Taking advantage of the parliamentary procedure of the bills of Patronage and of Foundations it is important to reflect on these entities to which could be applied what Cesar Albiñana applied to the cooperatives: "they constitute an essential institution when building a more stable society, the less utilitarian and the stronger its sense of solidarity"

Using the synthetic formula that is picked up in the "Legal Regime of the Foundations" number 23 of the Foundations Centre, that we summarize basically in this article, "the foundation is a patrimonial endowment affecting a goal of general interest through an ad hoc organization." A similar but less synthetic definition is that which is captured in article 1 of the bill "They are established non profit-making organizations that, at the wishes of their creators, have their patrimony permanently tied to the fulfilment of goals of general interest."

The patrimonial endowment of the foundation, in short, is the pillar of its legal entity and what it guarantees is that something will be apt for the achievement of the loans that constitute its objective. This objective must be achieved by application of estate income. Anyway, at the present time there is the possibility that the foundation is provided with the means for its performance through activities of a commercial or industrial type, or agreeing formally periodic donations on the part of third parties. It is also more and more frequent that in the act of the constitution, it is endowed with a quantity entry, but the commitment of one or more founders is established to annually balance the budgets of the foundation. This is a modern and typical form of endowment, very characteristic of entrepreneurial patronage.

These characteristics of the foundations make them especially appropriate for a multitude of social objectives. Since their general interest and the corresponding budgetary endowments are recognised, it would be hard for such endowments to stray from the objectives initially assigned to the institution. In turn, the organization is conscious from the beginning of the means with which it can count on to take on its more or less ambitious projects.

The prevalence of social cooperation means that even in the modern foundations the paradigmatic note of the foundational movement, gratuitousness, is blurred and what really counts is that its activities are non profit-making. This expression is not understood in the strict meaning that its activities cannot produce earnings, but in the most generic that such earnings, if they are produced, are not distributed, but are a means of increasing the patrimony and above all, of increasing profits.

While in a capitalist society the owner's profit decides the orientation of decisions faced with the social purpose, in the foundations the objective prevails over mercantile profit. When interested proprietors are lacking, profit-making disappears and with it capital retribution. Such retribution strengthens the foundation's objective.

These entities are justified by their social function. They reach where the State cannot, also assuming tasks of high social risk. The foundations are instruments of progress because they identify social demands and contribute capital for the public good without the bureaucratic problems of official institutions. Some laws are needed to compensate these mutually binding acts, since if it is not like that, the superior entities will continue to be rewarded, more zealous about their own fame than supporting the experiences that the most mutually binding spirits take on daily.

Joseph John Franch Menéu
Gaceta de los Negocios, Friday February 19th 1993