The Moral Dimension of Philanthropy in an Era of Scarcity
Date Published: May 5, 2009
Conversations for the Common Good
La Casa de Maria
Santa Barbara, California
May 5, 2009
Peter Karoff
founder/chairman
The Philanthropic Initiative, Inc
It is very good to be in this lovely and sacred place – where so many important things have happened – great ideas conceived and new organizations incubated, boards and staff of more nonprofits than you can count inspired and renewed, and thousands of people, very much like those of us gathered here on this gorgeous Santa Barbara Sunday afternoon, have found a safe space where the faint glimmer of an inner, reflective kind of meditative presence, the peace of mind, that the Dalia Lama addressed last week here in Santa Barbara, soothes the troubles of everyday life. So thank you La Casa de Maria for all that you are.
I am also pleased to announce that the powers that be have extended this conversation from an hour plus to 24 hours – which means that many of you will get to experience the Casa De Maria room accommodations, and more willingly agree to join the capital campaign to refurbish those rooms. So as we all have learned long ago – there is an agenda behind every noble deed – even here.
And that is as good as any way to begin a discussion about the moral dimension of philanthropy, which for me began on an evening in 1967 when the Vice President of the Boston NAACP threw a chair at me – so angry was he at the arrogance and the hubris that my well-meaning friends and I had displayed in our intervention into the life of the Black community of Boston.
Perhaps that is the first moral challenge that philanthropy and social action faces – the assumption, the presumption, that we are Good Samaritans, acting in good faith, and as donors are doing good, not harm – but how do we know, and what gives us the right to quote – “intervene” - a word I truly do not like and yet one central to many definitions of philanthropy - in someone else’s life, in a community that is not our own. For forty years I have been aware of those questions, and still am not sure of the answers.
What troubles me most is the inadequacy I feel every day in doing this work – what I see going on in the world and what is not going on in philanthropy to address it - how most philanthropic response has an astonishing lack of urgency. It still seems like business as usual and I was struck by the fact that Jeff Skoll, the co-founder of eBay, announced this month a new foundation to deal with Urgent Threats, a much too original an idea.
The financial sky is falling in such a way that the most vulnerable among us are being hurt the most. If philanthropy does not stand up and be counted in ways that are appropriate, who will? I heard a phrase the other day that has stuck with me – a lot of giving in recent years has been a kind of ‘tithing of affluence” – it has been easy to give, it has cost many of us very little, we no longer have that luxury. Where will we come out?
I think we too easily let ourselves and others off the hook. We nibble around the edges of the real problems and issues. The Ford Foundation’s data indicates that “only 11 percent of funders in the United States support work on social justice and globally the figure is considerably lower.”[i] I think that we are much too nice, too polite, too accommodating. I wonder - what would not-nice philanthropy look like? Something is missing – and it may be the first step is a heightened awareness of the moral dimension of the work that philanthropy aspires to do.
But before we get to philanthropy specifically, let’s talk about what is moral - a word so ideologically hot that some have suggested using another word, like ethical, but I can’t.
Moral dimensions are radical - radical in the sense of “going to the origin, touching or acting upon what is essential and fundamental….inherent in the nature or essence of a thing or person (or an organization.)”[ii]
The philosopher Allen Wheelis wrote this:
“Some things are not permitted… there are immanent standards of man’s making, but not of man’s design, that they are, therefore, to be discovered but not created, that though absolute, they change but slowly, that to live by them is what is meant by being human.”
….meant by being human. How do we know what that is?
Aristotle had one answer:
“It is the peculiarity of men/women that they share a sense of the just and the unjust and that their sharing a common understanding of justice makes a polis.”
The making and unmaking of a polis, a country, a community, the “bonds of civic friendship,”[iii] what we call a civil society, is underwritten by our individual and collective sense of the just and the unjust.
I think that is right - we may be getting there, closer to something truly radical, truly moral.
If John Rawls, whose 1971 landmark book, “The Theory of Justice” still resonates, still is being read by UCSB undergraduates, were with us today, he would add “A moral personality is characterized by two capacities, one a conception of the good, the other a conception of justice.” [iv]
Justice has been called fairness spread across society. In that sense love and justice are the same, for justice is love distributed - nothing else.
How do we make these judgments, these moral decisions?
David Brooks writing about “The End of Philosophy” in the New York Times on April 6 describes the evolution of moral thinking from that of reason and deliberation to one of intuition and the emotion-processing part of the brain. We make rapid, snap, moral judgments all the time. We often cannot explain to ourselves why something feels wrong or right. We know - when we see a family that lost its home living in a car - that it is wrong. We know - when we walk at dawn on Hendry’s beach at low tide - that it is stunningly beautiful. Seeing and evaluating are linked and basically simultaneous even if one is concrete and the other is not. The Dalia Lama, in his lectures at UCSB, referenced the lack of clear line, in Indian and Buddhist thought, between the “sensor level of consciousness” and the “mental level of consciousness.”
Brooks refers to the “social nature of moral intuition,” a warmer view of human nature, where “we don’t just care about our individual rights, or even the rights of individuals, we also care about loyalty, respect, and tradition. Feelings of awe, transcendence, patriotism, joy and self-sacrifice are central to most people’s moral experiences.” This is the yearning to be a good person we all familiar with, to be a moral citizen of the world that is real.
And I believe it is real for those who are the sleepwalkers – the vast majority of Americans who expressly care about an issue, but do nothing. It is why when last week President Obama signed the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act, a clarion call for what Martin Buber called those “willing to take on responsibility,” it was thrilling - fifteen million emails – twittering all the way across the consciousness of young, and senior, America, truly gives one hope.
We care about community, we need community. Brooks ends his piece this way – “most people struggle toward goodness, not as a means, but as an end in itself.” [v]
It always comes back to the struggle, the journey along the philanthropic curve - personal and public. It is at the end of the day – a moral journey. The TPI experience, the Santa Barbara Foundation experience, and that of everyone in this room, as donor, activist, and citizen, have proven that to be true. We are in the game - we are actors, because “some things are not permitted.”
You see we do care about legacy, and we know without being told that the legacy we leave is the life we have led.
Enter philanthropy, which is not the only articulation of legacy but an important one. Philanthropy presumes to be a “conception of good,” - the word itself based on love, i.e. justice. Philanthropy is an articulation of moral imagination, and an end in itself. American philanthropy has always been a combination of “the heart and mind in the search for the best in people, their organizations, and the relevant world around them.”[vi]
Peter Goldmark former president of the Rockefeller Foundation wrapped it this way - “Philanthropy is the practice of applying assets of knowledge, passion and wealth, to bring about constructive change.”
If these are the assumptions that underlie philanthropy, and they are, why even have a conversation about the moral dimension of philanthropy?
Well here are a few of the reasons:
To begin with, we need the discussion. Ethical issues permeate the daily news. As they should. Foundations, nonprofit organizations, and NGOs are not immune from ethical lapses. Philanthropy is private action in public space, and operates at the very intersection of social dilemmas and thoughtful responses. These are the very challenges that often mean a chair is flying across the room aimed at you – more often in the heat of emotion and words than in hard wood - but nonetheless real.
“Every decision a donor makes is a choice among competing values, and what choice is made significantly affects other people and communities, for better or worse.”[vii] Today, almost every nonprofit organization has to learn how to do with less which means they must make tough decisions about who they serve, and who they do not serve. Even though philanthropy is less than 20% of the average nonprofits’ income, the influence of donors on those decisions is huge. “All of this is moral in intention and consequence – from start to finish. Yet persons who engage in voluntary action for the public good are neither expected, nor equipped, to articulate or examine the choices they make, to engage in moral reflection or dialogue.”[viii]
And we need to learn how to do exactly that.
From a practical, defensive, perspective, the whole world is watching – philanthropy has grown enormously in scale and influence, and with it has come much more media and governmental scrutiny. Philanthropy is a metaphor, a lever, an influencer. Foundations especially carry weight far beyond their apparent resources. This is certainly true for major foundations, witness the amazing celebrity of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. This scenario also plays out locally in Santa Barbara and in every other community across the country. Yet many private foundations resent the very idea of public scrutiny, demands for increased transparency, and have a very limited sense of their public persona.
Yet the erosion of trust across every domain of society extends to philanthropy. Philanthropy is held to a higher standard and should be.
Everything is being reset – and the tax benefits and freedom of action that private philanthropy enjoys, its very special place in the American society, is just as much at risk, as everything else. The proposal in the Obama budget, now dropped, to reduce the tax deduction on large gifts was not an isolated example - there will be a serious review of the whole range of tax advantages that impact the field.
Change is always hard, but I think this trend is good, as it puts more discipline on all of us. It makes us rethink how the personal and family values and passions that drive our philanthropy can have even more leverage, more impact, across the communities of interest that we care most about. I like the idea that we are being asked to be clearer to others, as it makes the imperative to be clearer to ourselves why we do what we do, even more important. It also comes at the right time for another reason.
“Over the past two decades, the field of philanthropy has been significantly reshaped by a movement for greater accountability through measurement of impact and outcomes.”[ix] TPI has been among the champions of this trend for more strategic philanthropy for those twenty years, and much has been gained by the introduction of management science and market economy principles in the practice of philanthropy. What has been lost, or what is out of balance, is the equally important engagement with increased reflection about the values and the meaning of what we do.
In essence, “philanthropy has been totally focused on the keeping of accounts, not the giving of accounts.”[x] It is in the intersection of these two complementary quadrants that the opportunity lies to elevate the entire field.
It reminds me of how in sailing there is “apparent wind” and “true wind.” Every private foundation, every donor, every nonprofit organization, needs to think hard about where the true wind is, and adjust its moral compass to both public needs and public expectations as well its own manifest destiny.
What we need is a movement that creates an expectation for moral reflection as a core competency of philanthropy and social action.
What would that look like – well here are some of the elements and the challenges inherent within, some of which may fall in the category of not being nice – integrity of purpose, integrity of process, integrity of philanthropy in the public space, and integrity of the inner journey:
Integrity of purpose - vision and mission drives everything else. The issues to consider are –
Ambition, boldness and passion, in essence high expectations, which are a precondition to great philanthropy – the challenges are lack of imagination, playing it safe, not working hard enough, being too self- assured and comfortable with the status quo, and afraid of taking risks. There is another challenge that may be more of a surprise. Ten years ago TPI conducted a survey of high-net worth individuals - $50 million & up – and asked among other questions – what would make motivate them to increase their philanthropy – the first answer was “knowing the organization would use the money wisely”, which was not a surprise – the second answer, almost as important as impact, was “finding a passion!”
It is not an easy matter at all to decide what passion determines a hierarchy of need – in essence why you do one thing and not an other, especially in an economic crises of seismic proportion – the challenges are tough chooses between competing critical needs, knowing what to do that will make a difference, and for many donors, overcoming the pressure of social demands, personal relationships and community expectations, as opposed to addressing the things you really care about. I remember vividly a TPI meeting in Detroit with a prominent family talking about what issues they cared about. The patriarch, a man famous for his generosity and many major gifts, said –“I just made a list of the issues and things I really care about and my big gifts, – they don’t match!”
Managing conflicts of interest, self-interest, including issues of ego and status within the community, and ethical issues – the biggest challenge is admitting they exist, and establishing a governance and oversight structure that is honest and rigorous.
Best and highest use of all available resources toward the greatest impact – the challenges are putting your whole self in the game, including the role of advocacy in a multi-sector solution world, and rethinking the use of endowment as mission investment capital.
Integrity of process - how we go about the work –
The first challenge is that vision and mission statements are often filed forgotten in a bottom draw and bear little relationship to actual process. I remember a plaintiff comment from a program officer of a NY foundation who said – “All these great noble ideas are in our mission statement, the problem is we get so wrapped up in the day to day work, they are irrelevant.”
What is most relevant, is “how to do no harm,” which may seem simplistic - the challenges, however, are many – hubris - lack of humility - being a sensitive and deep listener - insufficient context and data about the issue being addressed, and being unprepared for unexpected consequences.
A fair, respectful, partnership-relationship with recipients and the communities of interest being served – the challenges are the inherent power imbalance between donors, and grantees, and the tension between appropriate influence and oversight by a donor and inappropriate intrusion in the operations of an organization. The same challenges and tensions exist between NGOs and the indigenous communities they serve.
Being open and accessible – the challenges are that demand far exceeds resources, being responsive to requests and the goal of being proactive and strategic, as well as the natural tendency for donors and staff to want to drive the process.
Learning from experience – the challenges are exaggerating about success, not admitting failure, which in philanthropy is rare, and the difficulty of evaluating both impact and ethical practice.
Integrity of philanthropy in the public space – its social responsibility to the greater good. The issues to consider are –
Private action in public space is at the intersection of public need and public policy – the challenges are the democratic, pluralistic, nature of private philanthropy based on donor intent and choice – many foundation donors still consider it “my money” - while at the same time acknowledging and accepting a public persona that embraces a larger responsibility to society beyond the goals of a foundation, or a nonprofit organization.
Transparency and accountability to the communities of interest served – the Foundation Center has a new Web site called glass pockets - the challenges begin with the sense of privacy and control that many donors value, and for some, uncertainty about what a rigorous outside critique of the work will produce, which of course is one of the reasons transparency is so important.
Tax-exempt endowments – should they be immortal or even allowed to exist - the challenges are economic and political when government is desperate for new revenue sources, as well as concerns about the immense concentrations of wealth in private foundations and college and university endowments – do such accumulations of power and wealth run counter to a true democratic process, do they add enough societal value?
The civil society, philanthropy writ large, may be the most promising place for moral learning in a world that is bereft of moral leadership. It is what philanthropy could become – the challenges are the fractious, and undisciplined, nature, of civil society, and the lack of awareness of what its role as educator and moral leader could be.
Integrity of the Inner journey - The expansion of moral imagination.
The issues to consider are –
Growing one’s soul - what the Dalia Lama called the quest for secular ethics as a growing phenomenon in a world where religion is in decline - a new kind spirituality of care, of civic vocation, exactly the experience that philanthropy and social action provide - it is what we learn when we touch someone else, when we reach out, when we give of ourselves - transforming the human heart – the poetry of the citizen within – the challenges are both internal and external - how to nurture and support those who work in the field, when social change is incremental at best, and burnout is common, while at the same time promote the growth of moral imagination within individuals and across society.
One memorable TPI story was when I met with Sam Walton and his family in Fayetteville on a Saturday morning – it was about nine months before Mr. Walton died. It was one of the first real conversations about philanthropy for the family – we had been meeting for about two hours, and Sam had just sat there and listened to his wife Helen and his four children. Then he finally spoke – “I made a mistake. The last few years I have been running around the country opening stores, rallying the troops, and looking over everyone’s shoulder at the company. I should have paid more attention to this – to what to do with all this wealth, to giving back.” Then he said this to his family – “don’t make that mistake”. And I have wondered since what Sam Walton, one of the most innovative entrepreneurs in history might have done had he worked his philanthropy with same degree of imagination that he had worked his business.
What would be different if moral reflection becomes a core competency of philanthropy and social action? I think the following would be a good beginning -
Donors and nonprofit organizations would have a clearer moral and ethical frame of reference within which to make choices, and as a result those actions will have increased potential to add value to the civic sector.
Those who care about philanthropy would have better tools to provide a thoughtful response to pressing challenges and will be better able to understand, promote, and rationalize the role of philanthropy in a changed world.
Philanthropists and foundations would be more sensitive to the relationship between their mission and their practice, and to the impact of grants within recipient communities.
Nonprofit organizations would operate within their communities of interest with greater clarity about ethics and their moral purpose.
The moral imagination of those who work in this field would expand and their energy and commitment to do this important work will increase.
Philanthropy will be bolder, more present in the public space, and would have greater impact!
Here is a poem to end this talk that I wrote for the NGO, Doctors without Borders. It has the right title -
Some Things Are Not Permitted
When a line is crossed
And we know it
When someone suffers
And no one steps forward
When cruelty runs rampant
And we lack courage and will
When officialdom is blind
And bureaucracy is deaf
When bullies rule the streets
And the corrupt rule the state
When children go to sleep hungry
And mother’s milk turns to tears
When belief turns
To persecution
When poetry is gone
From our lives
When we allow the natural world
To be destroyed
When access and equity
Is denied
When the rule of law
Is set aside
When prejudice and racism
Breed from generation to generation
When community is not allowed
To commune
When wealth is hoarded
And not shared
When charity is arrogant
And makes the recipient grovel
When women and children
Are abused
When anarchy brings out
The worst in mankind
When someone who knows better
Commits an unkind act
When we do not use our gifts
And waste our lives in sloth
When we see the egregious
And are silent
[i] Suzanne Siskel, Director Social Justice Philanthropy, Ford Foundation
[ii] Oxford English Dictionary
[iii] John Rawls – A Theory of Justice
[iv] Ibid
[v] D. Brooks, The End of Philosophy, New York Times April 8, 2009
[vi] Reference to the concept of Appreciative Inquiry that asks unconditional questions with the aim of discovery of what gives life to a living system.
[vii] From Elizabeth Lynn, Director of the Project on Civil Reflection
[viii] From Elizabeth Lynn, Director of the Project on Civil Reflection
[ix] Ibid
[x] Ibid