essay

Annotated Bibliography

By

Your Namehere

Soc101-0101

Professor Eric Jodlbauer

November 27, 2013

Topic: Public trust in nonprofit history museums.

Bryce, H. (2007). The public’s trust in nonprofit organizations: The role of relationship

marketing and management. California Management Review, vol. 49, no. 4, 112-131.

Bryce (2007) frames the relationship between the public and nonprofits as one that

includes “reciprocity of expectations” (p. 113). He argues that there are six concepts of public

trust: expectation-performance trust, custodial trust, discretionary trust, trust from asymmetric

information, identity trust, and trust related to both the mission and social capital. He also

identifies five core transactional relationships that serve as the bases of the public trust in

nonprofits: contracting, soliciting and receiving contributions, and similar to above custodial

trust, and trust related to both the mission and social capital. Beyond an extensive discussion

concerning the conceptualization of public trust, the article offers theories and strategies on

restoring lost trust.

As one would expect from a noted professor of corporate finance, Bryce (2007) provides

adequate categories in which to understand the role of trust in nonprofit organizations as it

pertains to both marketing and management. While the evidence for his conceptualization of

public trust is robust, the discussion on restoring lost trust could have been better elucidated

through delving further into the literature surrounding repatriating lost trust.

This article is pertinent to the topic of interest as it not only outlines the relationship

between trust and marketing, but does so specifically in terms of the challenges faced by

nonprofit organizations. Further, while it does not specifically mention history museums, the

author’s analysis and findings are generalizable to most nonprofit settings. Lastly, the

categories offered in this article provide a great foundation in which to frame the topic of the

research paper.

Gibelman, M. & Gelman, S.R., (2001). Very public scandals: Nongovernmental organizations in

trouble. Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations, vol.

12, no. 1, 49-66.

Gibelman and Gelman (2001) offer an extensive overview of scandals suffered by NGO’s

and nonprofit organizations from a multi-national perspective. Citing several cases, the authors

contend that “in the third sector [nonprofits], public trust is a key component…when public trust

is compromised, the costs to status, reputation, and funding can be significant” (p. 60). A breach

in public trust can go further than the bottom line through the loss of board members as well as

increased scrutiny from government officials and the public. The authors go on to posit that

there is no one formula and success depends on societal context.

Gibelman and Gelman’s (2001) work centers around large organizations and scandals

that involved theft or misrepresentation. With the analysis revolving around top tier nonprofits

as well as the narrow focus of just two aspects of trust, the article may not be generalizable to

smaller nonprofits or different forms of trust breech. While the paper does offer avenues for

corrective action, all four areas touched on (board development, staff development, etcetera) are

internal or buffering strategies and thus leave out the critical component of public perception.

Overall this source may did not do a lot in terms of informing the topic at hand. While

the discussion of large and public breeches in trust may prove insightful on a macro scale, the

relevance to history museums or smaller nonprofits may be minimal. In the bibliography, the

authors do provide interesting citations that could prove fruitful if explored.

References

Andreasen, A.R., & Kotler, P. (2003). Strategic Marketing for Nonprofit Organizations. Upper

Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Bryce, H. (2007). The public’s trust in nonprofit organizations: The role of relationship

marketing and management. California Management Review, vol. 49, no. 4, 112-131.

Fleishman, J.L. (1999). Not-for-profits into the breach: Between public trust and public policy.

New Directions for Philanthropic Fundraising, no. 26, 11-28.

Gibelman, M. & Gelman, S.R., (2001). Very public scandals: Nongovernmental organizations in

trouble. Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations, vol.

12, no. 1, 49-66.