2026 kicked off with thought leaders across the sector releasing a flurry of reports on the year’s predictions and trends, naming the forces actively reshaping our field: democratic fragility, escalating government overreach, rising political violence, cuts to federal funding, the erosion of DEI protections, the operational strain of donor-advised funds (DAFs), and unprecedented pressure on nonprofits to reorganize or merge.
From funders to advocates, dozens of leaders’ perspectives rightly identified turbulence ahead. Yet among the various recommendations of drivers for change, something was missing from these reports: the naming of movement-rooted philanthropic intermediaries as a necessary part of future solutions. That absence is neither intentional nor reflective of how intermediaries are expansively moving resources across the field, it spotlights a visibility gap that risks reinforcing the inequities that philanthropic investments aim to dismantle.
The Untapped Power of Movement-Rooted Intermediaries
Collaborative funds collectively move between $4 and $7 billion annually across more than 500 funds globally. A recent Philanthropy Together study found that these funds consistently rank in the top 15 percent of all funders nationwide for field impact, advancement of knowledge, and contributions to public policy—and in the top 10 percent for understanding the populations served and the political and socioeconomic conditions shaping grantee work. And yet, that $4 to 7 billion in global investments represents a fraction of the estimated $103.5 billion in annual US foundation giving.
Our sector has developed a shared understanding that community-driven solutions are key to advancing equity. As former Ford Foundation President Darren Walker has noted: “As we continue to address the major challenges of this moment—be it inequality, climate change, or the refugee crisis—we need to get out of our comfort zones, listen to communities, and develop unlikely, unconventional partnerships. We need to tap into relationships and resources that we don’t normally consider.”
Meeting this moment will require a deliberate alignment among funding priorities, data transparency, and the voices of those most impacted.
And community-rooted intermediaries, grounded in the social movements they serve, are a powerful vehicle for ensuring that community voices guide decisions. The infrastructure is proven. The rationale is clear. Yet the investment is not proportionate.
Aligning Priorities to Create a Beautiful Future Together
Today, funders have both the charge and opportunity to close this gap through investments in movement-rooted infrastructure—that is, the community-centered systems and supportive networks that grow directly out of the social movements themselves.
Forecast reports from the Chronicle of Philanthropy to Inside Philanthropy warn that our sector is facing and will increasingly be defined by our ability to respond to:
- Authoritarian pressure and attacks on civic freedom;
- Shrinking social safety nets and widening inequality;
- Narrative manipulation and disinformation;
- Unsustainable nonprofit operating models, including mergers driven by existential distress; and
- A growing expectation that philanthropy must “move together,” “spend more boldly,” and “center people, not institutions.”
Meeting this moment will require a deliberate alignment among funding priorities, data transparency, and the voices of those most impacted by the social, economic, and environmental challenges being addressed. Sitting at the intersection of institutional philanthropy and grassroots movements, community-rooted philanthropic intermediaries make alignment possible, and—by inviting simultaneously diverse opinions and experiences through collaborative positioning—offer iterative possibilities to collectively imagine and create a more promising, beautiful future.
Whether the threat is authoritarianism, disinformation, polarization, or fraying democratic trust, this connective function is exactly what philanthropy must safeguard.
When rooted in community values, collaborative funding can transform not only how resources flow, but how change is imagined, shaped, and sustained.
Building Bridges for Impactful Change
Fortunately, there is a rising understanding of the power of collaborative funds at the field level. A recent Bridgespan Group report, Releasing the Potential of Philanthropic Collaborations, outlines the unique role of collaboratives, including the pursuit of systemic change through “building fields and movements.” Robert Wood Johnson’s report, Working With Intermediaries Strategically, makes clear the sector’s “growing desire for more reciprocity among philanthropic, intermediary, and community partners.” Philanthropy Together’s report, The Collaborative Effect: Grantee Perspectives on How Collaborative Funds Work Best, summarizes: “The question is no longer whether philanthropy can pursue transformative change, but how it can do so while staying grounded in the experiences of those most affected.”
As two former institutional foundation staff members who now lead programming at Borealis Philanthropy—a movement-rooted intermediary—we have seen the approaches and impact of collaborative funds up close. We know firsthand that, when rooted in community values, collaborative funding can transform not only how resources flow, but how change is imagined, shaped, and sustained.
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Movement-rooted intermediaries are transformative because they:
- Translate pluralist values into practice
They bridge philanthropic institutions and donors to grassroots communities and resource a future where many kinds of leaders, communities, and strategies can shape the public good.
- Share responsibility and lighten the frontline administrative burden
They pool funds to distribute philanthropic burden so frontline organizations aren’t forced to absorb it alone.
- Bridge movements and resources to amplify the power of intersectional collaboration
They distribute investments across multiracial, intersectional movements, and serve as a connective tissue between rural and urban movements, between cultural work and civic work, between narrative change and material support.
- Protect and sustain movements through flexible, rapid funding
They steward flexible, multiyear commitments, ensuring movements’ long-term sustainability, and distribute money quickly, ensuring survival in times of crisis.
- Leverage community-rooted networks as insights to spot opportunities and risks
They ensure staff, grantee, and donor networks are rooted in communities that are directly impacted by the social, political, and economic shifts being addressed. Through these connections and learnings, they serve as an aggregator of field knowledge, identifying early threats and opportunities.
Insights from Our Collaborative Fund Journey
To be community-rooted is also to be movement-responsive. This has informed Borealis’s decision-making since our inception a decade ago—and it remains the case today. In 2025, for example, as we witnessed communities increasingly targeted—and federal and philanthropic resources waning—we knew what our people needed. To ensure additional resources to help frontline organizations meet emergency needs, Borealis launched the Security, Action, and Freedom for Everyone (SAFE) Initiative. Based on what we heard from community partners, the fund was established to route dollars to six key areas of rising concern: adaptive and operational, safety and security, rest and healing, facilities, tech and digital, and legal.
This initiative created a new opportunity for the sector to pool and mobilize dollars to frontline organizations’ self-identified needs, including increasingly vital program work—from narrative change to community safety and civic engagement—and growing organizational needs—from physical and digital security to legal defense and staff hazard pay. Our unique infrastructure allowed us to move with the alignment and urgency that our partners required. Grants were flexible and distributed within two weeks of receiving an application, ensuring that our partners received money when needed, to use however they determined best.
To be community-rooted is also to be movement-responsive.
The creation of SAFE allowed for responsiveness and experimentation. For example, we were able to route additional rapid dollars to Minneapolis-based organizations as ICE operations intensified there—including our grantee partner Sahan Journal, a nonprofit newsroom dedicated to covering immigrants and communities of color in Minnesota, following the arrests of law-abiding journalists in the state. We were also able to distribute dollars to targeted, hyperlocal organizing efforts via a partnership with Oregon-based funder Meyer Memorial Trust—a collaboration that facilitated rapid grantmaking at significant volume and linked statewide trends to national themes. This produced insights that are not always available to a local funder and will further sharpen our responsiveness in the critical years ahead.
From Underutilization to Greater Courage and Coordination
So why, then, are intermediaries underutilized across our sector? One answer is that some funders prefer to direct grantmaking dollars themselves. Others simply may not see the outsized impact of intermediaries or understand their unique role in the philanthropic sector. As sector commentator Vu Le pointed out, likening intermediaries to mycelium: intermediaries “are often invisible, we frequently take them for granted.”
Yet, from Hungary to Turkey, we’ve learned that obscuring or ignoring infrastructure is how systems fail. If philanthropy is serious about stopping our slide into authoritarianism, then intermediaries aren’t optional. They are a necessary infrastructure to protect democracy, offering the sector proximity to the people who are defending and building it.
