• Kym Madden, Wendy Scaife
• Australian Centre for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Studies, Queensland University of Technology

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11 November 2008The potential of bequests to contribute to the sustainability of charities is immense, with social and economic trends opening up the bequest landscape. Yet so much is unknown about how Australians think about charitable bequests - particularly about the motivations, barriers and triggers surrounding this behaviour. Do bequestors differ from other donors? What prevents good intentions from becoming good actions? Where do charities figure in this process? This study aims at a better understanding of those Australians who make a charitable bequest and those who might. It offers individual charities, and the sector as a whole, empirical evidence to support and extend the anecdotal knowledge of those working with donors around this sensitive, but vital, area.