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Uncharitable goes where no other book on the nonprofit sector has dared to tread. Where other texts suggest ways to optimize
performance inside the existing paradigm, Uncharitable suggests that the paradigm itself is the problem and calls into question our fundamental canons about charity. Author Dan Pallotta argues that society's nonprofit ethic acts as a strict regulatory mechanism on the natural economic law. It creates an economic apartheid that denies the nonprofit sector critical tools and permissions that the for-profit sector is allowed to use without restraint (e.g., no risk-reward incentives, no profit, counterproductive limits on compensation, and moral objections to the use of donated dollars for anything other than program
expenditures).

These double-standards place the nonprofit sector at extreme disadvantage to the for profit sector on every level. While the for profit sector is permitted to use all the tools of capitalism to advance the sale of consumer goods, the nonprofit sector is prohibited from using any of them to fight hunger or disease. Capitalism is blamed for creating the inequities in our society, but charity is prohibited from using the tools of capitalism to rectify them.

Ironically, this is all done in the name of charity, but it is a charity whose principal benefit flows to the for-profit sector and one that denies the nonprofit sector the tools and incentives that have built virtually everything of value in society. The very ethic we have cherished as the hallmark of our compassion is in fact what undermines it.

This irrational system, Pallotta explains, has its roots in 400-year-old Puritan ethics that banished self-interest from the realm of charity. The ideology is policed today by watchdog agencies and the use of "efficiency" measures, which Pallotta argues are flawed, unjust, and should be abandoned. By declaring our independence from these obsolete ideas, Pallotta theorizes, we can dramatically accelerate progress on the most urgent social issues of our time. Pallotta has written an important, provocative, timely, and accessible book--a manifesto about equal economic rights for charity. Its greatest contribution may be to awaken society to the fact that they were so unequal in the first place.
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Price: $22.14 [Notify me when price goes down.]

The journalist who famously lived as a man commits herself— literally

Norah Vincent’s New York Times bestselling book, Self-Made Man, ended on a harrowing note. Suffering from severe depression after her eighteen months living disguised as a man, Vincent felt she was a danger to herself. On the advice of her psychologist she committed herself to a mental institution. Out of this raw and overwhelming experience came the idea for her next book. She decided to get healthy and to study the effect of treatment on the depressed and insane “in the bin,” as she calls it.

Vincent’s journey takes her from a big city hospital to a facility in the Midwest and finally to an upscale retreat down south, as she analyzes the impact of institutionalization on the unwell, the tyranny of drugs-as-treatment, and the dysfunctional dynamic between caregivers and patients. Vincent applies brilliant insight as she exposes her personal struggle with depression and explores the range of people, caregivers, and methodologies that guide these strange, often scary, and bizarre environments. Eye opening, emotionally wrenching, and at times very funny, Voluntary Madness is a riveting work that exposes the state of mental healthcare in America from the inside out..
Price: $14.99 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Giving That Gets Things Done

"All outstanding philanthropic successes have one thing in common: They started with a smart strategic plan," say authors Paul Brest, president of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and Hal Harvey, president of ClimateWorks.

Money Well Spent explains how to create and implement a strategy that ensures meaningful results. Components of a smart strategy include:
--Achieving great clarity about one's philanthropic goals
--Specifying indicators of success before beginning a project
--Designing and implementing a plan commensurate with available resources
--Evidence based understanding of the world in which the plan will operate
--Paying careful attention to milestones to determine if you are on the path to success or if midcourse corrections are necessary

Drawing on examples from over 100 foundations and non-profits, Money Well Spent gives readers the framework they need to design a smart strategy. This is a book for everyone who wants to get the most from a philanthropic dollar: donors, foundations, and non-profits..
Price: $16.49 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Surprising proof that conservatives really are more compassionate--and more generous--than liberals

We all know we should give to charity, but who really does? Approximately three-quarters of Americans give their time and money to various charities, churches, and causes; the other quarter of the population does not. Why has America split into two nations: givers and non-givers?

Arthur Brooks, a top scholar of economics and public policy, has spent years researching this trend, and even he was surprised by what he found. In Who Really Cares, he demonstrates conclusively that conservatives really are compassionate-far more compassionate than their liberal foes. Strong families, church attendance, earned income (as opposed to state-subsidized income), and the belief that individuals, not government, offer the best solution to social ills-all of these factors determine how likely one is to give.

Charity matters--not just to the givers and to the recipients, but to the nation as a whole. It is crucial to our prosperity, happiness, health, and our ability to govern ourselves as a free people. In Who Really Cares, Brooks outlines strategies for expanding the ranks of givers, for the good of all Americans..
Price: $5.99 [Notify me when price goes down.]

"Kiernan's sharp-eyed biography brings back a woman who, far into her 90s, relished the dance of life."—O Magazine

The fabulous life of Brooke Astor, a pioneer of philanthropy and for decades a luminary of New York society. Hers is a story out of Edith Wharton. After a disastrous early marriage, Brooke Astor wedded the notoriously ill-tempered Vincent Astor, who died in 1959. In a highly publicized courtroom battle, Brooke fought off an attempt to break Vincent's will, which left some $67 million to the Vincent Astor Foundation. As the foundation's president, Brooke would use this legacy to benefit New York, where the Astor fortune had been made.

Brooke would personally visit each grant applicant and charm anyone she met. At her one-hundredth birthday, princes and presidents honored her, but in 2006 a grandson petitioned the courts to have his father removed as Brooke's guardian. Once again an Astor court battle became the stuff of headlines. This biography—based on firsthand knowledge and interviews with Brooke's friends and the heads of New York's great cultural institutions—gives us back the woman so loved and admired, whose hands-on approach would inspire future philanthropists. 24 pages of photographs..
Price: $9.42 [Notify me when price goes down.]

When Voluntary Simplicity was first published in 1981, it quickly became recognized as a powerful and visionary work in the emerging dialogue over sustainable ways of living. Now, more than ten years later and with many of the planet's environmental stresses having become more urgent than ever, Duane Elgin has revised and updated his revolutionary book.

Voluntary Simplicity is not a book about living in poverty; it is a book about living with balance. It illuminates the pattern of changes that an increasing number of Americans are making in their everyday lives -- adjustments in day-to-day living that are an active, positive response to the complex dilemmas of our time. By embracing, either partially or totally, the tenets of voluntary simplicity -- frugal consumption, ecological awareness, and personal growth -- people can change their lives. And in the process, they have the power to change the world. First published in 1981, Voluntary Simplicity was instantly recognized as a visionary work. The New York Times called it "seminal"; the Wall Street Journal noted that it was "considered the movement's Bible." Revised in 1993 to address the trend toward downshifting, this pertinent book helps us to adjust our thoughts, habits, and goals and embrace the key elements of simplicity: frugal consumption, ecological awareness and personal growth.

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Price: $4.95 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Write with confidence and reach your donors

You'll learn all the essential components of writing for success from this go-to book for writing for fundraising! Mal Warwick, the nation's premier letter-writing tutor and direct mail expert, shows you the essential tools for making your direct marketing program a success. He gives you both general advice about the most effective direct mail strategies and specific guidance. Learn his step-by-step model through all the critical stages -from laying the groundwork for a prosperous campaign through the importance of thanking donors. Includes ew chapters on E-mail solicitations, monthly and legacy giving and free downloads on josseybass.com.

Refreshed and Revised:

• Gain insight into current trends in the field with updated cases, samples, and examples
• Access more content for small to medium NPOs with limited budgets and resources
• Learn the latest technology with new sections on typography and lay out

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Price: $21.06 [Notify me when price goes down.]

All across America, people are knitting for peace. In yarn shops and private homes, churches and synagogues, schools and even prisons, they meet on weekday evenings or weekend afternoons to knit afghans for refugees, mittens for the homeless, socks for soldiers, or preemie caps for AIDS babies. The tradition goes back as far as Martha Washington, who spearheaded knitting efforts for the soldiers of the Revolutionary War, and has seen a recent flourishing in what is nowadays called “charity knitting,” “community knitting,” or “knitting for others.” And whether it’s for world peace, community peace, or peace of mind, today’s various causes have the common goal of knitting the world into a better place one stitch at a time.

Knitting for Peace is an exceptional book that celebrates the long heritage of knitting for others. It tells the stories of 28 contemporary knitting-for-peace endeavors, and features patterns for easy-to-knit charity projects such as hats, socks, blankets, and bears, plus a messenger bag emblazoned with the Knitting for Peace logo. Enlivened by anecdotal sidebars and quotations from both knitters and peacemakers, this inspiring book also includes everything readers need to know to start their own knitting-for-peace groups. .
Price: $11.15 [Notify me when price goes down.]

In this magnificent biography, celebrated historian David Nasaw brings to life the fascinating rags- to-riches story of one of our most iconic business legends—Andrew Carnegie, America’s first modern titan. From his first job as a bobbin boy at age thirteen to his status as the richest man in the world upon retirement, Carnegie was the embodiment of the American dream and the prototype of today’s billionaire. Drawing on a trove of new material, Nasaw brilliantly plumbs the core of this fascinating and complex man, at last fixing him in his rightful place as one of the most compelling, elusive, and multifaceted personalities of the twentieth century..
Price: $7.93 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Foundations are a peculiarly American institution. They have been the dynamo of social change since their invention at the beginning of the last century. Yet they are cloaked in secrecy- their decision-making and operations are inscrutable to the point of obscurity-leaving them substantially unaccountable to anyone.

Joel Fleishman has been in and around foundations for almost half a century...running them, sitting on their boards, and seeking grants from them. And in this groundbreaking book he explains the history of foundations, tells the stories of the most successful foundation initiatives-and of those that have failed-and explains why it matters.

The baby boomer generation is going to participate in the largest transfer of wealth in history when it passes on its assets to its successor generation. The third sector is about to become more powerful than ever. This book shows how foundations can provide a vital spur to the engine of the American, and the world's, economy-if they are properly established and run..
Price: $11.95 [Notify me when price goes down.]