Italian Corporate Foundations and the Challenge of Multiple Stakeholder Interests

This article investigates corporate foundations, a specific expression\r\nof corporate philanthropy that is narrowly considered in\r\nthe literature. We aim to verify whether the interests of the\r\nfounder firm are significant antecedents of the model, activities,\r\nand issues addressed by the related foundation. Data were collected\r\nthrough a survey of seventy Italian corporate foundations,\r\nrepresenting 59.8 percent of the total number of such foundations\r\nbased in Italy. The analysis identified three clusters of corporate\r\nfoundations—granter, expert, and edifier. Research\r\ndemonstrates that through these clusters, the interests pursued\r\nby founder firms have a significant influence on integration\r\nbetween firms and corporate foundations and on the foundations’\r\nactivities.