The EUR-NOVA workshop at WU Vienna (https://www.wu.ac.at) was organised by Michael Meyer (https://www.wu.ac.at/en/im/ng/team/michael-meyer) and Jürgen Willems (https://www.wu.ac.at/en/im/ng/team/juergen-willems) and conceived as an alternative format to more standardised academic conferences. Over two intensive days, the workshop brought together scholars from across Europe to discuss how nonprofit organisations operate under conditions of crisis, political pressure, and societal transformation.
Crisis finance, geopolitics, and systemic vulnerability
The opening keynote by Georg von Schnurbein (University of Basel, Centre for Philanthropy Studies – CEPS: https://ceps.unibas.ch | Profile: https://ceps.unibas.ch/en/team/georg-von-schnurbein/) set the tone by analysing the global consequences of the 2025 USAID shutdown. Drawing on evidence from Swiss NGOs, the keynote demonstrated how deeply interconnected international NGO networks are and how abruptly funding shocks cascade across European consortia. Structural vulnerabilities became visible: limited reserve funds, heavy reliance on earmarked public financing, and a risk culture that avoids debt even in crisis situations. The keynote raised core research questions around crisis resilience, coordination failures, and the long-term implications of shifting geopolitical priorities for development and humanitarian organisations.
Marketisation, epistemology, and comparative welfare regimes
A comparative presentation from Ghent University (https://www.ugent.be), presented by Ben Suykens (https://www.ugent.be/ps/ppmg/en/team/ben-suykens) together with colleagues including Bram Verschuere (https://www.ugent.be/ps/ppmg/en/team/bram-verschuere) and Johan Hvenmark (Stockholm University: https://www.su.se/stockholm-business-school), examined nonprofit marketisation across Belgium, Sweden, the United States, and Taiwan. Based on large samples and eight indicators across four markets, the study challenged the idea of a single, sector-wide marketisation trend. Instead, it highlighted strong variation across welfare-state contexts and pointed to a lack of an empirical core in the literature. Marketisation appeared as a perspective-dependent phenomenon, often associated with cherry-picking and prioritisation of “easy” beneficiaries. Methodological and epistemological questions featured prominently, including whether business-derived analytical tools adequately capture nonprofit realities.
Diasporas, transnational engagement, and political turmoil
The session by Amir Akiva Segal (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev: https://in.bgu.ac.il/en | Profile: https://in.bgu.ac.il/en/humsos/soc/Pages/staff/segala.aspx) focused on transnational political engagement among Israeli and Jewish diasporas. Using transnational transference theory and 42 in-depth interviews, the presentation traced reciprocal influences between homeland and diaspora during periods of acute crisis, including the 2023 judicial reform, the Hamas attacks, and the wars in Gaza and Lebanon. The analysis distinguished carefully between Israeli and Jewish diasporas and documented the emergence of new organisational structures, ceremonies, and support infrastructures across Europe, as well as growing government involvement and rising antisemitism.
Reputation, identity, and democratic backsliding
Several sessions addressed how legitimacy and reputation shape nonprofit action. A presentation on reputation and identity (“Mirror, Mirror on the Wall”), by Hannes Lampe (Uni Kassel: https://www.uni-kassel.de/fb07/ibwl/public-management/team.html), discussed congruence between organisational identity and external perception, building on reputational theory in nonprofit studies. The distinction between rated, narrated (media-based), and self-portrayed reputation was central, as was evidence of a positive relationship between media coverage and private funding (based on US samples).
Closely related, a session on democratic backsliding, with contributions from Michal Bar (Hebrew University of Jerusalem: https://en.huji.ac.il) and colleagues, analysed how shrinking civic spaces affect nonprofits. Using Israel as a case, the presentation documented tensions between government and civil society, delayed tenders, funding uncertainty, and growing pressure on organisations working with minorities.
Organisational trauma, impact, and access
The presentation “Echoes of Silence” examined organisational trauma using Diakoneo (https://www.diakoneo.de) as a case study, with theoretical references to work by Karin Kreutzer (ESCP Business School: https://escp.eu/faculty-research/faculty/karin-kreutzer) and Eero Vaara (University of Oxford, Saïd Business School: https://www.sbs.ox.ac.uk/about-us/people/eero-vaara). It traced historical involvement in Nazi-era euthanasia and post-war violence against people with disabilities, presenting a phased model of organisational coping from productive silence to engagement and healing.
Other sessions addressed impact and evidence, referring to work by Agarwal et al. (2025) and Men et al. (2020), and discussed how randomised controlled trials and evaluation practices reshape normative expectations in the sector. A further contribution on “Dismantling Barriers to Access”, involving cooperation with Caritas Vienna (https://www.caritas-wien.at), explored linguistic and informational precarity from a beneficiary perspective.
Volunteering, mixed workforces, and role substitution
The second day opened with a block on volunteering in crisis contexts, comparing volunteers, public-sector staff, and freelancers in Israeli social services. Discussions highlighted blurred boundaries between paid and unpaid work and the ethical dimensions of crisis response.
A qualitative study titled “Unpleasant Secrets”, presented by Kai Klein (Ghent University: https://www.ugent.be), examined conflicts in mixed workforces based on 31 interviews with volunteer managers across seven social service organisations.
Building on this, Lucas Meijs (Erasmus University Rotterdam: https://www.eur.nl/en/people/lucas-meijs) presented a conceptual paper on global dynamics of role substitution between volunteers and paid staff, drawing on discourse analysis using the NOW corpus (https://www.english-corpora.org/now/).
Fundraising, trust, and foundations
Later sessions turned to practice-oriented questions. Tine De Bock (Vrije Universiteit Brussel: https://www.vub.be | Profile: https://www.vub.be/en/staff/tine-de-bock) presented a policy and practice paper on the future of face-to-face fundraising, based on input from eight experts and structured around conversational, process, and organisational layers.
The presentation “Trust Creates Impact” focused on trust-based giving, referencing the conceptual model by Pamela Wiepking & René Bekkers / Wiepking & Wit (2024) and evidence from funding-monitor data. Trust was discussed as offering greater flexibility and effectiveness than detailed control.
My contribution: Brand equity and charitable giving
In my own presentation, Brand Equity and its Relationship with (Charitable) Donations, I presented findings from a large Austrian donor dataset, testing three established nonprofit brand-equity frameworks (Faircloth, 2005; Boenigk & Becker, 2016; Romero et al., 2023). Using latent variable modelling, I examined the relationship between brand equity and donor status, last donation amount, and total annual donations. The results show that Brand Commitment and Brand Trust are the strongest predictors of charitable giving, while Brand Awareness as a latent factor exhibits substantially weaker effects. Overall, brand equity explains between 30% and 50% of variance in donation behaviour, underscoring the strategic relevance of brand management for nonprofit resilience and resource mobilisation.
Slides and references are available here: Gerald Czech – Brand Equity & Donations.
Concluding reflection
Across its many sessions, EUR-NOVA provided a coherent picture of a sector under pressure yet rich in analytical perspectives. Financial vulnerability, political change, reputational dynamics, historical responsibility, and evolving forms of engagement were shown to be deeply interconnected. EUR-NOVA demonstrated the value of methodological plurality and reflective scholarship in understanding these dynamics—and reaffirmed the importance of spaces where empirical evidence, theory, and practice can be discussed without premature closure.
Diss-Tance 