Rene Bekkers (ICS Utrecht)

René Bekkers

News

February 2010 - Geven. Remonstranten, Hilversum, 13 februari 2010
February 2010 - Utrecht University farewell lecture: An overview of my work in the past five years
February 2010 - I have moved to the Department of Philanthropic Studies @ VU University Amsterdam
December 2009 - Explaining differences in charitable giving in Europe
December 2009 - Toekomstverkenning Collecteren
October 2009 - Confidence in Charitable Organizations and Volunteering Revisited
September 2009 - Who Gives What and When?
August 2009 - Name letter effect and incidental similarity cues in fundraising
May 2009 - Geven in Nederland 2009: Kansen voor de Filantropie
May 2009 - Charitable Giving to Fight Cardiovascular Diseases: Is it Any different During Recession?
December 2008 - Economische crisis en goede doelen
November 2007 - Generosity and Philanthropy - A Literature Review (with Pamala Wiepking)

A complete list of publications with links to papers is here.

Onderzoek naar de maatschappelijke stage op middelbare scholen

Associate Professor, Department of Philanthropic Studies, VU University Amsterdam

Visiting address: Room Z-443, Metropolitan, Buitenveldertselaan 3, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
Phone +31 20 598 6782; Fax +31 20 598 6810.
E-mail: r.bekkers @ fsw.vu.nl
NOTE THAT THIS IS MY NEW EMAIL ADDRESS

Research

Four Recent Papers

What's this?

Giving in the Netherlands Panel Survey

A list of variables available in the Giving in the Netherlands Panel Survey, waves 1 through 4.
2007 Wave Questionnaire

Giving & Volunteering Research Conference 2009, Amsterdam

Health Benefits of Volunteering

ESRA Conference 2009, Warsaw

Recently published

2009
- Explaining differences in charitable giving in Europe (with Pamala Wiepking). Abstract of article published in proceedings of the ESS workshop 2009.The entire volume is here.
- The Relationship Between Confidence in Charitable Organizations and Volunteering Revisited. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly.

2008

'Straight from the Heart'. Pp. 197-221 in: Advances in Medical Sociology, Volume 10: Patients, Consumers and Civil Society, edited by Susan M. Chambré and Melinda Goldner. Emerald Group Publishing. Unfortunately, the article contains a few mistakes in figure 1. Here is the correct figure.
‘And who is your neighbor? Explaining the effect of religion on charitable giving and volunteering’ Review of Religious Research, 50(1):74-96. (with Theo Schuyt)

‘Geographical Differences in Blood Donation and Philanthropy in the Netherlands: What Role for Social Capital?’ Journal of Economic & Social Geography, 99 (4): 483-496 (with Ingrid Veldhuizen).

'Volunteerism' Pp. 641-643 in: Darity, William A. Jr. (Ed.). International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA (2nd edition).
Social Networks of Participants in Voluntary Associations. In: Lin, N. & B. Erickson (Eds.). Social Capital: Advances in Research. Oxford University Press (with Beate Völker, Henk Flap & Martin van der Gaag).
Evaluatieonderzoek maatschappelijke stage (met Linda Bridges Karr)

2007

'Measuring Altruistic Behavior in Surveys: The All-Or-Nothing Dictator Game.' Survey Research Methods , 1(3): 139-144.
'From Games to Giving: Social Value Orientation Predicts Donations to Noble Causes.' Basic & Applied Social Psychology, 29(4): 375-384 (With Paul van Lange and Mark van Vugt).
'Intergenerational Transmission of Volunteering' Acta Sociologica , 50 (2): 99-114.
Just keep it simple: A field experiment on fundraising letters International Journal of Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Marketing, 12 (4): 371-378 (with Olaf Crutzen).
Two chapters in Kingma, V. & Van Leeuwen, M.H.D. (Eds.). Filantropie in Nederland - Voorbeelden uit de periode 1770-2020. Amsterdam: Aksant.

‘Giften aan goede doelen en geldzending onder etnische minderheden in Nederland’ (pp. 165-189, with Jessica Egelie)
‘Secularisering en filantropie in de 21e eeuw’ (pp. 190-202).

‘Geven van tijd: vrijwilligerswerk’. Pp. 99-109 in: Schuyt, T.N.M., Gouwenberg, B.M., Bekkers, R., Meijer, M.-M. & Wiepking, P. (Eds.). Geven in Nederland 2007: Giften, legaten, sponsoring en vrijwilligerswerk. ’s-Gravenhage: Elsevier Overheid.
‘Na de Tsunami: Giften aan nationale acties en het publieksvertrouwen’. Pp. 147-153 in: Schuyt, T.N.M., Gouwenberg, B.M., Bekkers, R., Meijer, M.-M. & Wiepking, P. (Eds.). Geven in Nederland 2007: Giften, legaten, sponsoring en vrijwilligerswerk. ’s-Gravenhage: Elsevier Overheid (with May-May Meijer)
Schuyt, T.N.M., Gouwenberg, B.M., Bekkers, R., Meijer, M.-M. & Wiepking, P. (Eds.). Geven in Nederland 2007: Giften, legaten, sponsoring en vrijwilligerswerk. ’s-Gravenhage: Elsevier Overheid.

2006

Traditional and Health Related Philanthropy: The Role of Resources and Personality (Social Psychology Quarterly, December 2006).
To give or not to give, that's the question': how methodology is destiny in Dutch giving data (with Pamala Wiepking, Nonprofit & Voluntary Sector Quarterly, September 2006). Click here for the long version of this article.
Effectiviteit van subsidies voor giften aan goede doelen (ESB, January 2006)

2005

Participation in voluntary associations: relations with resources, personality, and political values (Political Psychology, June 2005)

2003

De Bijdragen der Kerckelijken (Geven in Nederland 2003)
Trust, Accreditation and Philanthropy in the Netherlands (Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 32 (4):596-615)

Forthcoming

Wilhelm, M.O. & Bekkers, R. 'Helping Behavior, Dispositional Empathic Concern, and the Principle of Care'Social Psychology Quarterly. A previous version of the paper is here.
Bekkers, R. 'George Gives to Geology Jane: The Name Letter Effect and Incidental Similarity Cues in Fundraising’. International Journal of Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Marketing.
Bekkers, R. & Bowman, W. ‘The Relationship Between Confidence in Charitable Organizations and Volunteering Revisited’. Nonprofit & Voluntary Sector Quarterly.OnlineFirst PDF
Bekkers, R. ‘Benefits of Accreditation of Fundraising Nonprofits in the Netherlands’. In: Nonprofit Accountability Clubs: Voluntary Regulation of Nongovernmental and Nonprofit Organizations, edited by Mary Kay Gugerty and Aseem Prakash, Cambridge University Press. A previous version of the paper is here.

2007 Arnova Conference Papers

Ph.D-Dissertation, 'Giving and volunteering in the Netherlands: sociological and psychological perspectives', defended September 17, 2004

Download the entire dissertation here. - Het gehele proefschrift is hier te downloaden. Download chapters one by one here.
You can read a 6 page summary of the dissertation here. - Een samenvatting van 7 pagina's vindt u hier.
You said you wanted it shorter? Summary in 2000 words. Selbe Zusammenfassung auf Deutsch.
...or even shorter? Here's a summary of 500 words - Klik hier voor het persbericht.

Grants

My work is funded by a 'Veni'-grant from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research. Read my research proposal 'Learning to care: explaining the effect of education on prosocial behavior' here.
With a grant from the Department of Health, Well being and Sports I lead an evaluation study of service learning experiences in secondary education. More information about the study is available here .

Working papers

Trust and Volunteering: Selection or Causation? Evidence From a Four Year Panel Study
Keeping the Faith: Origins of Confidence in Charitable Organizations and its Consequences for Philanthropy aper prepared for the NCVO/VSSN Researching the Voluntary Sector Conference 2006, Warwick University, September 13-14, 2006)
Social Structure and Personality Assortment Among Married Couples (paper presented at the Dag van de Sociologie, Tilburg University, June 8)
Vrijgevig zullen we zijn, ik een beetje meer dan jij? (paper gepresenteerd op ASPO congres 2006, Groningen)
Secularisering: het probleem voor de filantropie van de 21e eeuw (paper gepresenteerd op congres ‘Geschiedenis van de filantropie in Nederland in de 20e eeuw’, Beverwijk, 22 september 2005)
It's not all in the ask: Effects and effectiveness of recruitment strategies used by nonprofits in the Netherlands (paper prepared for 34th ARNOVA-conference, Washington DC)
Charity begins at home: How socialization experiences influence giving and volunteering (paper prepared for 34th ARNOVA-conference, Washington DC)
Constructing a Philanthropy-Scale: Social responsibility and philanthropy (paper with Theo Schuyt and Jan Smit, prepared for 33d ARNOVA-conference, Los Angeles, November 2004)
Stability, Reliability and Validity of Social Value Orientations (June 2004)
Giving Time and/or Money: Trade-Off or Spill-Over? (Arnova Conference, November 2002)
Social Desirability of Social Value Orientations

Regulation of Philanthropy

An experiment with subsidies for charitable donations shows that rebates generate up to 30% lower donations than equivalent matching subsidies. This result calls the practice of tax deductions for charitable donations into question.
A press release on the experiment is available here.
Een beschrijving van het experiment
Charities that get accredited by the Central Bureau of Fundraising raise significantly more funds than charities that are not accredited. This finding emerges from 'Benefits of Accreditation of Fundraising Nonprofits' (working paper).

Published earlier

2004. Langetermijneffecten van jeugdparticipatie (with Marc Hooghe & Dietlind Stolle; Mens & Maatschappij, December 2004, in Dutch)
2004. 'Nee heb je, ja kun je krijgen' (Mens & Maatschappij, December 2004, in Dutch)
2003. Trust, Accreditation, and Philanthropy in the Netherlands (Nonprofit & Voluntary Sector Quarterly, December 2003)
2003. De bijdragen der kerckelijken (verschenen in Schuyt, Th.N.M. (2003). Geven in Nederland 2003).
2002. Secularisatie en veranderende motieven voor vrijwilligerswerk
2002. Giften van gereformeerden aan maatschappelijke doelen in Nederland (Sociologische Gids, december 2002)
2002. Verschuivende achtergronden van verenigingsparticipatie in Nederland (Mens & Maatschappij, december 2002)

2000. Religieuze betrokkenheid en vrijwilligerswerk (samenvatting artikel in Sociologische Gids, 47 (4), september 2000)

Philanthropy in the Netherlands

Curriculum Vitae

March 10, 2009

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