From Crowdfunding to Crowd Mobilization: The Impact of Digital Philanthropy on Grassroots Organizations and Local Politics in China

Abstract

The recent emergence of online crowdfunding campaigns has transformed the charitable landscape in China. This paper examines the participation of one county-level grassroots nonprofit organization (SW) in Tencent’s 99 Giving Day to reveal a paradox of organizational success in online crowdfunding, namely that local nonprofits have to wage corresponding offline campaigns with the support of the local government, and thus must co-evolve with local politics. While the online charitable campaign played a crucial role in the founding and professionalization of SW, the successful campaign was soon co-opted by the local government as a source of welfare soft-budgeting and performance management. To ensure the ongoing success of the three-day campaign, the online crowdfunding was transformed into a large-scale offline mobilization. We find that although crowdfunding creates new opportunities for rural grassroots organizations, these organizations must balance dual pressures from both the platform and the local government to successfully crowdfund online.