The question Hong Kong charities must answer
The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust’s impact report could help push the city’s NGOs towards a more serious culture of accountability
Hong Kong does not lack institutions that speak the language of service and responsibility. What it lacks, too often, is a clear account of what difference they actually make. That is why the Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC) Charities Trust’s first impact report deserves attention.
Publishing such a report may seem like routine institutional business. Up to a point, it is. But its publication opens up a bigger question, one Hong Kong has tended to skirt round: how should organisations with a public or social role be judged?
Large charities, public bodies and companies have become very good at reporting what they have spent and launched, and how many people they have reached. Those figures can show scale, and sometimes efficiency. What they cannot show, on their own, is whether people’s lives have improved, a need was met or a problem eased in any lasting way.