25 Years of Mobilizing Philanthropy
By: John Barnes
Setting the Stage
1987 was a momentous year. President Reagan was embroiled in the Iran Contra affair in the same year that he famously called upon Soviet President, Mikhail Gorbachev to “tear down this wall” in Berlin, and nominated Robert Bork to the Supreme Court. Televangelist Pat Robertson launched his campaign for the presidency and the Dow Jones Industrial Average hit historic highs at 2,000 and 2,500 before crashing on “Black Monday”. In pop culture, Aretha Franklin was inducted in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, while future global health activist, Bono, released Joshua Tree with U2; plans were unveiled for Euro Disney and The Simpsons were introduced to American television audiences.
While all of this was going on, the bourgeoning community of people living with AIDS, and those who loved them, was beginning to organize -- after dealing with half a decade of a mysterious-illness-turned-global-epidemic. Only three years prior, the HIV virus had been discovered, and just the previous year President Reagan had spoken of AIDS publicly for the first time. AIDS cases had been reported in every region of the world and unknowing millions awaited diagnosis. Passage of the Helms Amendment in Congress, which prohibited use of federal funds to “promote homosexuality” helped to galvanize forces such as ACT UP to begin to wage advocacy campaigns that would change business as usual in the delivery of care and development of drugs forever. In 1987, the approval of AZT as the first drug to treat AIDS offered new hope in a fight against a foe that heretofore had seemed invincible.
It was against this backdrop that Michael Seltzer initiated an effort to organize a philanthropic response to the growing crisis. In his words, “We could no longer stand by while the fight against the nation’s soon-to-be number one public health threat was being financed solely by raffle ticket sales. Philanthropy had to take its place at the table to support the hundreds of AIDS service, prevention, and advocacy efforts that were mushrooming across the country and around the world”. Thus FCAA was born as a project of the New York Community Trust with Seltzer as Executive Director and Joyce Bove, founding board chair.
25 years later
This year FCAA marks its 25th year of mobilizing philanthropic leadership, ideas and resources in the fight against AIDS. Since 1987, FCAA has monitored and informed the philanthropic response to AIDS – conducting research, analyzing trends, facilitating best practice sharing and fostering collaboration.
The history of the philanthropic response to AIDS demonstrates the power of private funders to drive innovation and develop models of prevention, care and service delivery for replication and scale up. One of the earliest examples of this was in 1986, when Robert Wood Johnson Foundation launched the AIDS Health Services Program to direct resources to the hardest hit cities. This initiative paved the way for the Ryan White Care Act, the central component of the federal government’s domestic efforts. Since that time, private philanthropy has helped to fuel advocacy efforts that have dramatically increased commitments of public support around the world.
In the last two years, however, the global financial crisis has led to dangerous reductions in both public and private resources to support efforts in prevention, treatment, care and research. This at a time when the careful and hard-won investments of the past have begun to yield promising results in reducing new infections and providing care and support in the regions of the world most impacted by HIV.
Over the coming months we will be revisiting the history of the philanthropic response to HIV/AIDS to celebrate our achievements, and importantly, to reconnect to the energy and urgency of our beginnings.
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JB