Conferences, The Third Sector as Civil Society in Australasia: Identity, Role and Influence in the New Century

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Engineering Trustworthiness: A Review of Laboratory and Field Evidence
Andreas Ortmann

Last modified: 2010-06-09

Abstract


Trust of private and public donors, and trustworthiness of providers of not-for-profit goods and services, are afflicted by what is known in the literature as fundraising, or credibility, problem (Ortmann & Schlesinger 2003; Ortmann & Svitkova 2007). Various institutional arrangements are known that in theory address this asymmetric information problem (e.g., Ortmann & Myslivecek 2010; Ortmann & Svitkova forthcoming; Ortmann & Brhlikova 2010). Much less, however, is known empirically about the - comparative - effectiveness of institutional arrangements such as registration, regulation, self-regulation, accreditation, certification, and so on. I compile experimental evidence from the lab and the field which speaks to the issue of how donors can be assured that their not-for-profit of choice delivers what it promised.