A question that was brought up in class falls along the lines of “Are we dealing with the consequences of a broken system and just slapping a bandaid on an issue by donating to wellness and relief aid efforts?”. With exceptions to unforeseen natural causes like hurricanes, earthquakes, and tornadoes, a lot of issues beg the question of ‘why don't we just address the source of these issues instead of playing clean-up?’ The simple answer would be ‘well, we cant fix governmental systems and laws overnight, but we can change lives overnight with our donation.’ Then it becomes the matter of seeing the bigger picture and the gratification of our donation changing lives. A Tedx Talk called “Helping others makes us happy -But it matters how you do it” examines the point that donors enjoy giving but are inclined to donate if they can envision the change (TEDxTalk). The speaker Elizabeth Dunn felt more willing and gratified to assist hands-on and donate to a refugee family than simply plugging in her credit card on a charity’s site. The message conveyed here is one that has arose in class discussion but has been mistaken for the theme of transparency. Inspired by this Ted Talk, my observation is we don't feel inclined to donate because we cannot register an emotional connection with an issue we cannot see. It's obviously important how a charity distributes donations, however, it’s likely that if we don't envision or see the impact ourselves, even if it exists, then we would steer away from donating. We assert that we’d want to know where our money is going but perhaps it’s more of a selfish reason that we cannot personally see the impact.
Now, this issue plays into the differences between philanthropists that donate to aid and relief efforts and those that donate to reform and campaigns of officials. As Charity Navigator advises, many charities have similar names and even similar mission statements, however, the manner in which they approach the issue is different. Therefore, there are donors who see the greater good in donating to the underprivileged directly and donors who see the greater good in donating to reform campaigns so that the cycle of poverty and issues of underdevelopment would no longer create its consequences to start with. It can be hypothesized that those who donate directly to providing vaccines, meals, or bed nets to prevent malaria are acting charitable but selfishly because its the self-gratification in which they seek. Those who do not donate to political agendas are simply encouraging the system in which undermines the people in need. On the other hand, those who do donate to campaigns and reform are attacking the issue at its source in which controls policies and laws that enable to suppression of such people. Therefore, one can say they are not acting selfishly because they’re in it for the long term effects and don't need to see the instant outcome to know that their help was charitable.
The argument, of course, can be countered with the ‘personal donations cater more to the individual value of life rather than the value of an issue’. In which, one can respond with “$10 dollars can provide a bed net for one child or $10 can be what helps win an election of an official that grants bed nets for everyone”. The hypothetical situation, obviously, depends on a just and equal democratic system in which the elected official takes into consideration the urgent needs of the people. Yet, its something to think about. Is it selfish to be motivated by an emotional connection reliant on envisioning the impact of a donation? Where should our money go towards, politics or aid?
- Gabriella Corrales
Yes, I do believe that it is selfish to be reliant upon envisioning the impact of our donation; however, I don’t think that it’s unjustified. We discussed that we should give operationally because it is assumed that the organizers know what they are doing. But, it’s a human, though unfortunate, response to be untrusting of other people. Even those who claim to be more empathetic or generous towards others become concerned about the magnitude of their benefit, as evidenced by this very class. But, I do believe that it’s an inevitable pitfall to those who self-ascribe any sort of ability to criticize others based on pride or experience. So therefore, good intentions coupled with a capable mindset is rational for those who distrust other people and want to see the things that they envision come to fruition.
ReplyDeleteSay, if someone were to be completely generous without any comment about the effectiveness of their generosity, they would be deemed flimsy and gullible. For those who are endlessly critical without the means to legitimize their opinions, well, that would just be annoying. Finally, those who are neither critical nor capable are treated as unworthy bystanders who are somehow incriminated for an indeterminate social character. No one wins, but I do believe that taking a healthy skepticism and a constructive mindset is the best balancing of productivity with moral and ethical satisfaction.
So, answering the question of sending money towards aid or politics, I think that sending money towards aid is more effective than politics simply because of bureaucracy. The amount of hoops that have to be jumped through in the name of political effectiveness renders the option identical to the latter in research and (dis)trust. Aid is very much effective if you are educated and wealthy enough to make a very large impact on the issue at hand. However, if you are of modest means, can research, and determine political effectiveness, by all means, donate to Bernie Sanders (the liberal candidate who is notoriously proud of his small donations). You will never know if he knows how to keep his promises until it’s too late.
Michael Tang
I like how you deliberate on the multiple ways that we, as donors, can lose. While we can all agree that philanthropy is good overall, a common theme that we keep seeing is that we simply cannot win. If we give a lot of money or started a foundation, our intentions may be seen as misplaced and inherently selfish. If we don't give much, we are simply just selfish. If we want to see the impact of our donations, we may be donating out of the "wealthy-savior" complex that may develop. Regardless, any philanthropy will be met with some criticism, yet as our first reflection paper noted, our only job is to donate according to our own values, and the "due diligence" that one needs to make an informed decision means something different to everyone.
DeleteHi Gaby, I really liked your post and agree with what you are saying. You are asking an important question and pointing out thoughts many of us have. I really like what you said about being able to change lives overnight and not fixing problems. In my last reflection paper, I wrote about this topic and many of our ideas overlap. Obviously, most philanthropists are different and have different objectives and motives. In my reflection, I focused mainly on bashing big philanthropists (which I should have done more research), but the TEDX video you posted is inspiring and made me think of philanthropy in a different light. I think that philanthropy is just such a big overarching term that there should be no stereotypes. Regarding your last point, I don't think it's selfish to have an emotional attachment to donations. As humans, it's very hard to separate our choices from our emotional attachments.
ReplyDeleteIn your post, you explained that we "can't fix governmental systems and laws overnight, but we can change lives overnight with our donation." Because of this, paying "clean-up" is more beneficial than not. I entirely agree, and wanted to touch on this issue. Of course, money should go toward political campaigns. But in the meantime, money spent on immediate aid is essential. In high school, I volunteered every Saturday at a soup kitchen near my house, where we fed nearly 150 homeless men and women. Someone on the more political side of things might say, 'wait a minute, homelessness should not be an issue in the United States of America,' and this is true. Homelessness is a result of poor economy and health care, amongst other things. We could campaign to end homelessness, demanding that the government find support and services for these citizens immediately. But, as you mentioned, this could not happen overnight. It is going to take a while. That's where soup kitchens come in. We cannot simply leave these people to starve. We need to take care of them, as a community, until government powerhouses do something. A happy medium would be to gather philanthropists, perhaps soup kitchen owners themselves, and have them work together to run soup kitchens AND start political campaigns and advocacy. Philanthropic efforts need to be divided both ways, toward aid, but also toward advocacy to create long-term effects.
ReplyDeleteThe idea presented by Gabriella in her blog post inadvertently sparked another question in my head. Focusing on “are we dealing with the consequences of a broken system and just slapping a bandaid on an issue by donating to wellness and relief efforts?” she contrasts the acts of donating to politics or aid. However, while that is a worthy topic of discussion it caused me, a former AP Government student, to immediately jump towards thinking about agenda setting. If big philanthropy suddenly stopped donating to aid and focused entirely on politics, they would leave a country’s leaders heavily in their debt. As such, they would be able to have more of a say in proposals lawmakers put forward.
ReplyDeleteDemocracies function based on the idea that all constituents are represented equally, but large monetary donations from big philanthropy could cause philanthropists to be heard louder than the average person. In the dissenting opinion on the Supreme Court case Citizens United vs Federal Election Commission, Justice ¬John Paul Stevens wrote that “the Court’s blinked and aphoristic approach to the First Amendment will undoubtedly crippled the ability of ordinary citizens, Congress, and the States to adopt even limited measures to protect against corporate domination of the electoral college” (https://www.britannica.com/event/Citizens-United-v-Federal-Election-Commission/Dissenting-opinion). This case was concerned with whether laws that prevented corporations and unions from using their general treasury funds for independent political advertising violated the right of freedom of speech. This was the interest of an entire corporation Justice Stevens was warning of harming the republic—this issue is further compounded when only one person is donating.
The FEC rules state that one person can only donate $2,800 to a candidate committee per election, but there are ways around this. An individual can donate $5,000 per year to a PAC (political action committee), $10,000 per year to a party committee on a state, district, and/or local level, $35,000 per year to the national party committee, and a whooping $106,500 per account per year to additional national party committee accounts (https://www.fec.gov/help-candidates-and-committees/candidate-taking-receipts/contribution-limits/). As such, it is relatively easy for a person to spend as much as they desire helping a singular candidate. Therefore, the more they spend, abet indirectly, the more likely a candidate/lawmaker is to acquiesce to their demands and represent them at an unequal level to the rest of their constituents.
As such, instead of arguing either for aid or policy donations, I argue that a balance needs to be reached to prevent philanthropists from agenda setting in the political domain. With their donations to aid-based charities, they can already circumvent the electoral process; it would be catastrophic to the institution of democracy if big philanthropists controlled the agenda of lawmakers as well to an even higher degree. Thus, I plead that those who are pushing for big philanthropists to attack the root cause of an issue rather than placing a bandaid think of the consequences of those actions before continuing their spiel.
Sabrina Reba