of welfare regimes (Esping-Andersen 1990) and varieties of capitalism (Hall and Soskice 2001). These theories generated robust academic debate over their development potential and application to the new socio-economic realities. See, for example, Rice (2013, 93): “Few concepts in the social sciences are both as loved and debated as the welfare regime concept introduced by Gøsta Esping-Andersen in his seminal 1990 work The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism”. Feldmann (2019) examines the current state of knowledge about global varieties of capitalism concluding that the debate inspired by Peter Hall and David Soskice’s seminal work has generated one of the most influential literatures in comparative politics and political economy in recent years. Compared to those theories, the SOT development potential as an analytical tool has been less explored. A recent paper by Anheier, Lang, and Toepler (2020) is an infrequent example of thoroughly examining SOT conceptual approach. Anheier et al. call for the connection of comparative nonprofit approach to a wider social science research agenda and for looking at the development of nonprofit sectors in the context of three other institutional complexes: state, market, and civil society.
To explore SOT analytical potential to a fuller degree, requires concerted scholarly effort and substantial further research. The contribution of the present article to this goal is twofold.
On a theoretical level, we look into the relationship between SOT, WRT, and VoCT. We shall show WRT and VoCT development to significantly rely on their common “generic” features. Since similar features are also characteristic of SOT, there are grounds to believe that its development potential is also fairly strong although not yet fully realized. As discussed below, the development of SOT largely took an “extensive” direction of augmenting its original typology with new models and additional parameters. However, application of SOT core parameters in the new context remains a relatively unexplored development path. As Salamon himself put it, an important test of SOT may be its ability to account for any new patterns with the same set of factors that comprise the theory’s existing core drivers (Salamon, Sokolowski, and Haddock 2017). Interestingly, a similar trend was observed in the development of WRT which according to Powell and Barriento (2011, 81) went mostly around the edges, producing different typologies and taxonomies to explain a particular case or outlier. To advance theoretical understandings of welfare production, Powell and Barrientos contend that more attention should be directed at how the key analytical elements of Esping-Andersen combine in welfare states.
To address this gap, the goal of this paper is to explore the application of SOT core parameters in the new pandemic crisis context rather than to bring into the analysis additional elements and factors. These core parameters described below (Section 3) in greater detail are: the scope of the nonprofit sector, the share of volunteer labor, the extent of volunteer workforce engaged in social services, and the share of government support for the nonprofit sector. On an empirical level, we apply the above SOT core parameters as an analytical tool to trace the trends in the SOT typology triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic.
The paper is structured as follows. Section 2 examines links between SOT, WRT, and VoCT, which gives grounds to chart potential directions of SOT development. Section 3 is comparative in approach. For our research, we selected countries that according to Salamon and Anheier, clearly represented basic nonprofit regimes. We trace changes in core parameters used to categorize SOT nonprofit regimes in the context of the pandemic. Key government programs aimed at the crisis support of nonprofits are also examined. We observe that responses to pandemic challenges have contributed to a certain degree of convergence of both the liberal and social democratic nonprofit regimes with the corporatist (welfare partnership) pattern. However, path dependency, which too is suggested by the regimes’ “moorings” embedded in the social origins approach, remains strong enough to explain the observed viability of the core features typical of “basic” nonprofit regimes in times of the pandemic crisis. The concluding section summarizes the results and outlines future directions of investigating SOT analytical and explanatory potential.
2 SOT, WRT, and VoCT: Common Features, Different Ways of Advancement
SOT draws heavily on Esping-Andersen’s WRT (Anheier 2014). The typologies developed by both theories show clear parallels even up to overlapping terminology. This is not surprising as SOT is based on WRT which associated a welfare regime type with a combination of political and historical factors that caused variations in the government system of welfare provision. Generally, both theories seek to identify and explain various constellations of what could be called horizontal and vertical interactions between parties in the societal life. Horizontal relations emerge and develop at the initiative of their autonomous members. “Vertical” interactions are based on legitimate coercion by the authorities. In fact, both types of interactions not only coexist but also compete, complement each other forming various combinations.
The relationships between “vertical” and market-type “horizontal” interactions are significant not only for WRT but also for VoCТ that focuses on economic development institutions. It distinguishes between liberal market economies (LMEs) and coordinated market economies (CMEs) based on differences in modes of economic coordination and production systems. In the original study (Hall & Soskice 2001), six of the OECD countries are categorized as LMEs (the United States, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand) while ten as CMEs (Japan, Germany, Sweden, Austria and others).
As for SOТ, it is applicable to a broad range of “horizontal” interactions that constitute civil society, including various forms of self-organization, both formal and informal. Empirical studies of third sector models focus on institutions registered under NPO legislation, for otherwise it would be difficult to deal with comparable statistics. However, it seems a simplification of the SOT approach to contend that it would not work for countries with a legislation that does not take into account NPO specifics or where civil society groups addressing social problems are unable or reluctant to register formally.
Thus, a common feature of VoCТ, WRT and SOТ is that they all examine horizontal and vertical interactions, although placed in different contexts: quite a traditional context of macroeconomics and institutional economics for VoCT, a welfare state context for WRT, and ultimately, a fairly modern interdisciplinary field of self-organization for SOT.
WRT and VoCT generated numerous discussions which shaped the contours of future development trends for both theories. Along these lines, Schröder (2013) noted links between WRT and VoCТ arriving at similar country groupings. Countries that rely on the market for the governance of their production system have a liberal welfare state; countries whose governments coordinate their economy usually have either a “conservative” or “social democratic” welfare state. Schröder suggested a unified typology combining the study of production systems with the study of welfare states. The discussions, however, overlooked SOT that considered various configurations of government-third sector interaction.
Given vertical and horizontal interactions examined by SOT, WRT and VoCT in various contexts, it could be assumed that closer involvement of SOT in the comparative studies of the relationship between state, market and civil society in changing socio-economic realities would facilitate further realization of SOT analytical potential.
In essence, VoCT and WRT as well as SOT have been evolving in two major directions, albeit at a different pace and to a different extent. These directions could be tentatively named extensive versus conceptual development. Extensive development relates to the modification and expansion of the original typology. Since the early 1990s, the geography of comparative welfare state research has changed dramatically, a number of new regimes were added to the WRT typology, including South European (Bonoli 1997; Leibfried 1992) and East Asian, Confucian regimes (Aspalter 2006; Goodman and Peng 1996). Leibfried (1992), Ferrera (1996), Castles (1998) and others argued that the Southern model is unduly neglected as a fourth “world of welfare capitalism” in Esping-Andersen’s work (Mahon 2018). Similarly, VoC approach was extended to developing economies (Schneider and Soskice 2009) and to East European countries in the process of marketization (Fenger 2007; Myant 2018). Similarly, the discussion of SOT mainly concentrated on supplementing the original typology with new models. For instance, Kabalo (2009) added a fifth nonprofit regime in the post–World War II decolonized states whose social structures are different from the European and North American patterns. Archambault (2009) introduced “emerging” and “post-communist” categories to extend SOT typology to Eastern and Southern Europe. On the contrary, Sivesind and Selle (2009) reduced Salamon and Anheier’s four categories to two: “liberal” and “European”, with the latter including both the corporatist and social democratic categories. They argued that government welfare spending and religious homogeneity define the categories, with liberal countries, including the United Kingdom, Australia and the United States low on both factors and European countries high on both factors.
Conceptual development received less research attention in the discussion of all three theories. As for WRT, Rice (2013) suggested transforming the welfare regime approach from an empirical typology into an ideal-type framework based on three dimensions: welfare culture, welfare institutions and the socio-structural effects of welfare policies. The framework, Rice argued, made WRT conception applicable to empirically diverse national and local welfare landscapes. A theoretical approach to SOT proposed by Wagner (2000) calls for treating nonprofits as part of the public sphere, which should provide a better understanding of the nonprofit sector dynamics and the interdependence among different types of institutions that characterize the public sphere in European welfare states. Einolf (2015) applies SOT approach to the analysis of cross-national differences in charitable giving and points out that religion is the most important missing variable in Salamon and Anheier’s typology. Both lines of development that we tentatively termed “extensive” and “conceptual” are not separated by a watershed and join in some cases. Thus, reflecting on Esping-Andersen’s welfare regimes in the context of the global South, Wood and Gough (2006) not only added two new regimes but also turned WRT original triangle of state-market-family into a “welfare diamond” by adding a community dimension.
It should be pointed out that a research agenda for SOT discussion and further development was influenced by recognition of SOT limitations. SOT has been criticized for various reasons, including a broadly inclusive definition of the third sector, not sensitive enough to the sector’s heterogeneity (Ragin 1998), insufficiencies in data collection (Steinberg and Young 1998), over-emphasis on government-nonprofits relations as partnership in delivering social services without regard to the adversarial aspects of this relationship (Young 2000), and others. Addressing limitations of the aggregate conception of the third sector, Anheier, Lang, and Toepler (2020) suggest reopening questions of definition that would capture different functions and forms of NPOs. Other authors suggested additional factors to supplement SOT core parameters, for example, a change from foreign to domestic influence in decolonized states (Kabalo 2009) or different paths toward the EU accession in CEE countries (Meyer et al. 2020). SOT focus on government-nonprofit cooperation in social service delivery has also been a debatable issue. Young (2000, 2006) identified three models of government-third sector relationships in service provision as supplementary, complementary or adversarial and drew attention to the fact that Salamon was the principal advocate for the view that nonprofits and government are engaged primarily in a partnership relationship. This raises a question of examining SOT typology from the viewpoint of democratic governance. Anheier, Lang, and Toepler (2020, 675), suggest linking SOT with the Varieties of Democracy approach and particularly, with V-Dem long-term data series surveying key aspects of civil society in the context of governance.
Obviously, suggested avenues of SOT development that involve essential new factors and expand SOT typology are a fruitful way forward. However, we argue that a test of SOT core parameters in the new context remains understudied compared to the expansion of SOT focus which also merits attention and interest.
Recent discussions have been marked by a focus on VoC and WRT transformations driven by global challenges and pressing issues, such as sustainable development (Magnin 2018), climate change (Mikler and Harrison 2012; Sivonen and Kukkonen 2021), renewable energy policies (Ćetković and Buzogány 2016), and others. Still most recently, the discussion agenda shifted to the changing welfare models in the context of the pandemic crisis (Hick and Murphy 2021; Mok, Ku, and Yuda 2021). Generally, the key trend in government response to the pandemic consists in intensified financial support of vulnerable populations and industries that sustain losses. However, this trend is manifested differently even in the countries belonging to the same WRT regime which is associated with path dependency. A case in point is government social support programming in the UK and Ireland, both positioned in the liberal groupings in the WRT and VoCT literatures. Although government policy responses contained notable similarities, there were also important differences, and particularly, the greater generosity of out-of-work supports in Ireland which mirrored institutional differences in the pre-pandemic welfare systems (Hick and Murphy 2021).
By contrast, the literature, so far, does not seem to provide any significant examples of SOT application in the context of pandemic crisis to complement similar research on VoCT and WRT. In the next section, we analyze empirical data of several countries to show that amid the pandemic, SOT liberal and social democratic models reveal a trend toward convergence with the corporatist (welfare partnership) model. Still, the signs of convergence take country-specific forms as a result of path dependency caused by socio-political and economic conditions and by the specifics of the government-nonprofit interaction.
3 Pandemic Impact on Nonprofit Regimes: Convergence and Path Dependency
3.1 Measurable Parameters of Nonprofit Regimes Show a Common Vector of Changes
Among prominent distinguishing features of SOT is a set of analytical tools containing four measurable parameters employed for categorizing nonprofit regimes. These parameters include (Salamon, Sokolowski, and Haddock 2017, 91–124):
scope of the sector measured by the share of each country’s economically active population (EAP) that is working in the civil society sector;
the volunteer share of that workforce;
the extent to which this workforce is engaged in social services as opposed to expressive functions;
the shares of the sector’s financial support coming from government, private fees, and philanthropy.
SOT assigns quantifiable combinations of these parameters to each nonprofit regime hypothesized by the theory (Salamon, Sokolowski, and Haddock 2017, 91–124).
These analytical tools may also serve an even more challenging purpose – the analysis of nonprofit regime transformation in a given country. Of particular importance are the dynamics of the relative share of the nonprofit workforce engaged in social services and of the share of the sector’s financial support by government which in SOT reflect integration of the sector into the welfare state. The scope of the sector is important as a measure of its overall capacity. The change in the volunteer share of the nonprofit workforce in a given country is often related to the process of professionalization of nonprofit service providers.
Tracing changes in measurable parameters of nonprofit sectors has been applied in the analysis of nonprofit regime transformation caused by the evolution of the welfare state and by government policies in the field of social services provision in Germany and France by Archambault, Priller, and Zimmer (2014).
Along with changes in measurable parameters the analysis of nonprofit regime transformations requires a close look at the “tool kit” of government-nonprofit cooperation. The concept of “third party government” developed by Salamon (1987) to explain the necessity of government-nonprofit cooperation in the modern welfare state is integrated in SOT and contributes significantly to examining relations among key social actors. Government policy, including that vis-à-vis nonprofit service providers plays an important role shaping the nonprofit sector (Anheier, Lang, and Toepler 2020). The focus on service provider organizations is in conformity with the goal of this paper which is applying SOT core parameters to the new context of the pandemic crisis. Explaining our focus on service provider NPOs, we would like to refer to a discussion of “welfare” NPOs which mentions that most of these are multi-purpose in terms of their functions. Service functions are typically inseparable from the representation of the interests of target groups. NPOs, even if they do not directly pursue advocacy, are agents of shaping government policies (Chinnock and Salamon 2002; Kövér 2021).
It has been repeatedly pointed out that nonprofit sector involvement into government social services contracting is fraught with the danger of the nonprofit sector cooptation by the government and a reduction of the sector’s autonomy (Anheier, Lang, and Toepler 2020; Meyer et al. 2020). However, along with the government paternalism, the third sector organizations in the social service contracting may be threatened by marketization. So the third sector independence needs to be examined from a broader perspectives of its autonomy from both the state and the market (Kövér 2021), which merits separate in-depth research.
Some public management approaches based on quasi-market concepts disfavor nonprofits bringing into question the identity and autonomy of nonprofit service providers, whereas other tools employed in government-nonprofit cooperation are more adjusted to the specifics of nonprofit organizations (Anheier and Toepler 2019). The former approaches would correspond in the framework of SOT to the liberal nonprofit regime, the latter – to the welfare partnership model.
We will now look at how the impact of the pandemic moves SOT core measurable parameters of nonprofit sectors in countries representing three “basic” nonprofit regimes corresponding to Esping-Andersen’s welfare state typology: welfare partnership, liberal and social democratic. We will also consider the composition of the “tool kits” employed by governments in these countries to support the nonprofit sectors challenged by the pandemic. The pandemic sends similar shocks across the selected countries. The analytical lens of the SOT typology will, as we hope, help explain nonprofit sector transformations triggered by the pandemic shocks.
Data in Table 1.[1] shows that in no country the nonprofit sector escaped pandemic shocks. The vector of change caused by the pandemic and moving measurable parameters of nonprofit sectors is identical in every country irrespective of the nonprofit regime type.
Impact of the pandemic (lock-downs) on measurable parameters of nonprofit sectors in Germany, Austria, United Kingdom and the USA.
| Type of impact | Germany (welfare partnership regime) (1) | Austria (social democratic regime) (2) | United Kingdom (liberal regime) (3) | USA (liberal regime) (4) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Scope of nonprofit organizations’ activities | ||||
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| Curtailing mission related activities (cutting back programs and projects), % of organizations affected | 50–85 | 63–74 | 42–64 | 64–91 |
| 55 expect further reduction of program and project activities | ||||
| Including: considerable reduction or complete cancellation of programs and projects, % of organizations affected | Not reported | 32–43 | Not available | 49–80 |
| Increased demand for organizations’ services provided, % organizations affected | Not available | For assistance to homeless people and child care services | 47–56 | 35 (May 2020) 50 (December 2020) – in organizations providing social services |
| Increased service provision due to pandemic, % of organizations | Not available | Not available | 36–38 | Not available |
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| Staffing changes | ||||
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| Lay-offs or unpaid vacations, % of organizations affected | Not observed | 3 (but 41% had to reduce working hours) | 12–15 (but 20–30 found the indicator inapplicable) | 14–26 have already taken such steps. 27–44 believe they will have to do so in the future. |
| Shortage/reduced number of volunteers, % of organizations affected | 26 | 51 | 26–27 | 35–63 |
| Increased/same number of volunteers, % of organizations | 8/20 | 3,6/15.8 | 10–16/47–49 | 10–12 |
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| Financial position of NPOs | ||||
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| Financial hardships/revenue decline, % of organizations affected | 38 (however, only 5% of organizations found revenue decline threatening the existence of the organization | 43 | 39–40 (financial situation deteriorated in the last month) | 83–90 |
| 75% expected a long-term decline in their ability to perform their charitable mission (by late 2020) | ||||
| Financial position improved/remained unchanged, % of organizations | Not available | Social service providing NPOs: 66 (as regards donations), 60 (as regards public funding) | 19–20/39 | 10 |
| Major new government support programs for NPOs launched | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Revenue reduction from pre-crisis level (2020 compared to 2019) | Not available | Not available | By 31% on average | By 19–37% on average |
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(1) Sources of data on Germany: Schrader, M., J. Roth, and R.G. Strachwitz. 2020. “Ein Rettungsschirm für die Zivilgesellschaft? Eine explorative Studie zu Potenzialen, Bedarfen und Angeboten in und nach der COVID-19 Krise”. (Opuscula, 144). Berlin: Maecenata Institut für Philanthropie und Zivilgesellschaft. https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-70032-4; Schrader, M. (2021). Zivilgesellschaft in und nach der Pandemie: Bedarfe – Angebote – Potenziale. (Opuscula, 149). Berlin: Maecenata Institut für Philanthropie und Zivilgesellschaft. https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-72852-2; Die Situation der organisierten Zivilgesellschaft im Juni 2021. Engagement-Barometer – 4. Panelbefragung //https://www.ziviz.de/sites/ziv/files/engagement-barometer_corona_befragung_2021-06_ergebnisse.pdf. (2) Sources of data on Austria: Millner, R. C. Mittelberger, M. Mehrwald, L. Weissinger, P. Vandor, and M. Meyer. 2020. “Auswirkungen der COVID-19 Pandemie auf die soziale Infrastruktur in Österreich”. In COVID-19: Analyse der sozialen Lage in Österreich. Vienna, BMSGPK: 92–150. Austrian Federal Ministry of Social Affairs, Health, Care and Consumer Protection (BMSGPK), Vienna. ISBN 978-3-85010-627-6. Also available at https://epub.wu.ac.at/7786/; Meyer et al. (2021) Partnership in Times of COVID-19: Government and Civil Society in Austria:. Nonprofit Policy Forum, Vol. 12 (Issue 1), pp. 65–92. https://doi.org/10.1515/npf-2020-0052. (3) Sources of data on the United Kingdom: COVID-19 voluntary sector impact barometer. Nottingham Trent University, Sheffield Hallam University, National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO). //http://cpwop.org.uk/what-we-do/projects-and-publications/covid-19-vcse-organisation-responses/; http://cpwop.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2021/02/NTU-Covid-voluntary-sector-report-Feb-2021_DIGITAL.pdf; http://cpwop.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2021/08/RRR-August-21-Report.pdf; http://cpwop.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2021/01/Respond-recover-reset-Covid-19-voluntary-sector-report_Jan2021.pdf. (4) Sources of data on the USA: Deitrick, L., Tinkler, T., Strawser, C., & Young, E. (2020). Nonprofit response to COVID-19: The immediate impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on San Diego County nonprofits. San Diego, CA: The Nonprofit Institute, University of San Diego. //https://digital.sandiego.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1003&context=npi-npissues; The U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency. (2020). COVID-19’s Impact on the Human and Social Services Sector. Washington, D.C.: FEMA. //https://www.fema.gov/sites/default/files/2020-11/fema_covid-19-impact-human-social-services-sector_best-practice_11-16-20.pdf; The Continuing Impact Of Covid-19 On The Social Sector (US) //https://www.lapiana.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/R2-COVID-Data-Share-Final.pdf?ver=2020-05-07-094644-193; NORP SURVEY SERIES#8 SPRING 2020. Nonprofit Organization Research Panel (NORP) Project Andrew Young School of Policy Studies Georgia State University. //https://norpanel.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/NORP-Survey-Report_8.pdf; Impact of the Pandemic & Economic Shutdown on the Nonprofit Sector: Charity Navigator //https://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=content.view&cpid=7900.
Across all regimes the pandemic caused a considerable decline in the scope and capacity of nonprofit sectors. However, the available data suggests that nonprofits operating in the liberal regime came off worse than those operating within the framework of the welfare partnership model: the share of nonprofits that canceled their programs in the USA is higher than in Germany, and surveys did not register German NPOs that significantly or completely canceled activities while in the USA no less than one half of surveyed NPOs were forced to do so. The pandemic caused reduction in the nonprofit workforce, organizations in the USA, UK, Austria resorted to lay-offs or unpaid vacations of paid staff. In Germany lay-offs or complete cancellations of programs and projects are likely to have happened, too, but on such a scale that they were not registered in survey data we analyzed for Germany. The country stands off in this respect.
The pandemic moved the structure of the nonprofit sectors in favor of the service-providing segment. Demand for NPO services showed mixed trends during the pandemic, with the demand for social support services growing, as indicated in Table 1, while demand for cultural and recreational services declining. According to experts, the nonprofit cultural and recreational segment will be slow to recover from the crisis (Martin, Gehling and Buteau 2021; Rich and Shekova 2021; Schrader, Roth, and Strachwitz 2020), while beneficiaries’ demand will accelerate the service-providing segment’s recovery and probably entail a long-term structural shift in favor of NPOs that provide social support services.
The pandemic induced governments to launch major support programs for the nonprofit sector (see e.g. Government of the UK 2020a, 2020b, 2021; National Council of Nonprofits 2021a, 2021b; Millner et al. 2020; Schrader, Roth, and Strachwitz 2020; Zimmer and Priller 2021). The pandemic is not yet completely over, and exact statistical data to assess the impact of the influx of pandemic-related government funding on the overall structure of nonprofit sector income is not yet available. However, in 2020–2021 Corona-related government funding was very significant for counteracting loss of nonprofits’ income from other sources and reflects a push towards further integration of the nonprofit sector into the welfare state.
A detailed interpretation of the pandemic impact on the volunteer work force goes beyond the scope of this paper. However, we have reviewed sufficient evidence suggesting that Corona-related government measures included restrictions on volunteers’ access into health institutions and on assisting elderly and disabled people at home, and led NPOs to seek solutions in the form of more professional volunteering.
Summarizing the findings of this section we conclude that the pandemic confronted nonprofit sectors in the selected countries with similar difficulties. We observe that SOT measurable parameters of nonprofit sectors show a common vector of change: in 2020–2021 the pandemic crisis strengthened what L. Salamon believed to be inherent characteristics of the welfare partnership regime and stimulated deeper integration of the nonprofit sectors into the welfare states in all four selected countries. Within the framework of SOT typology this integration suggests convergence towards the welfare partnership model. However, the evidence of the regimes’ convergence has to be weighed against indications of nonprofit sectors’ path dependency and viability of the nonprofit regime typology within the framework of SOT.
3.2 Pandemic-Induced Transformations: Addressing Regime-Specific Responses to Common Challenges
3.2.1 Welfare Partnership (Germany)
This pattern is distinguished by a substantial civil society sector workforce, mostly focused on service activities and heavily supported by the government (Salamon, Sokolowski, and Haddock 2017, 102). It is traditionally exemplified by Germany whose nonprofit sector is highly integrated into the country’s welfare state (Archambault, Priller, and Zimmer 2014). Against the background of changes caused by the pandemic that are common to the nonprofit sectors of all the countries under review, Germany shows specific features that could be expected under the “welfare partnership” model.
As compared to countries that represent other regimes, the German nonprofit sector was in a more sustainable economic situation (see Table 1). The deterioration of the German NPOs’ financial situation was less dramatic, as a relatively “modest” 38% share of the organizations was affected and only 5% found their financial difficulties threatening the existence of the organization. During the crisis, German NPOs were in a better position to retain their paid staff, because nonprofit service providers heavily rely on government funding, including funding by allowances of the social and health insurances as well as on funding from regional governments and municipalities.
Within the framework of a welfare partnership regime, numerous programs were launched by the Federal and regional German governments aimed at buffering the pandemic crisis effects on the nonprofits as early as April 2020 (Bundesfinanzministerium 2021). Although this support was embedded in an overall “Corona Protective Umbrella” program targeting the country’s economy in general, government support tools were remarkably well adjusted to the specific operating conditions of nonprofits. For example, the Bridging Allowance Program (Überbrückungshilfe für kleine und mittelständische Unternehmen) targeted at SMEs to compensate up to 80% fixed costs in case of COVID-related loss of income of 70 or more percent, enabled nonprofits to count as lost income not only the reduction in earned income but also reduced funding from other financial sources, such as membership dues, grants and sponsorship (Ueberbrueckungshilfe 2021). The Short-term Salary Compensation Program (Kurzarbeitergeld) which in Germany is a well-tested tool for avoiding dismissal of skilled staff in times of economic crises, took into account specifics of nonprofit operations and allowed organizations to claim compensations if paid staff working reduced hours or not working at all took up volunteering. The Bridging Allowance Program and many regional and municipal programs in Germany channeled support to nonprofits mostly through non-refundable government grants.
Another prominent feature of the German government support effort was the extension of support beyond service-providing organizations and to nonprofits not immediately involved in fighting COVID – a feature typical of the welfare partnership regime where government-nonprofit relations mostly follow cooperative behavior patterns. The Reboot Culture Program (Neustart für Kultur) launched in Summer 2020 by the Federal government provided for sizeable funds to nonprofits engaged in Culture and the Arts (Bundesregierung 2020). Many regional and municipal governments followed suit and introduced support programs targeting beyond Culture and Arts segments of the sector, including sports, amateur musician clubs etc.[2]
Summarizing the above findings through the lens of SOT, we may observe that pandemic-induced transformations in Germany strengthened the nonprofit welfare partnership pattern, enhancing cooperation between the government and nonprofits and fortifying the embeddedness of the sector in the welfare state.
3.2.2 Social Democratic Regime (Austria)
SOT defines the social democratic pattern as one characterized by a fairly sizable nonprofit workforce, mostly composed of volunteers and heavily oriented toward expressive functions, with a considerably smaller share of government funding in nonprofit income, if compared to the welfare partnership regime. Austria is attributed to this pattern due to the configuration of the measurable parameters of its nonprofit sector, although the balance of power relations which brought about this configuration is not fairly typical for the social democratic pattern (Salamon, Sokolowski, and Haddock 2017, 107, 203–210). More recently authors studying the transformative processes in the Austrian nonprofit sector note that the share of the sector’s service segment has been growing, mainly due to the growing number of NPO service providers that support socially vulnerable populations, with the government funding such services on a contractual basis (Leisch, Pennerstorfer, and Schneider 2016). This measurable change in government-nonprofit interaction suggests that the Austrian social democratic model of the nonprofit sector had been evolving towards a cross-sectoral cooperation pattern for a period of time of five to seven years preceding the pandemic (Pape 2019). In a most recent research paper, building on SOT, and offering a historical narrative of Vienna’s Civil Society Organizations, the Austrian civil society is characterized as already belonging to a multilateral neo-corporatist model (Maier, Meyer, and Terzieva 2022).
Adhering to the original typology of nonprofit regimes put forward by Anheier and Salamon, we observe that during the pandemic the Austrian nonprofit sector model drew even closer to the welfare partnership pattern. Researchers of the NPO and Social Entrepreneurship Competence Center at the Vienna University of Economics and Business analyzed the government-nonprofit relations during the pandemic concluding that the establishment of an NPO Support Fund under federal law represents an important shift in government-nonprofit relations, especially after the Austrian Parliament recognized the nonprofit sector, for the first time ever, as the government’s important social partner (Meyer et al. 2021, 73). Not only the considerable size of funding allocated from the federal budget to support NPOs, € 945 million as of September 2021, is indicative of this, but also the fact that the funds were disbursed in form of grants rather than contractual payments for services provided, as was typical for Austria before. Importantly, the government’s priority support from the Fund benefited NPOs providing social services to vulnerable populations. Such NPOs filed 5.8% of the applications but received 24.4% of all the Fund’s monies distributed in by the end of December 2020. Overall, Austrian service-providing nonprofits received 43.6% of the funds allocated (health and social assistance services to vulnerable populations, 24.4%; education and science, 14.7; voluntary fire brigades, 4.5%), although service-providing NPOs accounted for only 25.1% of the total number of applications for support (Parliament of Austria 2021, 11–19).
The composition of the government support “tool kit” and the Austrian government’s priorities with regard to the missions of nonprofits supported leads to expect the service-providing segment of the nonprofit sector to survive the crisis with smaller losses than those suffered by the cultural and recreational organizations. Experts believe that the situation in Austria already favors the formation of a long-term agenda for stronger government-nonprofit cooperation in the social sphere after the pandemic (Millner et al. 2020, 130–133).
3.2.3 The Liberal Regime (UK, USA)
The SOT typology positions the UK, like the USA, in the ‘liberal’ pattern. This pattern features a relatively large nonprofit sector supported extensively by private sources – such as market sales, philanthropy, and volunteer work – and relatively less so by government (Salamon, Sokolowski, and Haddock 2017. pр. 86–87; 99–100). Under the liberal nonprofit regime, the government engages NPOs as well as for-profit businesses on a competitive basis as service providers. This constitutes the liberal pattern’s important distinction from welfare partnership regime. Under the latter regime, the nonprofit sector is the government’s preferred partner in the provision of government-funded social services, and the nonprofits are deeply integrated into the system for the provision of social goods to the population.
Under the nonprofit liberal pattern, NPOs in the UK turned out to be more vulnerable to the pandemic than in countries like Germany that feature the welfare partnership regime. By late 2020, up to 75% of UK NPOs expected a long-term decline in their ability to perform their mission due to the crisis (National Council of Voluntary Organizations 2021, 10). Reliance on the sector’s own resources, typical of the liberal pattern, proved less than sustainable, for the pandemic-induced crisis developed in three dimensions simultaneously. Firstly, the lockdowns suspended income-generating activities and affected NPO social enterprise strategies that are widespread in the UK nonprofit sector. The charity funds’ investment return declined as well. Secondly, the lockdowns hindered the volunteers’ work. Thirdly, increased demand for NPOs’ social support amid the pandemic overwhelmed the organization’s capacity (Macmillan 2020).
Pandemic-induced transformations in the UK nonprofit sector affected government – nonprofit relations, altered the level of government support and the structure of the government support tool kit. The amount of public funding for NPOs increased substantially in 2020–2021, as the government formed a special £750m package of incentives for non-profit organizations and social entrepreneurs. Singling out nonprofits for targeted government support represents an important transformative shift in the liberal regime of the UK nonprofit sector. Recognition of nonprofit sector’s special social role by the government was reaffirmed by the Parliament in a hearing evaluating the implementation of public support measures for NPOs (UK House of Commons 2020).
However, our analysis of the nonprofit support tool kit used in the UK suggests that the liberal nonprofit regime in this country remains mainly intact, despite some apparent drift towards convergence with the welfare partnership pattern.
Firstly, the key tools of government emergency financial relief during the pandemic, such as the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme; Business Interruption Loan Scheme; Retail, Hospitality and Leisure Grant Fund, and Coronavirus Local Authority Discretionary Grants, were not developed to specifically support the nonprofit sector and only granted nonprofits access to funds earmarked for small and medium businesses without regard to nonprofit organizational special features. For example, to access one of the most coveted government support tools, the Business Interruption Loan Scheme, NPOs had to prove that in the pre-crisis period at least 50% of their income was “earned income”. This excluded many small NPOs that had existed on charitable donations or used volunteer work (UK House of Commons 2020). After the parliamentary hearing, the nonprofit sector’s opinion was heeded and charities were exempted from the above requirement.
Similarly, access to the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme was made conditional on empolyees’ full separation from work, so their own organization could not continue employing them even on a volunteer basis. This requirement, too, ignored the specifics of NPOs that sought to continue to provide their charitable services with the help of volunteers, not being able to pay their staff. Notably, a similar support tool used under the welfare partnership pattern in Germany (Kurzarbeitergeld) was far more responsive to NPOs’ specific needs and permitted the continued part-time employment of staff members, and did not restrict volunteering, including volunteering in their own organization.
Secondly, support in the form of government grants provided to NPOs in the UK also bears a visible imprint of the liberal nonprofit sector regime. Thus, only “frontline” nonprofits counteracting the pandemic were eligible to apply. That approach was criticized at the parliamentary hearing, and the government was asked to consider providing support to the entire sector’s infrastructure, so that the sector could resume development once the crisis was over (UK House of Commons 2020, 11–13).
Thirdly, a major focus of the UK government were large-scale efforts to strengthen the capacity of charitable foundations offering financial support to non-profit organizations during the pandemic. Fostering private philanthropy is a tool typical of the liberal model of the nonprofit sector.
To sum up our review of the pandemic-induced transformations in the UK nonprofit liberal pattern, we can observe that targeted government support to NPOs has become a notable sign of convergence towards welfare partnership. However, British experts doubt that the intensified cooperation between the government and NPOs in addressing pandemic-induced social problems, underpinned by substantial government support to NPOs, will continue after the pandemic crisis is over (Harris 2021). A more probable scenario is that the UK nonprofit sector and its relations with the government will retain fundamental typological features of the liberal pattern, with its distinctions from the welfare partnership and social democratic regimes, due to path dependency.
SOT attributes the USA, like the UK, to the liberal pattern (Salamon, Sokolowski, and Haddock 2017, 101–102). According to L.Salamon, the U.S. version of the liberal nonprofit sector model is distinguished by a broader spectrum of government-funded social services with delivery outsourced to nonprofit organizations. The result being a country-specific “amalgam of a welfare partnership and liberal pattern” (Salamon, Sokolowski, and Haddock 2017, 102).
Indeed, the U.S. public authorities officially recognize crucial importance of NPOs as partners in the provision of social services to citizens. The government funds major social programs, but nonprofits play a major role as service providers (FEMA 2020. Pp 1, 7). Private providers account for more than 60% of the jobs in the U.S. social service sector (FEMA 2020, 7). In that private segment, nonprofits account for e.g. 71% of jobs in education, 43% in health services and 41% in social assistance (Salamon and Newhouse 2020, 6).
However the U.S. pattern retains its main typological liberal features and its coherence. The U.S. nonprofit sector, including its service-providing segment, remains heavily dependent on philanthropy and fees. Public funding accounts for less than one-third of U.S. nonprofits’ revenues (National Council of Nonprofits 2019, 19–20).
In view of the typological features of the SOT liberal pattern, it was predictable that U.S. nonprofits were strongly affected by the pandemic-induced crisis. The share of U.S. nonprofits that had to scale down their activities, suffered financial difficulties/revenue decline and/or had difficulty attracting volunteers was the highest among the countries reviewed here (see Table 1). Between February and the end of May 2020, the U.S. nonprofit sector lost more than 1.6 million jobs, equvalent to 13% of their paid staff (Salamon and Newhouse 2020, 13).
Like elswhere, cultural and recreational nonprofits were the hardest-hit segment of the U.S. nonprofits (JHU 2020, 2021). As noted above, this structural shift in favor of a larger service-providing segment may be considered indicative of convergence with the welfare partnership pattern.
In the USA, the set of government support measures for the nonprofit sector at the federal level was enacted by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (US Congress 2020) (hereinafter referred to as CARES) and the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) (US Congress 2021). These measures included tax credits, government loans, tax deductions stimulating private donations, federal co-funding for state, local, and tribal governments’ nonprofit support programs (IRS 2020; US Congress 2020, Sec. 2301). In terms of SOT the measures can be considered as elements of a liberal nonprofit support tool kit. Only a few innovations in the government nonprofit support tools went beyond the “standard” American variety of the liberal model. These include the option of converting Paycheck Protection Program Loans and Economic Injury Disaster Loans into non-repayable government grants, made available to small NPOs under CARES Secs. 1106 and 1110, and the terms and conditions of the contracts being concluded between the government and NPOs for the provision of social services that were improved by the ARPA so that nonprofits could include indirect costs, particularly administrative and organization development costs, into government contracts (National Council of Nonprofits 2021b).
The evaluation of regime-specific responses to pandemic-induced challenges in the context of the typology proposed in the SOT suggests that the U.S. version of the liberal pattern proved resilient in 2020–2021. Transformative processes have somewhat strengthened the welfare partnership features inherent in the country-specific U.S. version of the liberal pattern.
3.3 Discussion of the Results
Applying SOT analytical instruments to the study of the transformations that affected the structure of the nonprofit sector and government-nonprofit relations during the 2020–2021 pandemic, allowed to identify a common vector of change in the countries reviewed. Overall, the pandemic crisis moved SOT core measurable parameters towards a combination considered typical of the welfare partnership model. That includes a growing share of the service-providing segment of the nonprofit sectors, expanded government support for the sector with official recognition by governments of the sector’s importance for sustaining social service provision in crisis.
We have highlighted above some important policy statements to this effect made in the UK and Austria. The U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency, in its report analyzing the human and social services sector during the pandemic, also highly praises the contribution of private social service providers and, among them, of nonprofits in particular to the social and economic development of states and municipalities, pointing out positive impact of nonprofit service providers on other sectors of the economy (FEMA 2020).
The level of government support to the nonprofit sector will probably go down after the pandemic ends. However, the transformations triggered by the pandemic are likely to entail deeper integration of the nonprofit sectors into the welfare states in all four countries reviewed. The case of Germany suggests that “path dependency” might become the dominant future development track for welfare partnership regime countries. To confirm this hypothesis further research on more countries belonging to the welfare partnership pattern is needed. In countries with other nonprofit regimes we may expect to see a fair measure of convergence towards the welfare partnership pattern, as some practices “borrowed” from the welfare partnership pattern in times of crisis gain permanent presence.
It is worth noting that pandemic-induced convergence of nonprofit regimes occurs in a direction that SOT authors predicted at an early stage of the theory’s development. According to Salamon and Anheier (1996, 20), “…the prospects for a liberal model are not good. More likely is either a corporatist or statist outcome depending on a variety of other social and historical circumstances”. This convergent transformation was predicted because “…in the corporatist model, extensive cooperation between government and the nonprofit sector is anticipated…” whereas “…government and the third sector are perceived as alternatives in the liberal and social welfare models but as partners in the corporatist model…” (Salamon and Anheier 1998, 230). Our analysis shows that the pandemic crisis stimulated government-nonprofit cooperation in all nonprofit regimes.
The analytical lens provided by SOT helps not only to identify elements of pandemic-induced convergence between nonprofit regimes but also enables us to understand regime-specific responses to common challenges nonprofit sectors in countries reviewed faced in the crisis period.
Comparative sustainability of German nonprofit sector can be attributed to the fact that pandemic-induced transformations “favored” the welfare regime, and some of the regime-specific tools could be employed for adjustment in times of crisis. “Path dependency” turned out to be a comparative strength of the German nonprofit sector. A remarkable resilience of the American variety of the liberal model during the pandemic could be seen as predictable when viewed through the lens of the strong “path dependency” pertaining to the special role nonprofit providers play within the “third party government” solutions established in the American social service provision system. As for UK, SOT analytical tools applied to explore the transformations of nonprofit sector in this country imply two potential scenarios. On the one hand, there are signs of evolution toward the welfare partnership model. On the other hand, there is evidence, as shown above, that “path dependency” may turn out to be a dominant trend shaping government-nonprofit interaction in the UK. In Austria, the pandemic-related transformations in government-nonprofit relations appear to have strengthened changes which had already gone on for some time before the pandemic. Cooperation between the government and non-profits in times of crisis links up well with the proliferation of third-party government approaches with respect to the social services delivery in Austrian welfare state in the pre-pandemic years. Consequently, we may expect the Austrian social democratic model to drift even further towards the welfare partnership regime.
4 Concluding Remarks
We have highlighted basic conceptual similarities between SOT, WRT and VoCT, namely complex relationships between “vertical” and “horizontal” interactions in various institutional contexts, which laid the foundation for numerous typologies identifying interrelationships of state, market, and the nonprofit sector.
However, while the discussion of WRT and VoCT development tends to encompass both typology modification and the refinement of theoretical frameworks as applied to the changing socio-economic realities, SOT further development largely focused on modifications of the basic typology. Studies attempting to advance SOT beyond its original conceptual framework are relatively few. As compared to the studies that apply WRT and VoCT approaches in the context of modern global crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, a lack of studies looking into the current changes in state-nonprofit sector relations through the SOT analytical lens is noticeable.
Applying SOT core parameters to investigate transformative processes in state-nonprofit sector interactions affected by the pandemic crisis, we identified certain convergence of liberal and social democratic nonprofit models with the welfare partnership model in the countries under research. Nonetheless, signs of conversion with the welfare partnership model are observed together with the persistent specific features of each model owing to path dependency.
Obviously, our conclusion is preliminary due to the limited amount of data and countries observed. This conclusion merits further investigation and more empirical evidence, particularly to evaluate the sustainability of the observed trend in the longer-term perspective and examine the interaction patterns of convergence and path dependency in various nonprofit regimes.
Cross-country examination of new trends in the relationship between state and the nonprofit sector affected by current challenges through SOT theoretical lens will serve to enrich our perception of the global third sector and realize the analytical potential of SOT to a fuller degree.
Funding source: This paper is an output of a research project implemented as part of the Basic Research Program at the National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE University)
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