Report: Community Service Organizations and Third Sector Dynamics

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Community Service Organizations (CSOs), focusing on their role within the "Third Sector" and comparing their functions and challenges with those of the public and private sectors. The report begins with a definition of CSOs, highlighting their non-profit nature and their commitment to community welfare, human rights, and social upliftment. It traces the evolution of CSOs, from their historical roots in safeguarding voting rights to their modern-day diversity, encompassing various sizes and scopes. The core of the report delves into a comparative analysis of the private, public, and voluntary (third) sectors, outlining their distinct characteristics, missions, and operational approaches. Key differences in revenue generation, social welfare goals, and governmental control are discussed. The report then examines the key features of the third sector, emphasizing its value-driven approach and its contributions to societal betterment and work-related learning opportunities. It also addresses significant challenges faced by CSOs, including funding limitations, lack of social responsibility awareness, and difficulties in securing adequate support from governmental bodies. The report concludes by summarizing the challenges related to the management and governance of CSOs, such as budget deficits and the need for improved infrastructure and technical support. The report references key literature to support its claims.

Running Head: COMMUNITY SERVICE MANAGEMENT
COMMUNITY SERVICE MANAGEMENT
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Community Service Organizations are basically non-market and not for profit
organizations which are exclusively meant to ensure community welfare initiatives, enforcing
human rights, uplifting the health status of women and children in the society. CSO’s have
existed since 1947 mainly working towards safeguarding the voting rights of the Mexican-
Americans and empowering the poor immigrants to help them voice their own demands and
create a safe place in the America’s mainstream society (Jagosh et al. 2015). Since its existence
it has received significant financial aid from the Industrial Areas Foundation of Chicago. Today
the nature and scope of Community Service Organization has evolved and morphed to something
very different as compared to past. Today Community Service Originations include varied set of
originations ranging from small, informal or community based organizations to very large high-
profile CSO’s collaborating with varied local partners and working significantly as independent
authorities. Community Service organizations are very different as compared to any other private
or government controlled and managed organization.
These Community Service Organizations (CSO’s), NPOs (nonprofit organizations),
NGOs (nongovernmental organizations), INGOS (international nongovernmental organizations)
altogether constitute a relatively new sector of organizational functioning which is distinctly
known as the “Third Sector” (Defourny, Hulgård and Pestoff, 2014). Therefore these third
sector organizations are neither public nor private. Thus drawing a comparison between the
functioning of the public sector with the private and the voluntary sector that is the third sector
will include: Private sectors can be referred to as an important part of country’s economic system
which are completely owned and controlled by individuals. These do not have any government
control on their functioning. Some sound examples of private sector undertaking who have

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established themselves as business conglomerates are organizations like Neptune Oil Company
Apple Inc, John Lewis, and Google. Private sectors are very much obsessed with their revenue
figures which distinctly sets them apart from the public sector enterprises as well as the newly
coined third sector or the voluntary sector of business operations. The very approach, mission,
vision, culture and techniques of working in the private sector, the intensity of competition is
much more severe in this sector compared to the two other sectors of business. Private
sector enterprises may be a sole proprietorship business undertaking or a joint venture but it has
no state participation rather any governmental control over it. Whereas Public sector
enterprises are organizations which are completely controlled and owned by the
government, either state government or central government. Public sector enterprises always
support with a notion of social welfare more than just meeting the business needs or the
revenue targets which in turn is the main significant point of difference between the public and
private sector undertaking. Public sector enterprises being under direct control of the
government are basically managed by the taxes and fees paid by the citizens thus making it
more liable to meet the community welfare needs of the society. Though they are more
concerned with ensuring societal welfare than generating revenue however often public sector
enterprises are seen to be running at loss due to an imbalance in their revenue and expenditure
ratio. Some examples of Public sector enterprise are Australian Rail Track Corporation Clean
Energy Finance Corporation Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Reserve Bank of
Australia .Now coming to the last and newly coined sector of business operation which ah sits
own distinct and unique features compared to the private and public sector enterprises is known
as the Voluntary sector or the third sector of business operations. The third sector compromises
of those organizations who are completely devoted in serving the mankind and society at large.

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Community Service Organizations are an important aspect of the third sector enterprise. The
main point of contrast between the third sector as compared to Public and private sector
enterprise is that the third sector completely operates for social good and does not emphasize of
the generation of revenue. They are often aided by varied other non-profit organizations as well
as sometimes receive structural support from the government. Some relevant names in this sector
comprises of: CARE Australia, Australian Relief Organization, Australian Refugee
Association (Bielefeld and Cleveland, 2013.) and many more. Thus the key features which
exclusively belong to this third sector comprises of a value-driven approach on part of these
voluntary organizations. Apart from significantly contributing to the welfare of the society it also
has provided enough scope of inducing work related learning for the youth who interested to
contribute for the greater good of the society. Community Service Organization which belongs to
this third sector have greater opportunities to operate in developing a swell as developed nation
to ensure sustainable development goals. However there are certain key challenges faced by
these voluntary organization, the major ones being: absence of social responsibility culture
and awareness in today’s business environment, access and availability of funds, lack of
proper motivated youths who are responsible enough to bring greater good in the society. The
major challenges which are witnessed in this sector and which largely affects the management
and governance of these Community Service organization include: Budget Deficit and a weak
foundation. These voluntary associations do not receive the required infrastructural and
technical support. Thus, the managerial heads of these organization do not receive enough
cooperation from the government and this leads to major performance hindrances. The
Community Service organization often work with cases like women trafficking where the
volunteers need special protection from the governmental authority or may require special

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permission for entering any organization involved with any unethical activity. However this is
often found missing and the lack of proper support often reduces the motivation of these social
workers to work for the society.
References:
Bielefeld, W. and Cleveland, W.S., 2013. Faith-based organizations as service providers and
their relationship to government. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 42(3), pp.468-494.
Defourny, J., Hulgård, L. and Pestoff, V. eds., 2014. Social enterprise and the third sector:
Changing European landscapes in a comparative perspective. Routledge.
Jagosh, J., Bush, P.L., Salsberg, J., Macaulay, A.C., Greenhalgh, T., Wong, G., Cargo, M.,
Green, L.W., Herbert, C.P. and Pluye, P., 2015. A realist evaluation of community-based
participatory research: partnership synergy, trust building and related ripple effects. BMC public
health, 15(1), p.725.