Examining The Relationship Between Different Types Of Information Disclosure Of Foundations And Chinese Donations

The philanthropy industry in China has rapidly advanced in the past few decades and become more prominent in importance. In this study, we examine and compare how the disclosure of different types of information of Chinese foundations is associated with donations by exploiting a unique dataset from the China Foundation Center (CFC). Specifically, we explore a unique index of transparency on information disclosure or the Foundation Transparency Index (FTI) provided by the CFC and investigate how the donations from Chinese donors are associated with the disclosure of foundation's basic information, its financial information, project information and its governance information. We find that Chinese donations are more sensitive to foundation's governance information disclosure. These findings have important policy implications for both Chinese policy makers and practitioners in the industry. Specifically, the results lend strong support to advocating for the imposition of more mandatory regulations on the disclosure of foundation information, especially the governance information.