Courageous Conversations: The Success of Black Women Philanthropists in a Challenging Landscape

By Mae Gates, BEC's Director of Philanthropy

Black Philanthropy Month provides a platform to celebrate and cement commitments to funding for people of African descent. It’s an opportunity to highlight the contributions of Black philanthropists as we pioneer cutting-edge solutions that address the core drivers of human indifference experienced by Black populations. 

As the Director of Philanthropy at the Black Equity Collective, I have the privilege and opportunity to amplify the work of Black nonprofits to increase their visibility with institutional, individual, and corporate funders. Our organizational team of 15 Black women continues to innovate how we fulfill the Collective’s mission–joining funders and communities to advance the long-term sustainability of Black-led organizations (BLOs). Before joining team BEC, I served as a Chief of Staff in the California legislature, and I owned a political consulting firm where I offered political fundraising services for candidates and ballot proposition campaigns.

I’ve been able to observe the flow of resources through the c3/c4 ecosystems. I’ve been on the political side, supporting progressive policies and lawmakers in delivering on Black permanency and racial equity. I am now on the c3 side, supporting organizations in holding our government leaders accountable for promises made to Black voters on the campaign trail. Far too often, those promises are broken,  and movement building through 501c3s becomes critical in filling the void created by a lack of cooperative and participatory governance. 

I continuously observe how dynamic Black female philanthropists are. At the Collective, we lean on teachings from our seasoned mentors and leaders in the California Black social impact sector, such as Anthony Thigpenn (founder of California Calls), to guide our fund development and programmatic strategies. We deploy a model of integrated power building that allows us to use inside-outside organizing and public-private partnerships that utilize a plethora of tools such as government, elections, voter engagement, nonprofit management, and policy advocacy. Black female philanthropists recognize that we must employ multifaceted frameworks to advance Black permanency. We utilize mainstream philanthropy to usher targeted investments to BLOs that fund policy advocacy in support of liberatory policies such as reparations. We move the work beyond the lifecycle of a grant. Black women philanthropists are often raising dollars to sustain a movement that will live on beyond one grant term or funder convening. Our philanthropy is directly tied to the liberation of our communities, including liberation from white, heteronormative, and anti-black funding practices that perpetrate a significant funding gap in the field.  

As Black women, we stand at the nexus of the very issues we advocate and fundraise for. We often carry lived experiences of racial, gender, and sexual identity inequities, which make us the best ambassadors for our own liberation movements. We are professionally working on behalf of the Black liberation movement while privately healing from the inequities we are fighting to end. Our work is always personal. Black women philanthropists hold a lot: both intergenerational traumas passed down from the time of enslavement and an ever-evolving world of philanthropy that often dismisses and under-invests in BLOs. 

What amazes me the most about Black female philanthropists is our personal and professional resiliency and commitment to the hard work of becoming–becoming our best and most whole version of ourselves, healed from and perpetually aware of our own interpersonal traumas, to honor the sacrifices of our ancestors by creating a world free from anti-Black racism. We utilize trust-based philanthropy to create the society we want to build and live in. We continue to fundraise competitively and effectively, even in the midst of historic backlash toward racial equity. Black female philanthropists within the Collective and beyond continue to rise above barriers to our success. As we navigate a world that is hell-bent on perpetrating Black erasure, we cultivate courageous hope and unwavering faith in our ability to overcome systemic challenges. We bet on ourselves, and we win–every time.