sztiv on "Philanthropy for social change: a response to Michael Edwards"

sztiv — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 16:49:47 +0100

Philanthropy of this kind is exploding for two very straightforward reasons. 1. The private sector is a lot wealthier than it used to be (or should be). 2. And that is because the public sector is not really taking care of public issues anymore -- few regulations, low taxes, no real capacity for welfare. Public wealth has been transferred into private hands at inconscionable speed recently.

So noblesse oblige.

It will seem fair enough to the extremely wealthy to demand some sort of return (bean counting, talking corporate jargon) on their investment. Having the power of wealth, it will seem only right to use it to inculcate the values that have made them fat.

Which is why the author sounds like he wants it both ways. Because of course, what he means is that we DO have to turn idealists into bean counters and talk hard-nosed business nonsense. In fact most NGOs have been doing that for years, certainly anyone who wanted to secure their funding drip.

Still, there's a long road ahead for the Atlantic Philanthropies of this world. Basically they want basic public goods to be provided below cost -- and to ensure that their delivery remains private, voluntary and inadequate. This set-up gives their own patrons (the very wealthy) more latitude to do what they like in the playing field of the world. After all, the last thing you want is revolution or even serious unrest. So they seek a certain kind of idealist professional. The poor fools who join NGOs are perfect for this -- they don't want (much) money and don't even think like capitalists. It takes real hard work to turn them into beancounting morons and require them to lower their ideals to the point of daily hypocrisy. But anyone who has looked closely at the way funding works will know it is possible, in time, to do this. A certain amount of ego-massage on one hand, and steady denigration of the naivete of social justice (indeed, of "society" itself) on the other. Carrots and sticks and travel and hotels.

But really we all ought to know better. We should recognise that the philanthropic bubble is the symptom of twenty years of bad policy geared to the desires of this tiny few. That it is a poor sop in the face of its own structural causes: the emasculation of public ethics and public service. We really have to learn how to get past this. We should just take the money off them, build ourselves a proper public sector, and stop letting these parasites stick a bandaid on the deep injustices that result from a system skewed to benefit them.

Philanthropy for social change, Gara LaMarche

david hayes — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 11:33:39 +0100

Michael Edwards, in his openDemocracy essay "Philanthrocapitalism: after the goldrush" (20 March 2008), raises an important and necessary voice of concern about trends in philanthropy that have received too little scrutiny to date - either because, as is often the case with donors of whatever variety, those hopeful for or dependent on their largesse fear to speak out, or because others are caught up in the latest vogue, hesitant to step away from the herd and ask if perhaps the newest "emperor" is a bit underdressed. I agree with much of his article but think it misses the mark or overstates the case in a few instances, so I will concentrate on my differences of emphasis or tone.
Gara La Marche is president and CEO of the Atlantic Philanthropies.

He writes a bi-weekly column on his experiences and reflections as Atlantic president

Also by Gara La Marche in openDemocracy:

"The crisis of democracy in America" (30 June 2005)

"America's closing society: a reply to Roger Scruton" (25 July 2005)

This article is a response to:

Michael Edwards, "Philanthrocapitalism: after the goldrush" (20 March 2008)
It is wrong to pose what Edwards calls "philanthrocapitalism" against traditional philanthropy, because much of his critique is as applicable as well to the large established foundations, which have hardly been in the vanguard of social movements. Notwithstanding the role played by a few small foundations like the Taconic Foundation or the Field Foundation in aiding the civil-rights movement in the United States, or some of the Ford Foundation's work in the 1970s and since with respect to the women's movement, the major social upheavals in the US in the 20th century owe little to philanthropy. The gay-rights movement, for example, got as far as it did, decades after the Stonewall protests of June 1969, with barely a dime from foundations. Meaningful social change that upsets the established social order will rarely receive - at least not in the critical earlier stages - support from establishment institutions, which join if at all at a later, safer point. The exceptions are few.

It is worth pointing out too that the strongest and most enduring non-governmental and civil-society institutions in the US - such as the American Civil Liberties Union, the Sierra Club, Amnesty International, and organising movements like Acorn (the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) - endure and grow based on a large base of relatively small individual donors and members, however much they have benefitted (once their existence is secured) from targeted foundation support.

That is not to say traditional foundations play no role in social change. They can at times be catalytic - think of Gunnar Myrdal's Carnegie-commissioned report on racism, An American Dilemma, or George Soros's support for opening up the debate on drug-policy reform. But foundations are not where social movement comes from; and in this respect the newer brand of venture capitalists resemble the older foundations they are beginning to overshadow.

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open Democracy News Analysis - Philanthropy for social change, Gara LaMarche - Comments

sztiv on "Philanthropy for social change: a response to Michael Edwards"

Philanthropy for social change, Gara LaMarche