Trading Voice for Viability? The Impact of Marketization on Nonprofits' Critical Voice

Abstract

Propelled by the New Public Management reforms, the infusion of market values in the public‐nonprofit interface is argued to have increased nonprofit organizations' (NPOs) capacity to influence public policy through increased access to government, yet often at the cost of abandoning their critical stance toward the said government. Drawing on cross‐country survey data collected from NPOs across three different welfare states (N = 779), this study examines to what extent key aspects of nonprofit marketization are associated with NPOs refraining from criticizing their funding government. Corroborating the critical nonprofit marketization literature, we find that compromised advocacy goes hand in hand with high(er) levels of resource competition, output‐based public control, and recruitment of business‐like staff. These results add to a growing body of evidence of a so‐called closing or shrinking space for NPOs across different welfare state regimes.