Forming International Networks of Philanthropy: The Cross-Border Activity of the Wellcome Trust, 1936-1995

Attention given to the international scope of large-scale philanthropy has grown over the past three decades, mirroring the increased prominence of organized philanthropy in the global institutional landscape. Aligning with such an environment, this research analyses the formation of international networks by philanthropic foundations, focusing on the motives and means of one such organization, the U.K. based Wellcome Trust. The paper takes an historical approach to examine the Trust’s formation of international networks. Based on archival research, it argues that the process by which the Wellcome Trust formed cross-border networks was non-linear; that while the international networks built by the Trust were all concerned with knowledge, they were heterogenous in nature and, that these networks shaped the conditions of possibility as to what international philanthropy could be and should do. Thus, the paper introduces a new dimension to debates around the nature, origins and scope of international philanthropic networks.