An Ecological Perspective on Nonprofit Research

Abstract

's chapter (this volume) is a work of remarkable scope, which cuts a trail through most of the issues that engage nonprofit researchers. The underbrush is thick and one can only marvel at the sharpness and clarity with which he slices away to reveal, in some cases, cumulating wisdom and, in others, more interesting and sophisticated research problems. Rather than follow Professor Steinberg's trail, I would like to make a few selective observations about the enterprise of research on nonprofits and markets that he summarizes so well. In doing so, I feel a little bit like Rip van Winkle. Although I have not been asleep for twenty years, I have not systematically surveyed research on nonprofits for some time (DiMaggio and Anheier, 1990), so I return to the field to find a few things that are the same but many that have changed. THREE FALLACIES AND THEIR ANTIDOTES One striking change is that three fallacies that once marked much thinking about nonprofits appear to have vanished. These fallacies-which I call the essen-tialist fallacy, the unified-actor fallacy, and the fallacy of direct effects-appear to