LGBT Identity and Race in the Nonprofit World

Research shows that LGBT people of color face especially high levels of discrimination in areas from incomes and employment to housing and health care. A new report shows that the inequity facing LGBT people of color across society also shows up in the nonprofit sector. Specifically, the report details how LGBT people of color employed by nonprofit organizations regularly face bias and discrimination that adversely affect their jobs, incomes and careers.  

The report from the Building Movement Project is based on its Nonprofits, Leadership and Race Survey of more than 4,000 nonprofit leaders and staff. The 2016 survey, together with an initial report on the findings, set out to assess why there are so few people of color leading nonprofit organizations, and what strategies could turn the numbers around. In the new report, Working at the Intersections, LGBT Nonprofit Staff and the Racial Leadership Gap, authors Sean-Thomas Breitfield and Frances Kunreuther dig into the survey responses from the one in five survey respondents who self-identified as LGBT.  

In addition to documenting the barriers facing LGBT people of color in the sector, the report issues several calls to action for moving to “greater acceptance and affirmation of the full diversity of nonprofit staff.”