A Brief History of Action Without Borders and Idealist.org

Action Without Borders (AWB) is nonprofit organization founded in New York City in 1995. Our mission is to connect people, organizations, and resources to help build a world where all people can lead free and dignified lives. AWB was founded by Ami Dar, an Israeli ex-software manager turned social entrepreneur. (Click here for Ami's biography.)

At the outset, we tried to build a network of "contact centers" that would provide a one-stop spot where people could find opportunities for meaningful engagement in their communities (much like the community points we are supporting now). However, noting the growing popularity of the internet and the way in which the web could exponentially increase our ability to foster connections, we refocused our efforts toward building a website that could serve as a hub for people and nonprofits that work on the betterment of communities. The result, launched in 1996, was Idealist.org.

Idealist quickly became one of the leading nonprofit sites on the web, receiving tens of thousands of visits per day and facilitating many thousands of connections all around the world. The site works by allowing nonprofits to create self-managed profiles where they can list their missions, contact information, services, programs, events, opportunities (jobs, volunteer positions, and internships), and needs. These listings are searchable by anyone visiting the site, and individuals can opt to sign up to receive email notifications of new listings meeting their preferences; by 2006, almost 400,000 people had signed up for these customized mailings. In addition to its database and directory, Idealist also features specialist resource centers on such topics as nonprofit careers, volunteerism, civic engagement, and nonprofit human resources. Almost all of our services are free of charge.

AWB also runs a number of on-the-ground programs that help us fulfill our mission. These include career fairs and graduate school fairs that focus on work and studies that promote the public good, and an annual campus conference that brings together some 1,500 student activists, faculty members, and nonprofit organizations. We also work with a range of partners—universities, corporations, specialist associations, and nonprofit networks—to increase our reach, enhance our effectiveness, and create more and better opportunities for connections to take place.

During 2003 and 2004, three strategic partnerships helped AWB expand our activities and scope. Through a merger with the Campus Outreach Opportunity League, we were able to diversify our programs on college and university campuses, at first in the United States and increasingly on campuses around the world. In 2004, we began a strategic partnership with Res Non Verba, an Argentine NGO focused on promoting volunteerism and civic engagement, which has given us increased depth in our work and enabled us to make our Spanish-language site, Idealistas.org, a more vibrant resource for the social sector. And in late 2004, Idealist's online resource centers were augmented by our adoption of The Nonprofit FAQ, a longstanding compendium of nonprofit-related frequently asked questions and expertly researched answers. These mergers, and our parallel growth in staff size and capacity, have brought AWB to a new level in terms of scope and influence, allowing us to reach more users and facilitate more connections than ever before.

AWB is a globally oriented organization with users from over 180 countries. At present, we have three offices in the United States—in New York, NY, Portland, OR, and Washington, DC—another in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and staff in Seattle, WA and Geneva, Switzerland. We have websites in English, French, and Spanish, and are currently developing new sites in more languages.

In November 2006, AWB unveiled a completely new Idealist.org that includes many of the social networking advances associated with Web 2.0. The new Idealist (and its sister sites) accommodate a wider variety of individual and institutional users than our previous sites, allowing for an ever-increasing array of opportunities for connection and collaboration among people and organizations around the world. Entering our second decade, AWB will continue to create new spaces, methods, and opportunities for all people to imagine, connect, and act for a better world.