Is Giving Local? Conceptualizing Why Place Still Matters in Philanthropy

In this paper, we develop an organizing, multi-theoretical framework for exploring the relationship between place and philanthropy. While there are several theories that help us to understand charitable giving at the individual level (i.e. theories of altruism) and a robust discussion of the mechanisms that activate charitable giving (Bekkers and Wiepking 2011), scholars have not well-considered geographic place as an antecedent of these mechanisms. Our primary contribution is to highlight several current social science theories that are relevant for explaining how geographic place influences the eight mechanisms of individual giving (Bekkers and Wiepking 2011)—awareness of need, solicitation, altruism, values, reputation, psychological costs and benefits, costs and benefits, and efficacy.