RACIAL JUSTICE AUDIT 2023
Our Audit
‘The audit has highlighted helpful trends, but also uncomfortable ones. It has allowed us to start an equity-based approach where we intentionally target communities that need us the most, communities who have historically not benefitted from funders. Thank you to FREA.’
Funder and member of FREA, 2024
The results of our fourth cohort of the racial justice audit are now available! This helps funders assess how much funding is reaching Black and Minoritised communities.
One of our key objectives is to increase sustainable and flexible funding for Black and Minortised-led organisations. To achieve this, we've designed a racial justice audit tool to enable funders to:
Identify the trends, patterns and how much funding addresses racial justice work*
Produce a snapshot of current portfolios and create a baseline to track funding on a yearly basis
Implement targets and strategies to ensure funders are advancing racial justice work
Allow greater transparency of current foundation expenditure.
In 2023, 14 funders submitted details of 1879 grants, 1362 of which were audited totalling £64.3m. These organisations represented a mix of large, small, specialist and generalist UK funders (see below for full list).
Our Key Findings
Just over half of grants (52%) addressing the root causes of racial inequity are projects related to campaigning and influencing.
The majority (61%) of grants addressing the symptoms of racial inequity are grants providing services.
In comparison to the third cohort, there was a 19% decrease in the percentage of overall funding intended to benefit Black and Minoritised communities.
The average annual grant to organisations led by people who reflect the communities they serve was a third (32%) lower than organisations whose leadership did not reflect their communities.
The average size of grants designed to benefit communities experiencing racial inequity was 23% higher than grants not intended for that purpose.
There has been an increase in funding to organisations led by and for Black/African/Caribbean/Black British communities. In comparison to the third cohort, funding to these communities has increased from 5% to 10% of the total audited.
The story behind the data
The 2023 audit results used the learning from previous cohorts, as well as feedback from funders and the FREA audit group on how we can strengthen this tool and maximize its reach and impact.
One of the major changes made since the last audit was to include questions on the start and end date of grants. This information was used to determine the length of grants, in order to get a truer sense of yearly funding to Black and Minoritised groups and communities. We also reviewed the audit booklet to make it simpler for funders to complete and to correct some inconsistencies in the language used.
As with previous cohorts, we asked funders for information about their funding for their last financial year, recognising the differences in audit period for funders. This meant we ended up with grants awarded in 2023 as well as some from 2022 - using only data from one year from all funders and excluding grants that did not meet this criteria.
Apart from general information, we asked questions related to the grant itself and about the organisation receiving the grant.
If you would like to see the story of our audit, please access our previous cohorts.
In 2023, 14 funders submitted details of 1879 grants, 1362 of which were included in the audit, with the total sample size of £64.3m.
DATA RESULTS
Grant purpose: Is it designed to benefit communities experiencing racial inequity?
Out of the total amount of grants audited, 27% were designed to benefit communities experiencing racial inequity. These grants totalled £17.5m.
No/Unknown 73%
Yes 27%
Length and size of grants by purpose
The average size of grant intended to benefit communities experiencing racial inequity was 23% larger than grants not intended for that purpose. Further breakdown by the length of grant also shows that grants intended to benefit Black and Minoritised communities are higher in value.
30% of grants intended to benefit communities experiencing racial inequity lasted 2 years or longer. In contrast, 17% grants not intended to benefit these communities were two years or longer. This tells us that grants to Black and Minoritised communities were awarded for a longer period of time.
Leadership and type of organisation
For grants intended to benefit Black and Minoritised communities, two thirds (67%) of organisations had mission/purpose to serve communities experiencing racial inequity. Of these, the majority were for organisations serving a mixed group of organisations, rather than a specific community.
Less than a sixth of organisations (14%) self-identified as having leadership with shared lived experience of their beneficiaries. 58% of grants intended to benefit Black and Minoritised communities were awarded to these organisations.
Grants designed to serve communities experiencing racial inequity
Over 50% of grants addressed the symptoms of racial inequity with 37% addressing root causes. Grants addressing the root causes of racial inequity were larger and awarded for a longer period of time. These grants were twice the financial value of grants addressing symptoms of racial inequity.
The largest percentage of grants addressing the root causes of racial inequity are campaigning/influencing projects. And the largest percentage of grants addressing the symptoms of racial inequity are grants providing services.
If you’re a funder, and would like to complete the Audit for the next cohort, email us!
Clarifications
No individual funder data is published in the Alliance’s findings.
Our audit takes into account approximately the same number (but lower value) of grants as was covered in the two previous audits combined, but with a substantially larger number of foundations.
*We understand and recognise that there can be differing views on terminology and how best to discuss the race equality agenda. “Black and Minoritised” was the language chosen when the tool was initially developed in 2019 after consulting race equality campaigners and advocates in order to ensure consistency with the sector. However, we are conscious of the evolution of language, identity and limitations of these terms, as well as the sensitivities and complexities involved. We endeavour to constantly review this language for future work.
**The criteria used to classify a Black and Minoritised-led organisation required that organisations have both a mission and purpose to benefit Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic communities and the majority of their leadership (at 75% of the senior team and the Trustee board) are from the Minoritised community(ies) the organisation serves.
A message from our chair
A very warm thank you to all funders who have completed the audit this year and to all of you in conversation with us. Your support and input are invaluable.
To those driving those conversations within your organisation and beyond: you are seen and appreciated. FREA is here to support you, so please get in touch if we can help.
Collecting and analysing data is key to understanding the current philanthropic and grantmaking landscape. Data collection is a critical tool that enables us to deepen, together, our understanding of funding inequalities in the UK whilst designing sustainable solutions.
This year, our data demonstrates that the race equality sector remains underfunded and, whilst we applaud the emergence of longer-term multi-year funding opportunities, we recognise that together, with focused strategy and commitment, we will achieve so much more.
Nelly Koko-Konan