Getting Global Philanthropy Going This event is sponsored by Alliance Magazine, in conjunction with the December 2004 issue of Alliance, which focused on “Getting Global Giving Going”. What would it take to really get global philanthropy going? This question was the subject of a special feature in the December 2004 edition of Alliance. As part of that feature, we brought together a roundtable of people from all over the world to brainstorm the topic. We begin this online event with a summary of their discussions (click here to read complete text), which ranged around a number of key questions: Is global philanthropy increasing? What are the barriers to its increase? What can be done to stimulate it?

What would it take to really get global philanthropy going?

Is global giving increasing?
‘People are asking for a tenfold increase in giving, but we need a hundredfold increase,’ said Shankar Venkateswaran (American India Foundation, India – AIF). For the purposes of this discussion, when we talk about global philanthropy, we really mean redistribution – giving from rich countries to poor countries, and giving from rich to poor within poor countries. Has this increased?

There were mixed views, but generally our respondents felt that it had gone up slightly, though this is not true of giving by governments. But all are agreed that it needs to increase much more. In some cases, people also felt there had been a change in culture. ‘We are seeing a new understanding of how private money can be an important contributor,’ said Marcos Kisil (IDIS, Brazil).

Making giving easier and more attractive
Tax incentives
Panellists all felt, as David Bonbright (ACCESS) said, that ‘tax incentives are largely irrelevant to people’s giving’. Moreover, argued Hylton Appelbaum (Liberty and Donald Gordon Foundation, South Africa), why should governments let rich people off contributing to the public purse, so that they might or might not dip into their pocket for a cause that appeals to them?

Diaspora giving
Diaspora giving is a potential growth area, as AIF shows, and it could also spark indigenous giving as emigrés forge links with home communities. But many felt that it depends on having a vehicle like AIF. As Andrew Kingman (Allavida, Kenya and UK) said of Africa, ‘there’s very little established here in terms of infrastructure to tap the diaspora.’

Enhanced public perception of NGOs
Then there is the reputation of NGOs to consider. People are unlikely to give money if they think it is going to NGOs who they feel are either self-serving, inefficient or untrustworthy, and this is still the case in many developing countries. Improving this perception of NGOs will be critical if global giving is to increase substantially.

More information and measurement
‘People feel overwhelmed by not knowing: where could I give my money effectively,’ said Peggy Dulany (Synergos Institute, USA). This was part of a general uncertainty that people felt was hampering giving.

Could the internet help? Many thought it could, both in facilitating online giving (still in its infancy, as many admitted) and in advertising need in a direct way. Another approach to overcoming the information deficit and providing a reliable guide to NGOs’ effectiveness is performance measurement. David Bonbright talked of ACCESS and how it would ‘make visible to givers … the good work that is being done on the ground’. Both for Bonbright and for Vicky Garchitorena (Ayala Foundation, Philippines), the most important single stimulus was ‘more information, more easily available’.

Partnerships with local organizations
Another suggestion for increasing giving was partnerships with local organizations. While Andrew Kingman suggested we should be making more use of domestic grantmakers, Rien van Gendt (Van Leer Group Foundation, Netherlands) suggested partnerships with community foundations and grantmakers’ associations.

Foundation advocacy
A strategy favoured by Tim Wirth (UN Foundation, USA) is philanthropic advocacy: ‘I happen to think that the opportunities that are available through political [with a small “p”] advocacy give people enormous leverage and help to get issues to scale.’

David Bonbright feels foundations may also be able to play a part in stimulating individual giving, acting as the ‘smart money’, giving a lead and helping to leverage and direct individual giving.

Creating a culture of giving
Family and peer group influence
Making giving easier is vital, but even more urgent is persuading people to give in the first place. How can we do that? ‘People respond a lot to what their peers do,’ Peggy Dulany pointed out. Things like giving circles not only encourage people to take the plunge, they also enable people to learn from each other and gain guidance in how and where to give.

Role of the media
The media, though a powerful weapon, can be double-edged. While it is a big factor in ‘sensitizing people’, it can also dwell on the threatening nature of global problems to an extent that sometimes paralyses giving. The Patriot Act, for instance, and the general rhetoric about the so-called war on terror, Barry Gaberman (Ford Foundation, USA) felt had had ‘a chilling effect’ on philanthropy. Peter Wheeler (New Philanthropy Capital, UK) emphasized the need for ‘true compassion as much as fear’.

Bridging the gap in experience
What can be done to bridge the gap in experience and in human sympathy between those who have and those who are in need. Many panellists, including all those from the US, thought the biggest single thing would be, as Adele Simmons (Global Philanthropy Partnership, USA) put it, ‘getting young people out and working overseas, particularly in developing countries’. This would create a lasting bond between individuals in rich countries and communities in the developing world. The need for a sense of personal connectedness was perhaps the strongest message to emerge from the discussion.

Caroline Hartnell is editor of Alliance Magazine.

Adele Simmons is President of the Global Philanthropy Partnership and Senior Adviser of the World Economic Forum.

Alliance Roundtable: Full text from the December 2004 Roundtable

Caroline Hartnell - Feb 1, 2005 5:20 am (#1 Total: 32)
Alliance Magazine


Where to now?

Our roundtable panellists have opened the debate and given us plenty to think about. Among the things that stand out are:

the need to create a new culture of giving among individuals;

the need to make it easier for individuals to give, both by simplifying the process and by assuring them that their donations are going to reliable groups.

We hope the discussion over the next two weeks will explore these questions further.

And, without wanting to dwell on it, the tsunami disaster, which has happened since the roundtable, has thrown a new light on the discussion. A disaster on an almost unprecedented scale, it has produced an equally unprecedented response. In the roundtable, panellists speculated on the future role of the internet in sparking giving. Even the most optimistic of them could not have anticipated the amount of giving that has taken place over the internet for tsunami relief.

What lessons can we learn from this about the use of information technology in promoting giving? If people have given once over the internet, will they be ready to do so again, or does it depend on the cause?

Another set of issues relate to the longer-term effects on giving. Is there a way in which we can capitalize on the energy and compassion unleashed by the disaster and turn it to longer-term account? On the other hand, given the amount of aid that has flowed in, it is inevitable that some of it will be wasted and this will equally inevitably attract the attention of the media. Will a combination of this and the blunting of the edge of people’s compassion with time produce a reaction and will this make people less generous in the future? What systems for accountability and transparency are in place and are they working?

Will the overwhelming response to the tsunami tend to make people more or less generous in the future?

We very much look forward to hearing from all of you over the next couple of weeks.

Charles Cameron aka hipbone - Feb 1, 2005 3:52 pm (#2 Total: 32)
HipBone Games / Rheingold Associates


Caroline, you write:

without wanting to dwell on it, the tsunami disaster, which has happened since the roundtable, has thrown a new light on the discussion. A disaster on an almost unprecedented scale, it has produced an equally unprecedented response.

I am very heartened by the magnitude of the response to the tsunami, to be sure, but I am also a bit wary of what happens to "every day" concerns when something this large comes down the pike. I was distressed to read a friend of mine, Christopher London of Educate the Children Nepal, writing elsewhere today (and quoted here with his permission):

The redirection of donations to tsunami vicitms is hurting us, as I expected it would. Human tragedy is infinite and the capacity to deal with it (mentally, morally, spiritually and economically) is most decidedly finite."

This wasn't a gripe, it was someone in the field who was profoundly grateful for the current safety of his organization's staff on Nepal in light of the recent coup there, summarizing the situation and mentioning the dip in funding as one of the elements he's coping with --

It's my Nepali staff that I have to worry about. That and keeping enough money flowing into the organization that we can even have a staff.

And yet that's it, right there where he's preoccupied by a sudden change in the specifically Nepali context, there's also the influence of the tsunami on global patterns of giving to be considered.

We humans are a funny lot. We follow fads and fashions. We don't have an intuitive map of the totality of global suffering such that we can respond at every moment to the greatest need, we respond to what the press tells us is the fashionable need.

And sometimes, sometimes in the aftermath of some great but perhaps avoidable catastrophe, our press or politicians will admit that yes, there was a disaster over there and we didn't bring it to your notice in time, we didn't respond to it in time.

There's not enough attention to go around, so we focus in on iconic causes, which are really a bit like celebrities: as the French phrase causes celebres might suggest. Tibet, I've heard it said, gets a great deal more attention from advocacy groups than say the Uigur, because Shangri La, because the Dalai Lama, because Hollywood, because fashion…

So there's a disconnect. We want to respond to actual need, it seems to me, to obtain the greatest benefit in relief of suffering from our contributions -- but in the aggregate we respond to something more like a need spotlight, which if it highlights Sri Lanka and Bandar Aceh may leave Kathmandu a little short of funding… And that disconnect should concern us, to the extent that issues of greatest need and benefit concern us.

I'm fascinated by this business. I'm fascinated by the people who mourned Princess Diana, never having met her, on the basis of her press aura, fascinated by those who want to know the latest about Jennifer Anniston and Brad Pitt (and indeed know more about Donald Trump, his thoughts, his palaces, his taste in shirts, than they do about their own cousins), whose travels to exotic lands take place via soap operas or romance novels, while their daily commute is something less than inspiring.

I'm fascinated by our ability to make a Kennedy, a King, a Mother Theresa stand for an ideal – but it worries me that we then repose so much of our own hope in these iconic figures that, how can I say it, there's less to go around elsewhere. We give enormous oomph to Bill Gates, and indeed he does some remarkable, phenomenal things with it – but are there perhaps a thousand smaller craft that can't survive the wake of the great ship Microsoft?

I'm arguing that the marketplace of fame, of projection, of icons, of importance and reputation and size – duly constituted by the processes of human psychology – does something to the ways in which we distribute our attention, our caring, our philanthropy which we haven't counted on, which is in its own way magnificently self-defeating, which we need to recognize and make allowances for.

Because otherwise the well-amplified appeal will drown out more urgent but smaller cries, and our response to the tsunami will be not only a magnificent gesture of concern and aid – but also a dip in our caring elsewhere, a shortfall for an educational venture in Nepal…a medical outpost in Uganda

Rain on Roke may be drouth in Osskil Ursula le Guin once wrote, meaning that there is a balance in all things. I'm hoping we can learn to avoid drouth in Nepal while bringing much needed philanthropic rain to Sri Lanka. That's all...

yvonne morgan - Feb 1, 2005 11:32 pm (#3 Total: 32)
Charities Aid Foundation Southern Africa


I agree that expanding the pool of givers, to include especially more individual giving, is an important way forward. I'm not sure that tax incentives don't play a role, though. Perhaps it depends more on the type of giving and the type of giver.

For instance, I did a brief electronic poll recently among employees of two large South African corporates, and asked them if they would consider giving through a Give As You Earn (payroll giving) scheme if there were to be an immediate tax benefit each month reflected on their salaries. (the question was directed at those employees not already giving through their company's payroll giving programme). 99% said they would. Although this can't be considered definite commitment, perhaps it indicates that we would be wrong to dismiss tax incentives completely as motivations for giving.

Sonja - Feb 2, 2005 4:45 am (#4 Total: 32)

--Your Message Here--

I think that people give for different reasons. One of these is the extent to which, as an individual, you can relate to the person who needs your help.

The Tsunami disaster was a completely unavoidable natural disaster that could have impacted on anyone who happened to be in the vicinity at the time. The appeal to individuals in first world countries is (I think) the fact that they could completely relate to the people whose terrifying stories they heard over and over again on CNN and Skye News. Individuals could not be 'blamed' for putting themselves into a vulnerable position. That person on the beach who lost his/her child could well have been them.

Now contrast this to the plight of the millions of people living with HIV in Africa. There is potentially a sense of "well that could never happen to me" as well as some apportioning of "blame" - "those people" must have been promiscuous or careless etc. Their infection could have been prevented.... I am not suggesting that this thought process is necessarily a conscious one but I do believe that this "othering" process may account (in part) for the difference in the response.

Sonja.

 

 

simon hebditch - Feb 2, 2005 4:54 am (#5 Total: 32)

--Your Message Here--

Message from Simon Hebditch from Charities Aid Foundation in the UK

 

We are now confronting one of the major problems we face if we want to raise charitable giving substantially - how do we convert the emotional commitment illustrated by the tsunami appeal into a generally higher level of giving on a regular basis? It seems to us at CAF UK that, in the right sense of the word, we must try and harness present commitment. The omens are not necessarily good - the follow up to 9/11 didn't lead to a transformation of giving. Neither did the Bob Geldof Band Aid/Live Aid events in the 1980s.

On the other hand, a recent CAF/NOP survey of British adults showed that 65% are intent on at least continuing their normal charitable giving alongside the gifts they made to the tsunami appeal. Also, over 80% of British adults gave money - a very high figure.

On tax incentives, I think it is difficult to generalise. It is clear that the cause and commitment come ahead of tax incentives but such reliefs can be an added bonus to some donors -especially at the more wealthy end of the market.

 

 

Svitlana Kuts - Feb 2, 2005 7:30 am (#6 Total: 32)


--Your Message Here-- Global giving largely depends on how it is applied locally. Western donors are giving in conspiracy - local donors will never follow them in the absence of giving culture. The very point of NGOs support does not work as people support the cause not the institution. Internaitonal donors arrive in countries like ours support NGOs and report that they support the NGO not a cause. This is about Ukrainian revolution - we all saw tremendous wave of giving to people on Kiev Maidan, almost without apeal. They were giving to people fighting for their future (to cause) not to organizations. My point is that NGO managers should forget about how to pay salaries to their office but think how they are solving problems, and western donors should report about supporting the cause (or its prevention) not organizations. Tax incentives in the transaction between donor and recepient look rather like the tax relieve option, it undermines philanthropic impulse. There should be clear government policy on tax deductions for philanthropy, so people understand that they are giving to publicly accepted causes.

abc4all - Feb 2, 2005 8:18 am (#7 Total: 32)
A Better Community For All (ABC4All)

Self-Funding for Charities: What the World Needs Now

A Better Community For All (ABC4All) has been in development for six years. The purpose is to create an action plan that will harness ALL consumerism via credit cards to benefit charities worldwide with self-funding. Included is the creation of an endowment fund, the Millennium Endowment Fund (MEF), that will match, or double any charitable contribution generated via such consumerism. Such “Directed Consumerism With Automatic “TechnoGiving” (DCAT)™” thereby supports worthwhile causes worldwide.

IMPLEMENTATION / MISSION

ABC4All has begun implementation in 2004. The mission of ABC4All is to assist with self-funding of worthwhile causes the world over: "Maximizing Charitable Contributions on and off the Internet"™  

In 09/04, there was the simultaneous establishment of the Foundation of A Better Community For All (FABC), a National Heritage Foundation, and The ABC4All Triple Giving Program (ABC4AllGGG)™ or TGP.

TRIO OF FOCI

Implementation of ABC4All has begun with a Trio of Foci: 1) Community Health, Exercise and Nutrition for All (CHEN4All), 2) The ABC4All Triple Giving Program (ABC4AllGGG)™ and 3) The Path of 8Petals leading to Health Heights™.

THE ABC4All TRIPLE GIVING PROGRAM (TGP)

With ABC4AllGGG or The Triple Giving Program (TGP), there is established the means by which the ABC4All mission can be fulfilled. The cornerstone of ABC4AllGGG is The Giving Card (TGC). TGC has received an endorsement by the Vatican.

No risk or obligation is involved for businesses, charities or consumers to participate. Once consumers are enrolled as a Friend of ABC4All (FABC) and then expand their support via enrollment via ABC4All in The Giving Card (TGC), automatic micropayments will be generated based on ALL consumerism executed with existing credit cards (no new card is required) that are used by the Friends of ABC4All.

FRIENDS OF ABC4ALL / MILLENIUM ENDOWMENT FUND (MEF)

With the creation of the Millennium Endowment Fund (MEF), The Foundation of A Better Community For All (FABC) will match, or double any charitable contributions created via such directed consumerism. The Friends of ABC4All with their participation can support one or more charities of their choosing.

ABC4ALL LEGACY

By establishment of A Better Community For All (ABC4All), no individual or group benefits, only the worthwhile causes to which the micropayments are designated by participating consumers, the Friends of A Better Community For All (FABC). The ABC4All legacy is thereby established and will continue into perpetuity. Finally, ALL consumerism is harnessed to the betterment of mankind.

Respectfully Submitted

Burton Danet, Ph.D., Co-Founder, A Better Community For All (ABC4All)

Caroline Hartnell - Feb 2, 2005 10:06 am (#8 Total: 32)
Alliance Magazine


I completely agree with you about the danger of the tsunami appeal drowning out other voices and other needs that are just as pressing being neglected.

The hope is that the response could be built on to create a wider and more all-embracing feeling of responsibility for our fellow human beings. In Britain, certainly, the public response to the tsunami appeal was seen to have pushed the government to respond more generously. Will this feeling just die down as the tsunami fades from the television screens, or is there a way to build on it? What the Millennium Campaign is trying to do is galvanize public feeling in rich countries so that governments are forced to increase aid levels to the UN recommended 0.7 per cent level. So the question for us, I guess, is how can we build on the response rather than just let it deflect attention from other needs?

DennisWhittle - Feb 2, 2005 11:09 am (#9 Total: 32)
Chairman and CEO, GlobalGiving


Caroline and Adele,

This is a timely conversation - thanks for initiating and hosting it.

You hit one of the nails on the head when you wrote:

Getting young people out and working overseas, particularly in developing countries...would create a lasting bond between individuals in rich countries and communities in the developing world. The need for a sense of personal connectedness was perhaps the strongest message to emerge from the discussion.

I would extend this beyond young people to all people. One of the striking things about our experience at GlobalGiving is the number of people who want to feel a personal connection to the project or organization or even other donors. The degree to which we can do this will determine the pace of our growth.

This is a challenge in a web-based environment, but it is doable. We are experimenting with a lot of different features. Some don't work, and we abandon them. Others do work, and we embrace and extend them. One of my favorite successes to date is the use of GlobalGiving as a wedding registry by the Nobel Prize winner Joe Stigltiz and his fiance. They and their friends around the world TOGETHER raised thousands of dollars for grassroots projects overseas.

How can we build these donors networks out more broadly?

Caroline Hartnell - Feb 2, 2005 12:13 pm (#10 Total: 32)
Alliance Magazine

I'm sure it's too sweeping to say tax incentives don't play any role in increasing giving - though none of the Alliance Roundtable participants felt they play a big role. I agree with Simon Hebditch that they they're particularly likely to make a difference at the wealthier end of the spectrum, and this certainly seems to be the case in the US.

But it's always seemed to me counter-intuitive that a tax benefit should actually make people give. After all, even if I get a tax benefit, giving to charity will still cost me money. (This may not be true at the very high-wealth end of financial management, which I don't know about.) So I'm interested in Yvonne Morgan's example of employees saying a tax relief might encourage them to give through a company payroll giving scheme. I wonder if they were already giving in some other way?

 

DennisWhittle - Feb 2, 2005 12:29 pm (#11 Total: 32)
Chairman and CEO, GlobalGiving


Caroline,

Our experience on this at GlobalGiving is that the main things driving employee giving through the workplace are:

Awareness - usually the company markets the opportunity to employees. This is especially important for international giving, since most employees are not aware that there are now channels that enable them to give to projects overseas.

Ease of giving - the company provides either a paper form or, increasingly, a web interface to the employee

Small bites - the employee can make a small donation each pay period that adds up to a lot on an annual basis

Company Matching - this is key. Most of our corporate customers offer a match to their employees' donations

What happened to my money? - Increasingly, donors want to know exactly what happened to their money, and what impact it had.

Tax deductibility. This does remain a key issue, at least in the US. If one giving channel did not offer it, I believe that donations through that channel would fall.

I will send a separate note on tax deductibility for appreciated stock, since it deserves to be highlighted.

DennisWhittle - Feb 2, 2005 12:39 pm (#12 Total: 32)
Chairman and CEO, GlobalGiving


As Caroline noted, tax deductibility matters particularly for high-income and high-wealth donors.

One tax-management strategy is particularly valuable, and I have been amazed at how many people are not aware of it.

In the US, most people can donate appreciated stock, and get a tax deduction for the full amount. So, for example, if someone paid $5,000 to buy 100 shares of stock 10 years ago, and the stock value has gradually risen over time to $15,000, they can get a substantially greater tax deduction by donating the stock itself rather than selling the stock, paying the taxes, and then donating the net proceeds.

I realize that this does not apply specifically to giving internationally. But since $10,000 can make a HUGE difference to a project in a developing country (and hence give the donor a greater sense of having achieved something), we are starting to see a number of donations in this range. And almost all of them are being funded by appreciated stock.

Robert Daoust - Feb 2, 2005 9:22 pm (#13 Total: 32)

"Each citizen should spend one or two hours every week rescuing an individual who will suffer or continue to suffer severely if this citizen do not intervene." That formula is the key to really get global (and local) philanthropy going. Money will never suffice, personal involvement is necessary first and foremost. Our own individual actions produce social ills of all kinds, or prevent good things to happen : it is only by systematically committing ourselves to rescue individuals in need that we will become aware of the effects of our actions, that we will stop undoing with one hand what we are doing with the other hand, that we will realize how much we are vulnerable and need solidarity, us as well as them.

That formula is the basis of a solution to the world problematique. To use the terms found in the Alliance Roundtable text, it is "the most significant innovation" that is sought for, it has "more information and measurement", and its main feature is "personal connectedness". Just picture yourself a Sunday afternoon, connected to your branch of universalrescue.org, examining what you can do to save individual X who will suffer severely from hunger if you do not intervene. It must be understood that universalrescue.org would have the mission to manage a system for the control and prevention of ALL those individual cases of severe suffering that CAN be controlled or prevented if and only if new individual citizens become involved in the system. Such an organization could be started easily with less than 100 000 dollars. The first few successful interventions would provide a powerful impetus for the rise of the enterprise.

That formula is offered freely to anyone who might find value in it. Everyone is invited to pay attention to its compliance with the following passages from the Alliance Roundtable text.

"People feel overwhelmed by not knowing: where could I give my money effectively,’ remarks Peggy Dulany. This is echoed by Rien van Gendt: ‘There is a kind of popular thinking that it’s complicated … And they would like to not just write a cheque but be engaged themselves."

"A lot of people want to feel really connected with what they’re helping in a positive way."

"Almost all the participants, in one form or another, expressed the sentiment that what’s needed is to find ways of bringing givers or would-be givers into intimate, personal contact with problems which are generally remote from their experience. This is perhaps the strongest message to emerge from the discussion. (It should be stressed that givers themselves often want this in some form or other. As Marcos Kisil remarks: ‘They are looking always, the donors, to become part of the process of change.’)"

"At some point, all participants alluded to the need to bridge the gap in experience and in human sympathy between those who have and those who are in need."

"And in spite of the greater visibility of organized philanthropy, the people who need to reach for their chequebooks are individuals. As we’ve seen, by far the greatest share of giving is done by individuals, yet according to Venkateswaran, ‘oddly enough, people are not asking individuals’."

Robert Daoust www.algosphere.org info@algosphere.org

Ise Bosch - Feb 3, 2005 10:37 am (#14 Total: 32)


To create a culture of giving: donor education! I think it makes sense to look where there is potential to give MUCH more. Here in Germany we have increasing top wealth but virtually no guidance on strategic giving. I assume this is similar in most countries outside US, GB, maybe NL. I'd love to hear from countries with a large wealth differential, like S. Africa, Argentina, etc. - re. the "give back" factor. This is not only about funding, it's about social healing. What cross-country exchange could support donor education there?

Mal Warwick - Feb 3, 2005 11:20 am (#15 Total: 32)
Author, consultant, public speaker


This discussion is unsettling, because in some ways I feel it's off the mark. First of all, the biggest problem faced by developing countries is not a lack of philanthropy from the Global North but a dramatic economic imbalance between poor countries and rich ones. Despite overseas aid, increasing private investment and philanthropy, and modest debt forgiveness by the richest countries, capital still regularly flows *from* poor countries to rich ones. The poor just go on getting poorer. And the very people who are most influential in the realm of philanthropy are in the best position to influence their governments to address this fundamental problem. If rich countries were to forgive Third World debt on a massive scale and direct multinational institutions such as the World Bank and the IMF to forego the destructive policies they foist on their clients in the Third World -- policies that impoverish rather than enrich the people they allegedly assist -- the need for a substantial increase in philanthropy as defined in this discussion would diminish sharply, or even disappear.

Second, not all "philanthropy" is good. Indeed, much private philanthropic activity in poor countries plays a negative role, reinforcing centuries-old bad habits forged in colonialism. Broadly speaking, philanthropy with an agenda is rarely of value in the Third World. Grants, loans, and technical assistance that are tied to religious teaching or that require the recipient to hire Western consultants, or -- even worse -- "aid" that's disbursed in the donor country to buy its goods and services is not much help. Such "assistance" typically helps the giver more than the beneficiary. At its worst, it saddles a poor country with yet more debt.

However, there are two ways that philanthropy from rich countries can truly help poor people in the Global South rise out of poverty. By providing capacity-building funds and tools, we can help them build home-grown institutions with the ability to generate local resources, making them truly self-sufficient. We can also fund much broader and more far-reaching efforts to identify sound, successful locally-run NGOs that have demonstrated the capacity to make a difference in their communities. All over the world, there are NGOs that operate ethically, effectively, and in concert with the culture of their communities. Philanthropy is at its best when we help them -- in the ways that they want us to help.

Mal Warwick, Berkeley, California, writing from Mexico City

cellulator - Feb 3, 2005 11:43 am (#16 Total: 32)
Christopher London


Continuing in this vein, a major problem is continuity in donor funding. The giving for the tsunami is 1) siphoning money away from prior commitments and 2) to the extent that it is bringing in new donors (e.g., my father, who never gives to anything) will not bring them in permanently. So, as has been mentioned, just as the waves eventually subsided, so too will the donation dollars.

But this isn't unusual, it is typical. I just came across an analysis of Bank investment in post-conflict situations (http://econ.worldbank.org/files/15710_CollierHoefflerAidPostConflict.pdf). Investment is heavy in the initial post conflict years, but just when the investment could begin to take root, funding slows to a trickle. It is indicative of a general problem in giving: it is short term. Change doesn't happen in the short term.

So, while agree with Mal's concluding comments, it needs to be added that funding this work needs to be based on a long term commitment, and a willingness on the part of donors to weather the ups and downs, two steps forward one back, nature of social change. In our experience many individual donors do make such commitments. But grantmakers should start making at a minimum three year grants, instead of the one year and out which often happens.

Caroline Hartnell - Feb 4, 2005 12:35 pm (#17 Total: 32)
Alliance Magazine


Thank you for this corrective comment. I don't think philanthropy will ever be the answer to the world's problems and I entirely agree with you that a lack of 'philanthropy' is not the major problem facing developing countries, and that any sort of philanthropy with strings attached is likely to be positively harmful.

I also agree that supporting good indigenous NGOs in poor countries is a valuable role that northern philanthropy can play. Finding such NGOs, and supporting them in various ways in order to help them become more attractive to donors, both in rich countries and in their own countries, is in fact the specific focus of many of the 'mechanisms' discussed in the Alliance Roundtable - diaspora philanthropy organizations, internet marketplaces such as GlobalGiving and Give India, and ACCESS, among others.

Another valuable role for philanthropy, I think, is supporting northern NGOs that are trying to pressure governments and multilateral agencies like the World Bank to adopt fairer trade policies, cancel debt, and deliver on the 0.7 per cent targets for aid.

Philanthropy may have a limited role to play in the overall scheme of things but it could surely do more and better than at present. How to encourage it to do more and better is the aim of this discussion.

Caroline Hartnell - Feb 4, 2005 12:41 pm (#18 Total: 32)
Alliance Magazine


Dennis

Your list of the different things influencing workplace giving seems to put tax incentives in context nicely. They're not going to be a driver of giving but they're an important part of the mix, especially where there's competition, ie where one scheme offers tax deductibility and another doesn't.

Adele Simmons - Feb 4, 2005 4:24 pm (#19 Total: 32)
Global Philanthropy Partnership


I have just returned from the World Economic Forum meetings in Davos. After the second day, the focus of the meeting shifted from "Touch Choices" to "We Must Act." Bono, Bill Gates, Bill Clinton, Tony Blair, Jeff Sachs, President Benjamin Mkapa of Tanzania, and Domenico Siniscalco, the Minister of Finance from Italy, participated on a panel that made a powerful case for immediate assistance for Africa. Prime Minister Blair focused on climate change and Africa in his talk a day earlier.

Bono called the current situation in Africa an emergency. Blair and Gordon Brown outlined their plan for an International Finance Facility that would speed up the flow of aid, and the British made a commitment to meet the 0.7 percent of GNP for Overseas Development Assistance. People said time and time again that the time for talking had ended and prompt action was required. The challenge from Porto Allegre was welcomed. There will be debate about how best to proceed, how to ensure accountably and transparency, and the role of African governments in determining how the aid is used.

Many of the foundations and NGO leaders at the Forum saw the significant attention being paid to Africa and poverty reduction overall as an important step, and discussed various ways of ensuring that support from governments and businesses for poverty reduction is maintained (and that pledges are fulfilled). In my view, the tsunami event has helped to mobilize an interest and capacity in giving and renewed a commitment to Africa and to long-term development issues. The challenge will be making long-term investments in development where immediate results will not be visible, and making these investments in regions that do not receive daily coverage on the evening news. In a culture that promotes instant gratification (corporations’ quarterly reports, one-year grants to NGOs), patient and committed social investments become increasingly important.

Robert Daoust - Feb 5, 2005 9:47 am (#20 Total: 32)


Caroline doesn't think philanthropy will ever be the answer to the world's problems and she agrees with Mal that a lack of 'philanthropy' is not the major problem facing developing countries. I agree. Philanthropy is not THE answer but AN answer, and lack of it is not THE major problem, but A major problem. The aim of this discussion, says Caroline, is how to encourage philanthropy to do more and better. Ok, let's look at that. How much more and better do we want it? As Shankar Venkateswaran puts it: "People are asking for a tenfold increase in giving, but we need a hundredfold increase." I agree with him, as most observers do, but then I must depart from Caroline's and Mal's ways of thinking.

The prevailing vision since more than 30 years is what I would call "provide structures instead of rescue". In the words of Mal : provide capacity building funds and tools, help people build home-grown institutions that will make them self-sufficient, help locally-run NGOs that make a difference... All this is good, but is limited by the lack of political will to go in that direction. Here is where philanthropy must come to the rescue! Changes in structures will come because compassionate people will insist on having them. Philanthropy must probably be regarded as "the first" answer to the world problems.

Now, no one wants to come back to giving fishes when fishing can be taught. However, perhaps teaching or enabling to fish is not the answer anymore, in a world threatened with resources depletion and a myriad of other intricated problems. What I propose is a new sophisticated form of direct rescue : each citizen should be invited to spend one or two hours every week rescuing an individual who will suffer or continue to suffer severely if this citizen do not intervene. In other words, we would become involved with individual X who is suffering too much, and perhaps we would feed that person with our money while we would become involved, by our own interest so to speak, in a local economy conversion from fisheries to seaweed export.

David Bonbright, during Alliance Roundtable : "In a sense it’s not how much people are giving, it’s the fact that they’re getting involved, not just giving money but also themselves."

In a world where millions are so much suffering, I want to know exactly who my money and time is helping. Albert Camus : "In his greatest effort, man can only purpose to reduce arithmetically the pain of the world." (The Rebel : An Essay on Man in Revolt). If your organization is not able to guarantee that my action is rescuing someone who would be lost without me, why should I care to help you? I mean, there will not be a massive endeavor to better the world if we don't have a plan to help ALL (one by one) those who MUST and CAN be helped.

Charles Cameron aka hipbone - Feb 5, 2005 2:17 pm (#21 Total: 32)
HipBone Games / Rheingold Associates


Robert, your incisive comment:

If your organization is not able to guarantee that my action is rescuing someone who would be lost without me, why should I care to help you?

reminds me, pretty obviously and directly, of the "tough love" criteria for triage used when a limited number of physicians are available to treat an enormous number of patients in a crisis – clearly, the physicians' priority is to treat those patients who are most likely to survive if treated and most likely to die if untreated, whereas treating those patients who are liable to die even if treated will and those who are liable to survive even if left untreated will by definition result in physician time being without effect (ie without affecting the individual outcome in terms of survival or death).

The heart, in its generosity, has no wish to leave anyone suffering in the untreated category – yet the mind in its clarity sees the necessity for this kind of difficult triage if we are to accomplish as much by way of the relief of suffering as possible. The Buddha was practicing something of the same kind of triage when he refused to answer complex questions such as whether the world had a beginning or an end, whether there was such a thing as a soul, etc, for his monks until they had meditated to the point of grasping the roots of suffering (his first noble truth) and thus delivering themselves from it. As a physician, he maintained that answering such questions, delightfully interesting though they might be, while suffering remained a problem, would be like answering a patient's questions about the height and gait of a man who fired a poisoned arrow, and the wood and feathers from which the arrow was made, while the arrow head had not yet been removed and the poison was still working in the patient.

Triage, then, and thus also Robert's remark, can be taken to represent a marriage of heart and mind – a marriage which hones the heart's generosity for maximum impact. This business of head and heart working in union is no slight thing. Our society is primed to divide people into "feeling caring nurturing" and "thinking tough aggressive" types, with the idealists tending to fall into the nurturing category where the thinking types can safely

I'm sorry to keep bringing us back to theses somewhat abstract / lofty principles, but it seems to me that the marriage of head and heart is precisely what social entrepreneurship is all about: it's heart entrepreneurship, its social intelligence in action. I suspect, too, that we'll get the level of giving that's requisite when we realize that idealism is not a sort of luxury that can be marginalized / tolerated on the margins of an unabashedly pragmatic and materialist society, but a necessary ingredient in the sustainability of the very system in which we live. Besides, Donella Meadows shows us that the most powerful place to intervene in any system is at the level of its paradigm.

Idealism is now, even if it wasn't before, a key survival trait for the human species and for the world.

I want to emphasize this because they key concept here is that we've arrived at the tipping point, that we can now recognize, in a whole array of different areas from ecology to geopolitics to "family values", that we are depleting the "commons" – of resources, but also of trust – to the point of no return, and that altruistic / philanthropic / gift behavior and even self-sacrifice are therefore paramount.

We will get the giving we need when the immediacy of the situation comes home to us. Feeding the hungry is not just a gesture that Christ, Buddha and Mohammed all happen to encourage – it's part and parcel of ensuring our world does not collapse under the weight of our differences. We are one of necessity, not just by some metaphysical fiat which we can safely ignore.

If I'm right about this, then philanthropy's task, in raising the funding from "normal" to "tsunmami" levels, or getting that "hundredfold increase in giving", is to sharpen the awareness of our interconnectedness, and specifically of the various system properties which – crossing all national, ethnic, religious, political and disciplinary boundaries – threaten the future of our grandchildren, as the indigenous peoples would say, to the seventh generation.

That's a whole different mindset, a whole different approach from the mindset used in distributing what funds we have, in assessing the efficacy of particular programs, their scalability and so forth. That's radical, that calls for the transformation of understanding. And the fascinating thing is that that understanding will already be present quite keenly, though not easily expressed, where the suffering is already greatest. But it will be the places where suffering is least, where people have the greatest luxury of freedom from suffering (through good health, satisfying and well paid work, liberty of conscience etc) and thus the least likelihood to think about it and be concerned about it (except on special occasions when the Fox or the WSJ happens to focus on it) where its impact actually needs to be felt.

If all (and I mean all) our focus is on disbursing funds, or evaluating their disbursement, or even "normal" means of raising them (charitable advertising, and so forth) – if that is all that those whose hearts and minds call them to giving, philanthropy, and social entrepreneurship concentrate on – then who is left to tackle this grave and insistant matter, the realization of the full implications of our joint necessity?

To whom do I look for that part of the picture? Where do I sign up if that's the area I feel the need to address?

Caroline Hartnell - Feb 6, 2005 10:53 am (#22 Total: 32)
Alliance Magazine


You say that ‘Changes in structures will come because compassionate people will insist on having them.’ I agree with you, but for this to happen surely compassion needs to be transformed into political will. Compassionate people need to put pressure on their governments in order to bring about the changes in structure that are needed. Mobilizing this compassion is a key role for campaigning NGOs in areas like Fair Trade and debt. And supporting this is surely a key role for philanthropy.

I’d like to ask you a question about your ‘direct rescue’ concept. Do you mean this literally, in other words that each citizen would spend one or two hours physically with someone who needs their help? If this is the case, I’m not sure that it meets the need for global rescue, where the people who are suffering are so concentrated in countries far away from many of those with the resources to help them. In the Alliance Roundtable Peter Wheeler also spoke of the need for ‘true compassion’, which he defined as being willing to ‘treat any human being as a brother or sister’, wherever they are.

And it’s the distance element that makes me unsure about your maxim: ‘If your organization is not able to guarantee that my action is rescuing someone who would be lost without me, why should I care to help you?’ The work of identifying good, credible organizations in developing countries, and helping build their capacity where they need it, seems to me crucial, but once we’ve identified good organizations to support, it seems to me that we have to take some risk and take some of their impact on trust. If we can’t do that, we will probably never be willing to directly support NGOs in developing countries.

Caroline Hartnell - Feb 6, 2005 11:08 am (#23 Total: 32)
Alliance Magazine


You say ‘We will get the giving we need when the immediacy of the situation comes home to us’ and that ‘philanthropy's task, in raising the funding from "normal" to "tsunmami" levels, or getting that "hundredfold increase in giving", is to sharpen the awareness of our interconnectedness’ – and I agree with you wholeheartedly. And I certainly hope that this discussion will contribute something to these central ‘heart and mind’ issues.

But ‘disbursing funds, or evaluating their disbursement’ is surely crucial too. It’s crucial for raising funds, as highlighted by Robert’s ‘If your organization is not able to guarantee that my action is rescuing someone who would be lost without me, why should I care to help you?’ comment and by many Roundtable participants. People are not going to rise to the tsunami levels of giving that are needed if they don’t feel it will do any good.

But it must also actually do some good. It is widely accepted that much international development aid over the last 50 years has not done much good. Ensuring that the development agenda is set by poor people rather than well-meaning people in richer countries seems to be a key part of ensuring we do better in future, and building the capacity of indigenous civil societies in poor countries to develop and implement that agenda is therefore crucial. We need the money, at tsunami levels, and we need to use it well.

Charles Cameron aka hipbone - Feb 6, 2005 1:30 pm (#24 Total: 32)
HipBone Games / Rheingold Associates


Hi, Caroline:

And thank you so much for initiating this conversation, and for returning time and again to participate in a manner which has enriched and I dare say helped to bond us all.

You write:

‘disbursing funds, or evaluating their disbursement’ is surely crucial too.

Absolutely. I am very far from wishing to devalue either the disbursement or the evaluation -- without the first, we have no social benefit, and without the second our social benefit risks being ineffective and thus essentially in vain. My point is simply that we have had agencies in place actively helping the needy around the world for a considerable length of time (eg the Red Cross Treaty, 1864), and making serious attempts at mechanisms for evaluation for some time now (as evidenced in several earlier conversations and events here in SocialEdge) -- and that the people of heart who manage to get themselves employed at "making a difference tasks" are thus busy (on the whole) either raising funds, disbursing them, evaluating their disbursement, or using them in the field for particular programs in health, disaster relief, education, etc.

I think all of that is wonderful, indeed it's that little piece of the human whole which keeps me feeling life is worth living, not the immensely greater energy that pours through the airline industry, or entertainment, or pharmaceuticals (licit or illicit) or much of politics...

But raising the consciousness of our interconnectedness, so that an increasing number of us come to realize that "giving" is not a decorative sprig of parsley accompanying the main course ("meat and potatoes") of life, but something far closer to the central nutrition of the entire social enterprise (the "fruit and vegetables" of the nutritionists) -- that seems to me to be something that doesn't fall directly in the remit of any particular part of the whole social entrepreneurial enterprise. And that's why I want to emphasize it, because it may be the part we're not focused on, the part we can get blindsided by -- and yet the part which, if we can pull it off, will give us the greatest opportunity for societal benefit across a whole range of issues.

So I'm hoping my comments will be taken as additives to your own, and not in any way as contradicting yours.

Ensuring that the development agenda is set by poor people rather than well-meaning people in richer countries seems to be a key part of ensuring we do better in future, and building the capacity of indigenous civil societies in poor countries to develop and implement that agenda is therefore crucial.

I am very much in agreement with you on this. I guess what I'm saying is that changing the mindset of potential givers – all those who contributed to tsunami relief from the widow with her mite to those who make decisions about the state's millions – in such a way that social giving is seen as a survival necessity, and service to others as being as crucial as self, looks to me to be an enormous task, equivalent to the Manhattan project, or landing that first man on the moon.

I am not sure who has time for this project. I'm not sure it's on anybody's agenda. I just suspect we need it.

Thanks again for your presence here, and for Alliance...

Robert Daoust - Feb 6, 2005 2:28 pm (#25 Total: 32)


Caroline says : "I agree with you, but for this to happen surely compassion needs to be transformed in political will". You may replace "but" by "and", because all you say in that paragraph of yours is similar to what I would say myself. Perhaps a point you've missed is that, for me, political will is going to be in sufficient supply ONLY when a sufficient number of individuals, by motive of philanthropy-or-compassion-or-enlightened-self-interest and by means of an adequate organization, will be personally involved in rescuing other individuals.

The answer to your question in paragraph two is no, helpers would not necessarily spend one or two hours physically with someone needing their help. When I gave the example "Just picture yourself a Sunday afternoon, connected to your branch of universalrescue.org" I had in mind someone connected to the Internet.

Your remark about distance is interesting. It is precisely because of distance that I want a guarantee. We need to know BY THEIR NAMES (or their individual numbers if you prefer in order to preserve confidentiality) the millions who suffer too much and who are actually the clients which our rescue enterprise must manage to satisfy. I know there is a cost to identifying individual cases of severe suffering, but I am willing to pay for it because sound management requires it and because more funds will be attracted by the clear accountability it implies. Moreover, it is congruent with the most recommended trend in favor of involving locally helped people, since they become personally engaged in a kind of contract... Not all organizations would have to comply to this guarantee requirement, of course, but only a few who would like to be associated with the so called universalrescue.org. Others would go on with business as usual. And these others would have better support (or opposition, dependingly!) from people like me because I would better appreciate what they are doing indirectly for the control and prevention of the individual cases of severe suffering that I am dealing with.

You know, the classic capitalistic view on aid has been something like "let us make the cake bigger and there will be more for everyone", or "let us bring more water in the lake and every boat will be higher", while "philanthropy will take care of marginal cases or collateral damages". That's what has been called trickle-down economics, I guess. Obviously, it does not work quite as intended. I think it needs a counterpart, a "trickle-up economics". If, systematically, we would start bringing rescue to everyone who must and can be saved, global prosperity would soar incredibly, wouldn't it? To comment Charles' last message, beginning that endeavor would be a small step for people like you and me, but a giant leap for the world community.

Caroline Hartnell - Feb 8, 2005 6:15 pm (#26 Total: 32)
Alliance Magazine

I'd like to take the conversation back to Adele's post a few days back.

'In my view, the tsunami event has helped to mobilize an interest and capacity in giving and renewed a commitment to Africa and to long-term development issues. The challenge will be making long-term investments in development where immediate results will not be visible, and making these investments in regions that do not receive daily coverage on the evening news. In a culture that promotes instant gratification (corporations’ quarterly reports, one-year grants to NGOs), patient and committed social investments become increasingly important.'

I think everyone who has contributed to this discussion has stressed the need somehow to mobilize the huge surge of compassion and giving in response to the tsunami for longer-term social investment. The challenge, as Adele says, is how to do this.

All ideas needed!

Bonnie Koenig - Feb 9, 2005 2:22 pm (#27 Total: 32)
President, Going International

A number of people have commented on the importance of getting more people to travel/work overseas to directly understand need.  Most successful international giving programs will tell you that this is a highly effective strategy.  But the reality is that the larger part of the potential pool of donors are outside the reach (for one reason or another) of this type of experience.  Perhaps then we need to be more creative in developing programs that allow potential international givers to have a transformative and positive “citizen of the world” experience closer to home? 

venkat - Feb 9, 2005 8:19 pm (#28 Total: 32)

Hi, Caroline. By creating such a great discussion, you're pushing my workload this week to 100 hrs. I simply MUST go to work but can't resist throwing in my 2-bits.

All- I run GiveIndia (www.giveindia.org) that tries to connect individual donors to individual causes (often individuals in need of help). Robert- we do exactly what you ask, tell each individual donor who was actually helped by his/her money. See www.giveindia.org/give/common/assist.pdf. Post-tsunami, we gave a small sum of under $10,000 to help an NGO in Andhra Pradesh, India, help fishermen repair their boats. 450 boats were repaired, and we have photos of those 450x3=1350 men standing next to their boats, the names of each person, the village, etc...- will go live on our site soon. This can get even better, but it is a decent start. It costs us roughly 1-2% of the donated money to give this feedback. We've given feedback to more than 10000 individuals in the last 4 years. Robert, part of what you say is also echoed in a famous MK Gandhi quote- "we must (ourselves) be the change we wish to see in the world". If each one of us connects with and helps 1 person, the world CAN be changed!

Mr Cameron, I feel privileged to read your posts and the point about marrying heart and mind. Creating the "connectedness", which is what Robert also stresses, is critical. www.indicorps.org is trying to do this with young diaspora Indians, getting them to spend a year in their motherland. But this is even needed locally. For instance, at every traffic light in Mumbai, we (the well off) have mentally shut out the little kids standing there with their scrawny outstretched arms... I am trying hard to convince my own team that we shd take groups of 20-30 payroll donors (we run a payroll giving program in Indian companies) out on a Sunday to cook food (own effort) go out on the streets, serve these children and talk to them. I want us to be able to create a school program where we take children from private schools to visit 6 different places (show them poverty, show them disease, show them child labour,...- but all with the POSSIBILITY of change) and after 6 months, tell each one of them- now YOU go ahead and raise money/resources for whatever YOU believe in from your friends/family, etc. and do what you wish to... would LOVE to have schools giving kids course credit for this (like the movie Pay It Forward)....

Got to rush, it's 8:45am and we have 4,000 donors to send receipts to today ! They all supported someone's run in the Mumbai Marathon on Jan 15. I wish I could meet the 400 people who reached out to these 4000 and thank them personally for being the change.

Robert Daoust - Feb 10, 2005 11:47 pm (#29 Total: 32)


With your message, Venkat, you're pushing my day long past midnight! I began reading giveindia.org and givefoundation.org, and could not stop reading! My comments will come tomorrow morning. Meanwhile, I invite people here to look at http://www.giveindia.org/give/organisation/SearchOrganizations.do?Key=Search and click on some of these NGOs and see some "donation options" that are offered with each NGO...

jimfruchterman - Feb 11, 2005 8:18 am (#30 Total: 32)
Benetech


I visited Brazil late last year for the Schwab SE Summit. A surprising thing was that corporate sponsorship was the biggest single funding stream for both of the successful SEs I visited in Rio, especially since it's our smallest funding stream here in the U.S.

I asked why, and got two explanations most commonly: - lack of tax incentives for individuals - lack of a philanthropic cultural norm

Enacting tax incentives by itself may not be enough, but national law is one way to express norms!

Robert Daoust - Feb 11, 2005 1:44 pm (#31 Total: 32)


Hi, Venkat. You bring an amazing contribution to this discussion about getting global philanthropy going!

You claim that GIVE is "the first 'philanthropy marketplace' or 'charity exchange' [September 2000]". If we look at your operating model(http://www.givefoundation.org/opemodel.htm) and its parallel between investors and donors or the stock market and the giving industry, I'm inclined to believe your claim. Your idea seems really great, and seems working too. I think you are building the kind of sound platform from which the next global philanthropy revolution will be able to soar.

I was moved with what can already be done with your organization. For instance, the Association for Leprosy Education, Rehabilitation & Treatment offers me to "Sponsor diagnosis & treatment of 2 leprosy patients" for less than twenty dollars, feedback with photos included (http://www.giveindia.org/give/ngoprofile/ShowDonationOptionsDetails.do?ngoid=135&optionid=669&quantityForUser=0)!

Indeed, you do exactly what I ask, at least on the point of feedback to donors, but I beg you not to miss my main point about severe suffering as a paradigmatic new criteria in the field of philanthropy. If there is not a systematic concern with the totality of individual cases of severe suffering that must and can be resolved, I am afraid philanthropy will not raise much above the new platform you are laying.

You are providing a really good structure. What strikes me is the prominent place given to well identified individual beneficiaries within many of your selected NGOs. I suppose this is an effect brought up by your feedback requirement, and I am quite impressed. What I would like to see now, in many sponsoring offers, is an estimation indicating how much an individual case is considered to be a case of severe suffering that must and can be resolved. This is an essential information in determining the return on my investment when my sector of interest is the relief of suffering.

For the rest of my comments and questions, I will write to you personally Venkat.

Thanks Caroline and Social Edge for having brought us closer.