UK Civil Society Almanac 2024

In the Almanac, the voluntary sector includes organisations that have six common features.

While we recognise there is no perfect term or definition, the Almanac focuses on organisations that meet the following criteria.

There is no single administrative database for all voluntary organisations. The Charity Commission charity register is the most comprehensive database available. Most of the figures produced for the Almanac come from this data.

When we refer to the voluntary sector or voluntary organisations, these are what we call ‘general charities’ (registered charities minus those charities that do not meet the list of criteria above).

Civil society refers to a broader range of organisations that play a significant role in society by providing services that:

• benefit the public
• advocate and campaign for social change
• act as a watchdog
• promote civic engagement
• take part in global governance processes.

Recent years have seen the rise of ‘hybrid’ organisations that share the characteristics of more than one sector. For example, social enterprises (businesses with social objectives that reinvest the money they make back into their business or the local community) can have multiple registrations including:

• community interest companies
• limited liability companies
• charities.

A charity may also have a trading arm registered as a social enterprise.

The heart of civil society

The voluntary sector is at the heart of civil society – a far wider range of organisations

• Our research briefing on civil society ‘Beyond charities’ explores a broader range of civil society organisations than the ‘general charities’ definition, for which the data is more fragmented and less consistent
• The latest report on below the radar organisations, produced for Local Trust, explores grants data for grassroots organisations
• ‘What’s missing’ paper by Pro Bono Economics on gaps in civil society data
• Articles by former NCVO data manager, Lisa Hornung, on:
  • issues with charity sector definitions
  • charity sector data and its limitations
• These articles and publications that have also informed our thinking:
  • The Voluntary Sector in the UK, J.Kendall and M.Knapp (1996)
  • Global Civil Society: Dimensions of the Nonprofit Sector, L.H Salamon, H.K Anheier, R. List, R., S. Toepler, S.W Sokolowski and Associates (1999)
  • Civil Society, M.Edwards (2004)
  • Defining the third sector in Europe, A.Evers and J. Laville (2004)
  • A strategic unity: defining the third sector in the UK, P. Alcock (2010)
  • What is Civil Society, its role and value in 2018? Cooper, R. (2018)