![](\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/img-assets\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/GettyImages-2289643929-e1788683950986.jpg?w=2048\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Asia\u2019s richest families approach philanthropy in much the same way they approach business: Managing things directly and keeping a close eye on outputs, rather than just writing the checks.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s one of the conclusions from a new report from the Bridgespan Group, a U.S.-based philanthropy advisory group, released at the Philanthropy for Better Cities Forum in Hong Kong on Sept. 7.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Asia\u2019s family fortunes are still younger than the rest of the world\u2019s. About 94% of the Asian families Bridgespan studied are in their first or second generation of wealth, versus 85% of families in high-income economies elsewhere. Around as many are still in control of the businesses that made them rich, compared with 68% outside the region.<\/p>\n
That continued ownership shapes how Asian families give. Business-linked giving dominates in Asia, used by 95% of wealthy families in the region\u2019s middle-income economies and 80% in its high-income ones. Elsewhere, just 28% of high-income families give through their businesses. Most Western families instead choose to set up their own foundation: Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, for example, chose to set up their own foundations rather than give through Microsoft or Berkshire Hathaway.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe level of control that families expect to have over their giving\u2014because they\u2019re still so used to having that level of control over the corporate\u2014is definitely a lot more hands-on,\u201d says Gwendolyn Lim, head of Southeast Asia at Bridgespan and an author of the report.<\/p>\n
She traces the habit to the conglomerate era, when Asia\u2019s tycoons built sprawling groups by spotting \u201cgaps in the market\u201d and grew comfortable running operations that had nothing to do with each other.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When they turned to philanthropy, they saw similar gaps, such as non-profits lacking the capacity to do good work or governments unwilling to step in to take action. The result was the \u201coperating foundation\u201d that both funded and managed charitable projects.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Western philanthropists, on the other hand, are surrounded by mature civil-society groups, and so are more content to just deliver funding through grants. Bridgespan\u2019s report finds that families in middle-income countries are more likely to administer their own programs than those in higher-income countries.<\/p>\n
More than three-quarters of Asian family philanthropies partner with the government, versus 58% outside Asia.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That willingness to work with the state is unique, Lim says. Asian families are used to dealing with ministries through their businesses, and thus see few qualms in doing so again through their charities.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Yet Western donors are more wary of the government. \u201cIf you talk to American or European philanthropists, working closely with the government is something that makes them nervous,\u201d she says. \u201cTheir faces change a little bit. They\u2019re like, \u2018Maybe we influence the government from an advocacy perspective.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Bridgespan\u2019s report notes that Asian families might fund pilot programs to prove that something works, before handing over successful models to the government to run at a larger scale. Lim points out that philanthropic families are \u201cusually standard bearers who are able to experiment a lot more.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another difference is that Asian philanthropists are more willing than their Western counterparts to report how much work they\u2019re doing, using metrics like schools built or teachers trained. More than 80% of Asian families report their outputs, compared with 45% of families in high-income economies elsewhere.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
Yet relatively few families\u2014in Asia or elsewhere\u2014report outcomes, or how things changed because of what an organizatrion did. \u201cThey go: \u2018I don\u2019t want to pay you to measure outcomes, but I want you to report on outcomes.\u2019 That\u2019s pretty terrible,\u201d Lim admits.<\/p>\n
This week, Bridgespan also updated its rankings of the world\u2019s largest corporate and institutional givers, based on average annual giving between 2020 and 2024.<\/p>\n
The Hong Kong Jockey Club, the city\u2019s only authorized betting operator, tops Asia\u2019s corporate rankings at $774 million a year, ahead of Tencent at $404 million.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Globally, the Jockey Club is the only Asian entity in the corporate top 10, at No. 8, behind Deutsche Telekom and well behind Johnson & Johnson, the world\u2019s largest corporate giver at $3.8 billion a year.<\/p>\n
Much of the Jockey Club\u2019s money is funneled through the Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust. The Trust gave an average of $705 million a year between 2020 and 2024, putting it in the lead among Asian philanthropic organizations, but just shy of the global top 10. The Gates Foundation leads the way among institutional funders at $6.5 billion per year.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The top 20 Asian philanthropies together gave $2.7 billion annually; the global top 20, $21.4 billion.<\/p>\n
Both reports were commissioned by Bridgespan\u2019s Funders\u2019 Council, whose members include the Institute of Philanthropy, the Gates Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation, and were released at the Philanthropy for Better Cities Forum, organized by the Jockey Club. <\/p>\n
According to AVPN, a network of Asia-based social investors, the region faces a development funding shortfall of $26 trillion through 2030. Filling that gap will be a tall order.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe call philanthropy the first line of risk,\u201d Lim says. \u201cPhilanthropic giving fills the spots where corporates may be too nervous to invest. And family philanthropy is even more at the vanguard of giving.\u201d<\/p>\n
Yet the gap Asian philanthropy is being asked to fill keeps growing. The Trump administration\u2019s dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development canceled roughly 83% of the agency\u2019s programs, gutting development budgets in a region where USAID once spent about $860 million a year; in Indonesia and the Philippines, program values fell by 95% or more. Aid financing to Southeast Asia could drop by more than $2 billion, according to estimates from the Lowy Institute.<\/p>\n
Nobody, Lim concedes, can plug the hole left by Washington. \u201cGovernments can\u2019t fill the gap. Philanthropy can\u2019t fill the gap. There\u2019s not enough money,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Still, in the \u201cAsian decade,\u201d Asia\u2019s philanthropists will need to find some way to pick up the slack. \u201cThis is the decade where our own people have to help our own people,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
#Asian #family #philanthropy #lot #handsonand #corporatethan #West<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Asia\u2019s richest families approa… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3988,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[6870,6872,1338,6871,1953,473,3366],"class_list":["post-3987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance-news","tag-asian","tag-corporatethan","tag-family","tag-handsonand","tag-lot","tag-philanthropy","tag-west"],"yoast_head":"\n