The last decade has been one of rapid change in the role of the third sector in the UK, a period “bookended” by attempts from within the sector to assess the situation in which it now finds itself (Taylor, 1990; and Independent Commissions, 1996 and 1997). Essentially, the issue, as these successive inquiries have defined it, is one of finding a means of coping with the new pattern of relationships – both with the state and the market – that have developed over the past decade, without compromising in the process those characteristics that define the distinctive identity of the third sector itself.