Nonprofit Arts Organizations’ Pursuit of Public Interests: The Role of Board Diversity

Abstract Although nonprofit organizations are expected to contribute to public interests, their tax exemption does not necessarily entail serving the broader public. What, then, makes nonprofit organizations orient their work externally, serving the broader public, instead of internally, pursuing private goals? This paper examines this question by studying the link between nonprofits’ board governance, with a specific focus on boards’ racial diversity, and their contribution to public interests. The analysis of the 2015 US Local Arts Agency Census reveals that boards’ racial diversity is closely related with nonprofit arts organizations’ participation in serving the broader public through civic engagement and community development activities. The findings offer insights on how nonprofit boards, which are neither publicly elected nor publicly accountable, can be trusted to attend to broader issues of the public interest.