.The calendar has turned, and with it comes a fresh wave of strategic planning, board retreats, and budget approvals. But 2026 is not simply an extension of the past few years. The landscape of Canadian philanthropy is shifting in three fundamental ways:

  • Flow of capital and change in power dynamics,
  • Moving away from impact reporting to learning systems, and
  • Redefining what it means to collaborate and connect. 

This year will demand a new level of courage, clarity, and openness from foundations and major donors.

To secure long-term relevance and meaningful impact, philanthropic actors must pivot to address these demands head-on. This isn’t about minor adjustments; it’s about a foundational recalibration of how capital, power, and learning move through the ecosystem.

A little bit of history…

A 1999 study conducted by researchers, John Havens and Paul Schervish from Boston College (Center on Wealth and Philanthropy, Boston College)  highlights that North America and for the most part, most of the Western World was entering into the “Golden Age of Philanthropy.” As time progressed, this became evermore apparent. It was reinforced in their follow-up study published in 2014, “A golden age of philanthropy still beckons: National wealth transfer and potential for philanthropy.”

This Golden Age results from the start, and now ongoing, wealth transfer along with the external (non-familial) socio-economics at play. These socio-economic realities include those who prospered during the downturn in 2008 and then again post-covid, and those who increasingly struggle (the income gap as an example). 

But what now? 

It’s been over a decade since that second study was published.  We find ourselves at a new philanthropic evolutionary stage. This is because society faces a critical set of questions – do we continue in this current direction of how we allocate private resources to public good knowing that we are not as effective as we can be, or do we pivot? 

So…

There are two directions:

  • Follow the past pattern of decline from the Golden Age downwards with a few spikes of optimism, or
  • As outlined in Thomas Homer Dixon’s, “Mapping the Hope Attractor”, perhaps there is a model of change that, “…even in the midst of compounding and interacting global crises, there are still coherent and plausible paths toward more just, democratic, and sustainable futures.” (Polycrisis.org)

Reflecting on where philanthropy in 2026, and for the foreseeable future, could go in context of the PolyCrisis Core Model, there are three significant landscape shifts.

Landscape Shifts in Canadian Philanthropy

Demand 1: From Payout to Power Flow

For decades, the central operational metric in philanthropy has been the payout rate. While crucial for getting money into the hands of organizations, it says little about the power dynamics inherent in that transaction. 2026 will demand that funders move beyond simply meeting the minimum legal requirements (disbursement quota) and instead focus on how their capital flows and what power structures it reinforces or dismantles.

This means asking harder questions:

  • Is our funding genuinely flexible? Are we prioritizing unrestricted, multi-year support that allows community leaders to adapt to shifting realities?
  • Who holds the decision-making authority? Are we transferring power to those closest to the challenges, or are we maintaining gatekeeping roles based on our own expertise?
  • What is the cost of our compliance? Are our application, reporting, and evaluation processes imposing undue burden on grantees, effectively recapturing a portion of the grant in administrative overhead?

The demand is for a shift in mindset. Seeing grantmaking not just as a distribution of funds, but as a deliberate act of power redistribution and trust-building.

Old Metric (Payout Focus) New Demand (Power Flow Focus)
Goal: Maximize immediate dollars dispersed.    Goal: Optimize capital for community    self-determination.
Default: Restricted, one-year grants.    Default: Unrestricted, multi-year funding.
Focus: Funder compliance and risk mitigation.    Focus: Grantee sustainability and reduced administrative burden.

Demand 2: From Impact Measurement to Learning Culture

“Impact” remains the ultimate buzzword. Yet, many foundations find themselves caught in a cycle of complex logic models and mandated metrics that fail to yield true insight. The systems we are funding are dynamic, not static. As such, 2026 will demand that we pivot from rigid, retrospective impact measurement to the creation of proactive, continuous learning cultures.

The goal is to embrace failure as a necessary input for evolution. This involves:

  • Prioritizing Curiosity over Confirmation: Designing evaluations to discover what isn’t working, rather than simply validating existing theories of change.
  • Establishing Psychological Safety: Creating internal and external spaces where staff, partners, and grantees can share failures and tough lessons without fear of financial or reputational penalty.
  • Rapid Iteration Loops: Using short, frequent feedback cycles (learning loops) to adjust strategy mid-flight, rather than waiting for annual reports to guide decisions.

Foundations that thrive in 2026 will be those that view their learning budget as equally, if not more, important than their evaluation budget.

Demand 3: From Collaboration as an Event to Collaboration as a System

We often celebrate large, one-off collaborative initiatives. These moments are important, but they often fail to create sustained change. 2026 will demand that funders treat collaboration not as an event, but as a system—an ongoing infrastructure for shared risk, shared intelligence, and shared action.

The complex, interconnected nature of challenges—from climate change to housing affordability—requires funders to pool resources and align strategy in a coordinated, reliable way. This means:

  • Shared Backbones: Investing in shared infrastructure, data platforms, and coordinating bodies that support a collective movement, rather than just funding individual efforts.
  • Venture Philanthropy Mindset: Applying a long-term, risk-sharing approach to complex social problems, similar to how venture capital funds invest across a portfolio. This includes using Program-Related Investments (PRIs) and Mission-Related Investments (MRIs) alongside grants to create a blended capital approach.
  • Accountability to the Field: Establishing clear, publicly visible commitments among collaborative partners that move beyond polite information sharing into genuine resource alignment.

2026 is a year that will separate the adaptive from the archaic. It demands that Canadian philanthropy move from comfortable operations to courageous leadership. Those who embrace the shift from payout to power flow, from measurement to learning, and from episodic collaboration to systemic coordination will be the ones who define the future of impact in this country.

Check out our client case studies on how K&C helps foundations establish themselves as learning organizations and adopt the funding principles shared above. 

Interested in seeing how you can develop a learning budget for your foundation? Contact us: info@karmaandcents.com.