CHERYL CORLEY, host:
Now to an effort to bring upward mobility to women and girls. A new fundraising initiative is pushing women of means to donate significant amounts of money -$1 million or more - - to increase the reach of foundations that benefit women.
Over the next year and half, the women's funding network is hoping to raise over $150 million to bring the combined power of foundations advocating for women over the billion-dollar mark.
Abby Disney is an active philanthropist. She is the president and co-founder of the Daphne Foundation, a New York-based anti-poverty organization, and she's working with many others to help the women's funding network reach its goal. Welcome to TELL ME MORE.
Ms. ABIGAIL DISNEY (President and Co-founder, Daphne Foundation): Thank you so much.
CORLEY: Well, what's been the early feedback from this initiative?
Ms. DISNEY: Oh, it's been incredibly positive and strong. In fact, we went public last week, and we'd already raised $70 million. So I think the pump is primed. The time is right.
CORLEY: Uh-huh. So the 70 million was your silent phase, I take it?
Ms. DISNEY: Exactly.
(Soundbite of laughter)
CORLEY: Okay. Now tell me why would someone who is thinking about donating a million dollars focus on giving charities that specifically impact women.
Ms. DISNEY: I got involved as a donor because I was persuaded by the it's-not-fair thing. You know, just - there have historically been these enormous deficits between money for programming for women and men. But what I've come to understand in the time that I've been doing this is that this is a really a remarkably powerful way to reach out to communities, just because of the way, globally, we now, women, are positioned at the centers of their families and their churches and their block associations and their schools and so forth. So that if you give health care to a woman, the family gets health care. If you educate a woman, the family gets educated.
So, you know, in fact, if you're interested in lifting communities out of poverty in a way that's sustainable, then you really need to reach out to the women in them.
CORLEY: These women's funds have been around since the 1970s - first one started with Gloria Steinem. But very few have received these gifts of a million dollars or more. Talk to me about how advocating for wealthy women to donate money to these women's funds may provide a sense of empowerment.
Ms. DISNEY: Yeah, it's a really interesting phenomenon. The Ms. Foundation has been around since the '70s, and then just a couple of others. It really was the '80s and then the '90s when this movement kind of took off. And I think there are a variety of historical factors all sort of coming to a head, one of which is that this is the first generation of women who have inherited money outright, without having to sort of cede power to it to their husbands, or, you know, have to go to their brothers for permission and so forth. So there was a real critical mass in the '70s and '80s of women who were coming into their own and in full power and control of their money.
And also, obviously, there are a lot of women who've earned their money and are now, you know, seeing that have enough breathing room to really become generous philanthropists. And also, I mean, I think that the movement in general around women and the relationship of women to poverty has gotten a lot more articulate about why this is important, why this matters, and why it's not simply a question of being fair.
And so I think women have a tendency to incline toward charity, because of their identification with children, their identification with the innocent. So we really need to go out and make the case, then, that, you know, if you really do want to change the world for children - effectively and for good - you really need to reach out and change the circumstances for women.
CORLEY: You talked about the distinction between women who have inherited their money and women who have earned it. Is it easier - one group or the other - to get them to donate?
Ms. DISNEY: I think you have to take the case of them in different ways. They have different attitudes toward money. I know that a lot of women who inherit money are terrified of it. I know it sounds a little crazy, and I know a lot of women who have a fear and anxiety. I know - which sound nuts, but it's really common. Business women tend not to be that way, but they also tend to really want you to make a lot of sense about measurement and evaluation and those kinds of things, which are very important things, but you go to them with different cases, really.
CORLEY: So how do people who don't have a million dollars make a difference in the lives of needy women? What about the rest of us?
Ms. DISNEY: Exactly, this is such an important question. You know, the Women Moving Millions Campaign is partly about women who have a million speaking to other women who have a million and saying, you know, the water is fine, jump on in with me. You know, and that's a really important process.
But the other piece of this is I think whether you have a million or a billion or $10, everybody wakes up in the morning and looks around them and says, my, God, the problems are so enormous. How will I ever have an impact?
I had an extraordinary moment at the New York Women's Foundation breakfast last May when the breakfast was so moving that a woman walked up to me and handed me a $10 check from her personal banking account. And, in fact, she was one of the clients of one of the programs that we were funding. And she said to me, I just want to be a part this. I want to be a philanthropist like you.
CORLEY: Well, Abby Disney is a philanthropist. She is with the Daphne Fund, and is working with the Women's Funding Network to raise over $150 million over the next year and a half. She joined us from our studios in New York. Thank you so much.
Ms. DISNEY: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.