Follow the money. How Non-profits are Governed through Public Fundings. A Research Project in the city of Lille, France

There is a growing literature on the way private philanthropic funding channel and govern the non-profit sector, sometimes labelled a non-profit industrial complex. What about public funding? What is its rationale and consequences? While the question of the public funding of non-profits and NGOs has often been tackled through the lenses of patronage and clientelism (Marwell, 2007), we contend that a broader perspective is necessary. Since the 1990s, a body of work has identified a certain number of logics coming with the professionalization of the non-profit sector such as the the marketization of practices and the generalization of project- and contract-based funding, or also the casualization of work through employment insertion schemes (Salamon 1993; Prouteau and Tchernonog 2015; Enjolras et al. 2018). Our research, by analyzing the totality of all non-profit subsidies granted by a local body – the city of Lille – over a 10 years period, allows to decipher the place of patronage and clientelism in the broader political economy of non-profits/institutions relationships. This research, by following the financial trajectory of all non-profits in a large French metropolis reveals the diversity of the rationale supporting public funding. what rationales govern the allocation, reduction or withdrawal of subsidies from the municipality or other public bodies? Are the decisions underpinned by political reasons (expression of support or criticism of public policies), managerial reasons (achievement or non-achievement of contractual objectives, satisfaction of administrative or accountancy requirements), financial reasons (poor budgetary health), etc.? How does a local authority arbitrate in order to deal with the contraction of its resources, and to the detriment of which types of associations? To answer these questions, this research is based on a quantitative and a qualitative study: - a quantitative analysis of the database of all the subsidies granted by the Town Hall to associations between 2010 and 2020 - interviews with municipal actors (elected officials or agents) to understand the internal logic of the institution governing allocations and withdrawals, increases and decreases - an investigation through interviews and budget monographs with associations identified as "stable", "promoted" or "fallen" actors in order to enter into the details of the processes that led to the continuity or changes in their funding. In this paper, we test in particular the hypothesis of depoliticization through transparency and exemplarity insofar as all the measures and efforts produced within the municipality tend to make decisions concerning subsidies appear technical and not political. It conceals a phenomenon that could nevertheless be considered highly political, namely the increasing instrumentalization of the nonprofit sector by the local authorities and ultimately by the State.