Assessing the impact of the transparency of blockchain on donations to charities : a UK use-case

Abstract

This dissertation investigates the impact that the transparency offered by a blockchain could have on donations made by individuals to charities, using a UK charity as an example. The rationale for this investigation is that, whilst individual donations have tended to make up the biggest source of funds for most charities in the UK, these have been in steady decline due to various reasons, with the most prominent being related to lack of transparency - donors’ concerns about how and where charities will spend their donations, and the proportion that will be consumed by administrative expenses. The investigation was undertaken through a combination of doctrinal and empirical research methods, with a literature review of blockchain-based charity donation platforms, followed by an online questionnaire survey seeking quantitative and qualitative responses. Whilst the literature review revealed that there was limited attention given to the quantitative impact that a blockchain’s transparency could have on donations to charities, the survey demonstrated that such increased transparency would lead to a material uplift in both the number of donors and the average amount of their donations. Transparency of the charity’s expenses had the greatest impact, followed by transparency of the purpose for which donations would be used. Whilst the transparency feature of a blockchain could therefore be of benefit to charities, most of the platforms considered as part of the literature review were found to be no longer in operation, suggesting that there were wider issues that charities would need to address as part of any adoption of blockchain. Accordingly, this dissertation recommends several areas for further research related to the findings reported. In the spirit of transparency, the full (anonymised) results from the survey undertaken have been provided, to assist others in building on the findings with the aim of helping charities to continue to raise funds to support those most in need.