Citizen Participation in Non-Profit Governance by Sondra Koff

From the Publisher

Nonprofit organizations, their governing structures,
boards of directors, and their newest constituency, members
who represent the public at large, are the subject of
this book. In recent years, new mechanisms have been
developed to link citizens with government and with
diverse policy-making entities. Earlier, it was assumed
that citizens had little interest in policy deliberations,
and responsibility for public needs was best left to the
experts. Many citizens now believe that they have a
legitimate right to influence how power is exercised in
public organizations.

Koff constructs a demographic profile of public members,
their activities, and their opinions about board
membership. She also catalogues the perspectives of executive
directors about public members, identifies specific
problems related to public participation, and suggests
strategies to help resolve them.

How effectively these bodies perform, and how well
they respond to the public, are in part determined by
the talents and activities of their members. All of these
members, especially public members, need appropriate
tools to be able to perform in a superior fashion. Despite
the importance of governing bodies to an organization's
performance, there has been little examination of board
members in general and specifically of public members.
This is the first book-length study on the subject.

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