Evolution of Nonprofit Self-Regulation in Europe

This article explores the emergence of nonprofit self-regulation in long-established and emergent nonprofit sectors in Europe. An application of agency, resource dependence, and institutional theories to specific national cases reveals three predominant self-regulation types, compliance, adaptive, and professional models, conditioned on varied market, political, and social antecedents. The compliance system predominates in the Western European cases (Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and Austria), where the nonprofit sector is long established and public regulation of the sector is weak. The adaptive model is evidenced in the United Kingdom, where the nonprofit sector is well established but self-regulation design shifts in response to changes in public regulation and the resource environment. The professional self-regulation type occurs when the nonprofit sector and its legal system both are emergent, as in Poland, with self-regulation emerging to shape philanthropic, civil society, and nonprofit practice. An analysis of the European context more broadly reveals that as self-regulation is emerging across a number of contexts, there is evidence of isomorphism.