I spent this summer interning at a foundation in DC, Ploughshares Fund, that does all of its grantmaking in the nuclear weapons / nonproliferation / disarmament / terrorism sphere. Of the handful of foundations engaged in this space, Ploughshares Fund has one of the largest footprints, measured both in endowment size and "bang for the buck" -- the caliber of projects being completed by Ploughshares-backed organizations.
For me, it was fascinating to sit on a perch, so to speak, and see what kinds of interesting and exciting projects our grantees were pursuing with the money we provided them. It also led me to realize the strength of the network that Ploughshares is able to build through its grantmaking. Behold the power of money! Whether working on advocacy campaigns around the national budget or identifying key experts to put together a panel on Iran's nuclear program or Pakistan's accelerated nuclear weapons buildup, the network of think tanks and experts that are funded by Ploughshares could be summoned, often on very short notice, to put together reports, briefings, talking points, and more.
Over the course of the summer, I also noticed that while the think tank community in DC is tremendous, and while the security and defense community within that circle is still fairly large, and even while the nuclear-focused group within THAT is still sizable, the same names and personalities started popping up.
So I've been thinking about the relationships Ploughshares Fund maintains with nuclear-focused experts, both at the individual level and at the institutional level. What I'd like to do, therefore, is develop a knowledge analysis of the DC-area nuclear-focused community by constructing an ego network around Ploughshares Fund. This exercise will help me see not only who the foundation's most frequent individual collaborators are (on presentations, panels, Congressional hearings, books, articles, manuscripts, media appearances, etc.), but also what relationships are strongest between Ploughshares Fund and other institutions, regardless of whether they are actually funded by Ploughshares. That is, what organizations (think tanks, academic research centers, grassroots / advocacy organizations, etc.) come to the forefront in terms of working closely with the foundation?
Answering this question would be crucial to identifying the fields in which Ploughshares could reassess its funding strategy for upcoming fiscal years. From the data gathered and inferences made from the ego network as described above, one could determine those individuals and organizations that collaborate most frequently with Ploughshares Fund. More importantly, the network analysis would help isolate individuals and organizations that currently do not receive funding from Ploughshares.
This creates space to determine what grantees should be funded by Ploughshares in upcoming grantmamking cycles. After all, grantmaking is a two-way street -- while organizations can submit a grant proposal for Ploughshares to consider, the foundation can also take an active approach to grantmaking by aggressively identifying and courting potential grantees.
This network analysis would have the additional benefit of identifying those organizations and individuals that are currently funded by Ploughshares and yet are not close collaborators on projects and campaigns. This insight can assist Ploughshares in deciding which grants should be renewed for the following fiscal year and which should be terminated.
Using network analysis tools to determine a foundation's current and future grantmaking mix would be a novel departure from the current funding process, which does rely on connections amongst individuals and organizations to identify reliable experts, but in a less formal and structured way. As a result, grantmaking in the DC-area security community can be rather hit-or-miss, with some grantees doing amazing things and others remaining fairly static.
Money is a powerful motivator, but I find true effort and brilliant work comes only when strong relationships are built amongst individuals and groups that share not only common goals, but the same level of drive and ambition to achieve those objectives. The knowledge network analysis proposed above would help create those synergies in a more efficient and proactive manner.
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3 comments:
This is OK, but it leaves us with some questions. Do you really mean construct just an egonet of Ploughshares? If you do, then you miss all the interconnections between them and their collaborators. How are you going to measure strength of relationship. Is it frequency of contact? How are you going to identify "potential grantees?" What kinds of SNA analysis would you use? etc.
I meant "...interconnections between their collaborators." Leave out the "them and"
Great questions, and certainly I should devote some more thought to the details of the analysis.
You're right that an egonet alone would be insufficient to measure connections amongst Ploughshares collaborators. A larger network displaying the strength of connections amongst these individuals and organizations would be necessary to provide the requisite insight to impact funding strategy.
This connection strength would be reflected in a survey question asking how frequently in a given time period the survey-taker has collaborated with a given organization on a certain issue, with responses on a scale of 0 to 5. It would be important to ask this question across multiple time periods (quarter, year, five years, etc.), which would help understand trends, with a view to determining what organizations are "up and coming."
It would be interesting to use a variety of centrality measures, including degree and betweenness (and maybe eigenvector) to determine what organizations in the network are sought out often for advice, expertise, publications, collaboration, etc.
Potential grantees are then determined by comparing the results of this network analysis, which identifies key players in the space, with the list of Ploughshares grantees (which at a minimum is publicly available on the foundation's website). Those that have become or are on the verge of becoming expert organizations but are not currently receiving grants from Ploughshares Fund should be considered by the foundation for future funding.
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