VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY TRAN HONG HANH THE NECESSITY OF A LEGAL FRAMEWORK REGULATING ONLINE DONATION BASED CROWDFUNDING IN VIETNAM MASTER'S THESIS VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY TRAN HONG HANH THE NECESSITY OF A LEGAL FRAMEWORK REGULATING ONLINE DONATION BASED CROWDFUNDING IN VIETNAM MAJOR: PUBLIC POLICY CODE: 8340402.01 RESEARCH SUPERVISOR: Dr. NGUYEN THUY ANH Dr. YANAGIHARA TORU Hanoi, 2021 ACKNOWLEDGMENT Foremost, I would like to extend my appreciation and sincere thanks to my supervisor from the Vietnamese side, Dr. Nguyen Thuy Anh.
Her patient and constructive advice had helped me a lot in the completion of this thesis. My great gratitude is due to my supervisor from the Japanese side, Dr. Yanagihara Toru for imparting his valuable guidance and constant supervision during my preparation time. Special thanks to the lecturers and staffs in Master’s Program of Public Policy and researchers for their studies and reports on the topic I have researched, whose information and findings had been a great support for my thesis.
Finally, I would like to express my love and gratitude towards my family and my friends. Their encouragement and support have shaped my thesis to this stage. Hanoi June 20, 2021, Sincerely, Tran Hong Hanh TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES. i LIST OF FIGURES .iii Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION.
Research scope and time. Structure of research. 6 Chapter 2 LITERATURE REVIEW AND METHODOLOGY. Overview of crowdfunding.
Studies on donation based crowdfunding. Research Design and Methodology .2 In-depth interview. 19 Chapter 3 CURRENT LEGAL STATUS OF DONATION BASED CROWDFUNDING BY INDIVIDUALS IN VIETNAM. Theories behind government’s intervention.
Legal documents and framework relating to donation based crowdfunding in Vietnam .1 Popularity of DCF and willingness to participate. Donor’s motivations and perceived creditability. Attitude toward the proposed regulation. From the perspective of fundraisers view.
Lawyer – Fundraiser for disaster relief. Major findings and discussion. 38 Chapter 5 CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS. 48 LIST OF TABLES Table 2.1 Classification of crowdfunding model .2 Summary of interviewee’s project.
32 i LIST OF FIGURES Figure 2.1 Sources, levels and dimensions of donors' motivations to invest in crowdfunding projects. The most popular donating channel. 29 ii ABBREVIATIONS DCF Donation-based crowdfunding model CET Cognitive evaluation theory ISSEE Institute For Studies Of Society, Economics And Environment ITD Intention to donate SET Social exchange theory SNS Social network sites SDT Self-determination theory TAF The Asia Foundation VAPEC The Vietnam Asia Pacific Economic Center VND Vietnam dongs MOF Ministry of Finance NGOs Non-governmental organizations iii Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION 1. Research background Emerging from the tide of industrial revolution 2.0, crowdfunding models are becoming an effective micro-financing methods used by both for-profit to social project founders (Mollick, 2014).
Lambert and Schwienbacher (2010) first define crowdfunding as “an open call, essentially through the Internet, for the provision of financial resources either in form of donation or in exchange for some form of reward and/or voting rights in order to support initiatives for specific purposes. In the realm of donation funding, the model is called donation based crowdfunding (DCF). DCF has been gradually become a popular fundraising method to financially support charitable projects. According to recent studies, the global value of DCF in 2016 amounts to $0.
The volume is predicted to keep increasing. DCF is used to fundraise for a wide variety of charitable causes ranging from specific tasks such as providing free meals to the poor to more ambitious projects like arts promotion and sustainable goals. Among which, DCF has been proven as an effective fundraising mechanism for disaster recovery (Behl et al., 2020) and medical aid (Z. Ba et al.
Though sharing a great commons with traditional charitable fundraising, DCF distinguishes itself by the utilization of the internet which makes it superior in term of eliminating geographical barriers (Choy & Schlagwein, 2016; Zhao & Shneor, 2020). Often just through a single click anyone can make information on a person in need of help known to the large crowd. It means that, on the one hand, the information on the beneficiaries are more diverse and abundant. On the other hand, with the assistance of social network sites (SNS) the information can reach a wider range of audience.
Besides the fundraiser’s social network, the call can also spread extensively with sharing function to reach donors who is not known to the fundraiser before. From the 1 donors’ side, DCF, thanks to search engines, may tap to donors who is actively seeking for the right project to support. Furthermore, DCF increases the likelihood of a charitable project to be funded as coordination and transaction costs associated with donation collections are reduced in a significant way. With the aid of the internet, each step to fundraise for charitable purposes has been simplified and integrated into one standardized process (Zhao & Shneor, 2020).
The campaign initiator can not only easily broadcast the call, but also provide real-time interaction in form of updates, comments and live streams to emotionally appeal the donor. The availability and popularity of wire transfer and e- banking enables the donor to make donation from anywhere at any time. DCF, thus, is open to anyone who wishes to raise funds or make a donation by lowering the threshold for participant and activism. In recent year, Vietnam witness the trend of DCF in form of individual calling for voluntary contribution for charitable cause on the internet.
In October 2010, Hoang Phan Anh – a famous MC, through a Facebook post, raised 24 billion Vietnam dongs to support people suffering from flood in the central provinces of Vietnam. November 2020, for the same cause and with the same means, Thuy Tien – a pop singer collected roughly 178 billion Vietnam dongs. Furthermore, DCF model is not only used by celebrity but also regular persons. Hoang Hoa Trung, a normal man of his thirties, thanks to online platform like social network and mobile application has connected to 12,000 donors and galvanized enough financial resource for 77 voluntary construction works, providing lunch for a year for 20.000 children in mountainous area with the value of 1.000/per school year in year 2020.
Besides Phan Anh, Thuy Tien, Hoang Hoa Trung, many persons are utilizing online networks to initiate both ad-hoc and long term charitable projects. The emerging of DCF by individuals also comes with concerns. First, asymmetric information between the donators and the beneficiaries exists, especially in the context that information used in online platform is mostly unverified and unapprised. Recently, in the national television news reported an individual illegally gain 07 billion Vietnam dongs by posting calls for charity donations through SNS.
Unofficial reports on the fraud in form of DCF are also popular. 2 Second, in cases where the fund raised is large, the question of effective distribution comes to hand. Both Phan Anh and Thuy Tien faced problem of distributing the mobilized voluntary contribution. In the case of Phan Anh, among 24 billion VND, emergency assistance including financial assistance, food and supplies amounts roughly to half of the total donations.
The remaining was used for providing breeding cows and calves to 04 poor communes of 02 provinces of Ha Tinh - Quang Binh, namely: Phuong My, Phuong Dien, Mai Hoa, Thach Hoa; building 1 clean water station to serve 500 households in Minh Cam parish, Tan Hoa village, Quang Binh province; sponsoring heart surgery for 90 cases of children in the Central with congenital heart disease through the Heart Understanding Fund; supporting project to build 31 flood-proof houses for people in Phuong My commune, Phuong Dien, Huong Khe district, Ha Tinh province. Though being transparent in the way of distributing the donations, Phan Anh was under criticism for not using the money for the purpose as stated in his fundraising status. Similarly, the post of Thuy Tien asking for using part of the donations to assist Vietnamese labor in Japan during Covid-19 was opposed by many supporters. Later, she announced to have been assigned all the contribution to local province to distribute to 61.532 households affected by the flood.
Some expert claimed that the distribution of a large amount, if not being in line with the government support scheme, may cause overlap. Some households may receive too much while others cannot access to necessary assistance. In Vietnam, the mobilization, receipt, distribution and use of sources of voluntary donations is regulated by Decree 64/2008/ND-CP. Accordingly, organizations allowed to perform mobilization, receipt, distribution and use of sources of voluntary donations are limited to Vietnam Fatherland Front and Red Cross Society (at all administrative levels), social and charity funds registered under Government's Decree No.
148/2007/ND-CP of September 25, 2007, and central and local mass media agencies (in case of donations for terminally ill patients only). The emerge of DCF practice has revealed the gap in the current legal framework. In October 23rd 2020, Government Office issued Official Correspondence No. 8876/VPCP-QHĐP to assign the Ministry of Finance to urgently draft a Decree replacing Decree No.
According to Correspondence No. 8876/VPCP-QHĐP, the purpose of the amendment 3 is to ensure the efficiency and timeliness of the mobilization, reception, distribution and use of voluntary contributions to support people in overcoming difficulties caused by natural disasters, epidemics and incidents; patients suffering from dangerous diseases; and to encourage, honor and create favorable conditions for organizations and individuals to promote the spirit of solidarity, mutual love and support in order to stabilize life, restore and develop production and daily life of the people. According to the latest proposal from Ministry of Finance on December 25 2020, regarding the regulations on individuals participating in the mobilization, receipt, distribution and use of voluntary contributions, two options are being proposed. The first one is that mobilization, receipt, distribution and use of voluntary contributions by individuals shall be regulated through reporting regime.
The second option is that the Government provides just the legislative backing for individual to do DCF, leaving open all the requirements. Since 2010 when Vietnam achieved low, middle income country status, foreign donors have been considering the plan to assist countries at lower status. In the trend of gradual decrease in foreign development assistance the mobilization of voluntary contributions within the nation is essential to help address existing and new development challenges. Meanwhile, a regulation can be a double-edged sword.
If it imposes too much burden on the subject, initiatives to do good can be discouraged. Therefore, it is essential to have a research to explore the DCF carried out by individuals in Vietnam and evaluate the necessity of a legal framework regulating such activities. From the analysis, suitable recommendations can be proposed so that new laws and regulations can provide a favorable condition for individuals mobilizing resources for charitable cause and yet ensure the effectiveness of distribution process. Problem statement In the era of Web 2.0, individuals are assisted to changing from solely donors to the fundraiser using DCF model.
The DCF model by individual now has not been regulated by any official regulatory documents. Meanwhile, frauds and ineffective distribution are potential to happen, causing lost to the society. In line with the aim of 4 mobilizing resources from society for charitable cause of the Government, it is necessary to explore the practice of DCF by individuals and evaluate the necessity of issuing new legal regulations regarding the matter. Research purpose The research aims at giving an exploratory of the current situation and analysis of the draft regulation on mobilization, receipt, distribution and use of sources of voluntary donations by individuals using DCF model, especially for the cause of helping people to overcome difficulties caused by natural disasters, fires or serious incidents and for terminally ill patients.
From the analysis, the paper will then propose suitable policy implications to create favorable conditions for individuals participating in fundraising activities and to ensure the efficiency of the mobilization, reception, distribution and use of voluntary contributions.