The Ford Foundation was chartered by Henry and Edsel Ford in 1936 "to receive and administer funds for scientific, educational and charitable purposes, all for the public welfare", and initially served the Ford family's charitable interests in the Detroit area. Following the deaths of Edsel Ford (1943) and Henry Ford (1947), the Foundation was propelled to the forefront of philanthropy as the largest American foundation in terms of both endowment and yearly expenditures, and with an international scope to its major program areas.

During the Foundation's first twenty years its major programs were in international economic development, primary and higher education, educational and public broadcasting, behavioral sciences, civil liberties, urban development, fine arts and the humanities. The Ford Foundation also partnered with the Rockefeller Foundation in supporting agricultural development in South America, Africa, and Southeast Asia. Since the 1970s, the Foundation has also pioneered programs in women's rights, energy policy, micro-financing in under-developed countries, establishing human rights groups, and improving international HIV/AIDS education.

Segment One: International Activities of the Ford Foundation: An Overview

The Foundation's aspiration to become a national and international philanthropy for the advancement of human welfare was first formally expressed in the seminal 1949 report of the Gaither Study Committee, Report of the Study for the Ford Foundation on Policy and Program (RAC Library, call letters 361.7 GAI ), which was commissioned by the Board of Trustees to chart the Foundation's future. Foundation Trustees launched Ford's international grantmaking activities in 1950 when they approved the committee's report and its embrace of peace, democracy, and freedom. Since then, the Foundation has tackled these goals using a variety of strategies and responding to changing contexts, from the Cold War to the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall and beyond.

Toward the Foundation's aspirational goal, "the establishment of peace", its international activities have comprised a wide range of conceptual approaches and focus areas. These include international affairs, international studies, international understanding, arms control and disarmament, international law, international economic concerns, and overseas development in nearly every region of the world. Three distinct periods emerge for the international grantmaking defined by external contextual changes and internal changes in Foundation leadership and structures: the expansion era of 1950-1965; the transition and restructuring years of 1966-1988; and the post-1989 shift away from Cold War dichotomies. During each of the distinct historical periods the consistent objectives were: 1) to ensure freedom and democracy in developed countries; 2) to foster education and international understanding in all countries; and 3) to contribute to the social, economic, and political development of less developed countries.

Segment 2. Period Summary - The Expansion Era 1950-1965

With the ever-increasing budget and trustee willingness to invade capital, presidents Hoffman, Gaither and Heald oversaw vast growth in the Foundation's international activities in the United States, other developed countries and developing countries. Activities crossed disciplines, institutions, and national boundaries, although few crossed intra-foundation boundaries. Under the three presidents, Foundation staff in various domestic and international offices from New York interacted with the regional and country offices headed by representatives. Usually in this period, however, these offices in fact worked more closely with local governments than with New York staff, reinforcing the commitment to locally led social and economic development in less-developed countries.

The shared values of this early period reflected as much the continuing competition between the Communist and capitalist worlds as the concerns about maintaining peace. The Cold War provided the contextual continuity for grantmaking on the core themes of increasing American understanding of the rest of the world, building and strengthening connections not only with European and Asian democracies but also with Eastern European countries, the Soviet Union, China, and Cuba.

Segment 3. Period Summary - Transition and Restructuring 1966-1988 During this era, the Foundation's earlier interest in business and the economy evolved into a commitment to improving conditions for people living on the margins of society. The Ford Foundation promoted advancements in women's rights around the globe and introduced micro-lending into grantmaking. At the same time, the economic issues that were shaping program strategies also affected the Foundation's assets. Severe cuts resulted in a significant restructuring of country programs and reduced budgets across all programs.

Even with the cuts in country offices, in the 1970s Ford grantees in developing countries received approximately 80% of the International Division budget. The remaining fifth went to Population, Development Studies, and International Affairs. Although representing a much smaller piece, the International Security and Arms Control program from 1973 was the Foundation's most concerted effort to make meaningful inroads in disarmament and nuclear issues - those challenges most directly linked to the Foundation's historic concern for peace. By 1979, the Ford Foundation was the biggest funder of arms control as a field, both in the U.S. and overseas.

Segment 4. Period Summary - The Post-1989 Shift Away from Cold War Dichotomies

Franklin Thomas's presidency, lasting until his retirement in 1995, was defined by a commitment to connect the Foundation's US and international activities around a few key themes. These themes were addressed through grants that created private sector partnerships, enhanced support for local community groups, and enlarged initiatives to promote human rights, with special attention to women's rights. Throughout Thomas's tenure, Ford staff reinforced his special commitment to bolstering marginalized communities and broadening access to the law and educational opportunity. The Ford Foundation led the way in building the fields of international security studies, arms control, human rights, and governance. Moreover, in this period, Ford was innovative in drawing together the fields of international cooperation and human rights into one program.

Susan Berresford in her tenure as president from 1996-1997 continued and expanded the activities she helped initiate under Thomas. She and her colleagues increased support for the arts and established a variety of major international collaborative efforts implementing the concept of one foundation. Ford staff in this period drew on the Foundation's time-tested grantmaking strategies (supporting individuals and new institutions as needed), while concentrating on under-addressed issues and underserved populations. With Berresford's encouragement, Foundation staff explicitly took into account the new global context, increasing opportunities for inclusion of disadvantaged populations in all of their activities.

In the first decade of Thomas' tenure, the international work was still framed using the post-war East-West dichotomy. Several trustees brought to the board active engagement in international issues: Donald F. McHenry (trustee over the period 1981-1993) had served as ambassador to the U.N. and was active in the anti-apartheid movement; and General Olusegun Obasanjo (trustee over the period 1987-1999) had been Nigerian head of state from 1976-1979, and was then president of the African leadership Forum. Along with McNamara and Soedjakmoto, Rodrigo Botero, an internationally renowned economist from Colombia and former Colombian Minister of Finance and Credit from 1974 to1976, remained on the board over the period 1978-1989.

Segment One: Population Activities of the Ford Foundation: An Overview

The historical arc of the Ford Foundation's work in population covers the scientific, public health, social, cultural, economic, and policy issues associated with population growth, contraceptives, family planning, women's reproductive health, women's rights, gender rights, and related national policies and programs. Gradually, in response to changes internal and external to the Foundation, the program involved women in the research and policy aspects and of informing public debate and understanding.

In sum, the Foundation's broad swath of activities related to population and human reproduction represents a significant area of continuous attention from the 1950s until the present time. (It is important to note, however, that some aspects, such as the focus in in the 1960s on population-related scientific research, was an outlier in terms of the Foundation's overall emphasis.) Despite all the changes in leadership at the Foundation and consequent reorganizations, changes in local and global contexts, and changes in understanding of what constitutes effective work in population, the Ford Foundation has maintained a commitment to this field directly related to the health and well-being of women, their families, and their communities.

Segment Two: Ford Foundation Population Activities, 1952-1963: The Early Years

The Ford Foundation's first grant in support of population was made in July 1952 to the Washington, D.C.-based Population Reference Bureau. The justification was the impact of population growth on increasing food shortages and on threatening world peace, the Foundation's top priority at that time. In October 1952, Ford Foundation president, Paul Hoffman, supported Waldemar Nielsen to prepare a feasibility study about developing a full-fledged population program. [Hoffman had been Nielsen's boss at the Marshall Plan, when Nielsen was director for its European information division.] Other early grants included support to the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population.

Starting in 1954, the Ford Foundation began to support the Population Council for research, training, and action programs in population control and family planning. Over the period 1954-1993, Ford Foundation provided $88 million in support of the Population Council.

These early grants also relate to the Foundation's work on the behavioral sciences conducted under the auspices of that program area and its lead officer Bernard Berelson (Berelson had a PhD from the Graduate Library school, University of Chicago; following postdoctoral training at Columbia University, he became a recognized expert on public opinion studies). In 1951, Hoffman had hired Berelson to run the Human Behavior Program. When that program was terminated at the Ford Foundation in 1957, the work on population became part of the program on Economic Development and Administration. Berelson joined the Population Council in 1962 and served as its president from 1968 to 1974.

When Berelson left, Oscar (Bud) Harkavy was assigned responsibility for the grants related to population. Harkavy, a member of the faculty at Syracuse University College of Business Administration, had joined the Foundation in 1953 to work on economics and business education under the program of Economic Development and Administration. He had no background in any of the fields related to population. Nonetheless, he was able to build on prior grants and the work of other foundations to develop the program. As noted by Harkavy, following the grant to the Population Council in 1959, the Board of Trustees began to take more seriously the question of population growth and soon family planning. Population issues had become a more prominent concern for other foundations and international organizations, as well as the newly independent developing countries. As a result, the Ford Foundation created a new overarching Population Program to handle more efficiently the varied grant proposals and activities ranging from biomedical research to field-based family planning activities in the United States and abroad.

Segment Three: Ford Foundation Population Activities, 1963-1981: The Population Program

In 1963, then-Foundation president Henry Heald appointed Harkavy as the first director of the newly configured Population Program. Under varying titles, Harkavy remained responsible for heading the work in population under three presidents, until 1989. Harkavy and his program colleagues, many of whom went on to lead significant programs in other organizations, oversaw the expansion of the program and guided it through various restructurings under different foundation presidents and vice presidents.

Harkavy and his team were responsible for the grantmaking originating from the Ford Foundation headquarters in New York. In addition, they worked closely with the country and regional programs, where the program directors took responsibility for the country-specific initiatives. During this period, country programs, for example, in India, Pakistan, and Indonesia early on invested in the area of population with particular emphasis on family planning. The attention to population soon spread to other Foundation offices, with considerable efforts in Bangladesh, Egypt, Nigeria, and Mexico, as well. Harkavy was also responsible for initiating and sustaining collaboration with the Rockefeller Foundation, the Population Council, the Mellon Foundation, and various other entities.

In 1966, McGeorge Bundy became president of the Foundation and reorganized the grants programs into two divisions: National Affairs and International Division. The Population Program was placed as a separate program in the latter division, with Harkavy continuing as "program officer in charge," the new title for directors. He reported to Vice President David Bell for the next fifteen years.

Under Bundy, the Foundation began to support work on refugees and immigrants, noted as a theme related to population and population movements. Work on this theme continued as an integral part of human rights, both domestically and internationally, into the 2000s.

Ford staff estimated that between 1959 and 1979 the Foundation spent $225 million in the population field. Of that amount, from 1960 to 1979, the Foundation spent more than $100 million in support of biomedical research related to contraception and fertility as well as human reproduction. Support also included research and development grants toward developing more effective contraceptives. For example, Foundation grants led to the development and testing of the intrauterine device, the IUD. It also funded work at the Population Council and the World Health Organization on contraceptive research; it provided overall support for the World Health Organization's Special Program on Human Reproduction. Through these programs, the Foundation supported the strengthening of scientific research around the world. The work on family planning also included support of the International Committee in the Management of Population Programs and helped establish a network of institutions that focused on improving the delivery of population programs through research and training.

In the United States, Foundation grants enabled the Alan Guttmacher Institute, for example, to conduct research on population problems. Those grants included training for specialists on population communications, promoting school population education, and preparing family planning publications and materials.

In addition to the basic biomedical research on contraception and fertility, the Foundation also supported social science research related to population and family planning. While international population conferences held under UN auspices started in 1954, it was the one organized in Bucharest in 1974 (and subsequent ones in 1984 and 1994) that attracted Ford population staff members' attention. These meetings introduced new ideas about the relationship of population growth to social and economic conditions, highlighting new issues, such as fertility and education, marriage, income, land tenure, and the status of women. The Ford Foundation reoriented some of its grantmaking to include these themes. Like the biomedical science research, the social science and behavioral research from the beginning included support for nongovernmental, national, and intergovernmental organizations in the United States and around the world.

Starting in the late 1950s, training linked to research was a core program strategy to build capacity in the biomedical sciences, demography, and social sciences. Grants supported, for example: the University of Michigan's Population Study Center, Princeton University's Office of Population Research, and the Brown University Population Study Center. The Foundation also provided support to twenty-five population study centers in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

Other examples of training and research programs include: a Latin American program of population studies linking social science research institutions; a Southeast Asia population research award program; and a worldwide research competition on population and development cosponsored by the Rockefeller Foundation and the Population Council. Over more than twenty years, with Harkavy at the helm for the Ford Foundation, these three partners funders worked together to strengthen the field of demography and promote interdisciplinary research and training across the social sciences, as well as linking social scientists with demographers and other population researchers.

Segment Four: Ford Foundation Population Activities, 1981-1992: Renaming and Refocusing the Population Program

In 1980, the new president of the Ford Foundation, Franklin A. Thomas, created two new divisions, (1) United States and International Affairs and (2) Developing Countries, each led by a vice president (two long-time staff members, respectively, Susan Berresford and William Carmichael). He also identified six program areas for work both in the US and overseas- Urban Poverty and the Disadvantaged (soon called Urban Poverty), Rural Poverty and Resources, Human Rights and Social Justice (soon, Human Rights and Governance), Education (soon, Education and Culture), International Political and Economic Issues (soon, International Affairs), and Governance and Public Policy (soon moved to Human Rights, and replaced by Program-Related Investments).

He indicated that the population work as it was conducted would be closed. The work was absorbed into a new area called, "Health, Nutrition and Population," within the International Division. Grants began to support more explicitly the relationship of population and family planning to broader health and development issues. A new focus developed around giving a "fair start" to infants and children. Harkavy, now based in the Urban Poverty Program, remained the responsible program staff member with the title, "chief program officer."

By 1982, however, another change took place: population was separated from health and nutrition. The Population Program regained its distinctive status as a separate initiative under International Affairs. It maintained its traditional scope on limiting population growth, assessing the impact of such growth on social and economic development, and developing new approaches to demographic analyses, along with fostering basic research on contraceptives and fertility control. The work on health and nutrition was taken over by the Urban Poverty program, which addressed the population-related issues of teenage pregnancy and child survival both in the United States and developing countries. Grants concerned with refugees and migration, along with reproductive health rights, were supported under two programs, Human Rights and Governance, and International Affairs.

In 1989, President Thomas implemented another reorganization of the Foundation's programs. He coalesced all of the programs under one vice president, Susan Berresford. Harkavy had retired in 1988, and was replaced in 1989 by José Barzelatto, who joined after serving as director of the Special Program on Human Reproduction at the World Health Organization. He was appointed senior program advisor and placed in the Foundation's Urban Poverty Program. With his appointment, and in the context of the reorganization, the Foundation conducted an external review of the work in population. Following the review, in 1991 Barzelatto was named director of the newly named population program, Reproductive Health and Population. Once again, the program became free standing, and Barzelatto reported directly to Vice President Berresford. (An important staff note: Margaret Hempel was appointed in 1989 to work with Barzelatto, serving first with as assistant program officer and then moving with him to the new program, becoming deputy director in 1994. Hempel continued to work on reproductive health and population grants until 1999, when she assumed leadership positions outside the foundation. She returned in 2008 to direct the newly configured population program on Sexuality and Reproductive Health and Rights. In 2013, she became the head of the enlarged program focusing on Gender, Racial, and Ethnic Justice. She left the foundation in 2018).

As described in the 1990 Annual Report, the new Reproductive Health and Population Program built on and expanded the traditional focus on contraceptive research, demographic and social science research, and institution strengthening related to population and family planning. As part of the social science research and training efforts, the team introduced culture as an influential component of family planning programs. The program also gave special focus to the reproductive health issues affecting disadvantaged women in both rural and urban areas. In addition, the program began to support community-based reproductive health programs, women-centered programs in reproductive health including issues associated with maternal morbidity and mortality, and reproductive health rights.

With the increasing spread of HIV-AIDS both in the United States and around the world, the Foundation began to address the complex of issues associated with sexually transmitted diseases. The initial grants fostered public dialogue on the theme of HIV-AIDS, as well as supported the development of culturally appropriate ethical and legal frameworks in the context of women's reproductive health. The Foundation also supported projects that explicitly addressed issues of sexuality and sexual behavior.

During this period, the program actively collaborated with the Human Rights and Governance Programs around grants to improve women's role in society and their legal status. The work on refugees and migrants continued under Urban Poverty and International Affairs. Increasingly over the next few years, the program targeted international level activities, providing support for the 1994 UN Conference on Population in Cairo and the 1995 UN Conference on Women in Beijing. Under Barzelatto's leadership, the program's activities ranged from the most grassroots projects to global strategies, with women always at the center.