SPEAKER_06 0:37

Hello, you're listening to the Philanthropisms Podcast. This is the podcast where we try to put philanthropy in context. I'm your host, as ever, Rod Davis, and this week it's just me taking a bit of a deep dive into an issue that has uh come into the news in philanthropy circles recently and caused some pretty fierce debate, particularly in the US, and that is the question of pluralism and philanthropy. Now I will explain what the debate's all about and kind of why it is uh causing so much consternation at the moment uh in a bit, but I think I just wanted to say up front, this is a really interesting topic to get into because it really gets to some pretty kind of fundamental questions about the role of philanthropy in a democracy and some of the kind of inherent tensions in the very idea of philanthropy, things that I've been interested in for a long time and hope to sort of bring some historical perspective and theoretical perspective to what I'm talking about today. But I should say it's also quite a difficult topic to get to grips with in some ways, because the the very uh notion of trying to take a kind of measured approach to the question of pluralism has itself become something that actually draws ire in some ways. So actually, it's one of those um uh questions where the general complaint that things become too binary, if your response is to say, oh well, we just need a bit of nuance and let's try and understand both sides, that in itself is seen as kind of contributing to the fundamental problem, and there is a grain of truth in that as well. There is certainly a danger of both sides in issues that don't actually have a reasonable both sides, or in trying to be nuanced and balanced, uh legitimizing points of view or values that are abhorrent. But equally, I think there is a danger of a kind of moral absolutism on the other side and a refusal to engage with the idea that there might be people who have points of view different to your own or kind of values different to your own that you don't agree with and you might criticize in you know the strongest possible terms, but that they do have a legitimate right to hold those views. And I think you know, we'll see as we we go through the episode that that tension kind of runs through a lot of of what we're talking about here. So the the background to why I wanted to talk about it is that if you follow philanthropy at all, you might already be well aware that there's a kind of debate raging on, certainly in in US philanthropy circles at the moment. And this was all sparked really, or the most recent version, because it's definitely not a new debate, for uh by a letter that was written to the Chronicle of Philanthropy, which is the sort of paper of record about philanthropy in the nonprofit sector uh in the US. And this was a joint letter from a group of I think six um sort of foundation heads and senior figures in philanthropy. I'll talk a little bit more about who they actually were in in a while. And essentially they were making a plea for uh the importance of pluralism and in their eyes a case that actually pluralism is under threat and that it needs to be preserved and protected. And and the letter, I just want to kind of dig a little bit into the detail because I think it's worth unpicking three sort of broad points that come across in this letter, and then I'll talk a bit about you know why the letter itself and and the nature of the signatories caused some uh some raised eyebrows, what some of the response has been to that, and how this ties into much longer standing debates about the value of pluralism and some of the challenges that it raises. So the kind of three things that I think it's worth unpicking in the letter, first of all, were um, first of all, I think, you know, a case that is outlined for why it is necessary to make a defense of pluralism. And in a way, as we'll see, this might be the shakiest part of the whole thing. Essentially, the letter is kind of uh trying to convey the idea that pluralism was under threat because somehow the freedom for philanthropists and philanthropic institutions to have their own ideas and express them and also to kind of follow their own um motivations in terms of where they give and how they give is being imperiled by uh some kind of unseen force that is trying to constrain everybody to to tow some line or other. Although, as we'll see, it's kind of it's very unclear exactly how this is happening. But in the letter they say um the result of these pressures, however meritorious and morally urgent, so they're I think talking there about kind of widespread concern about social justice issues and inequality and that kind of thing, uh, is that foundations and philanthropists are often expected to pledge allegiance to one or other narrow set of prescribed views. So that's that's the kind of the danger is that increasingly pluralism is under threat because everybody is expected to tow this line. There's then uh an argument in favour of donor freedom and the importance of respecting the kind of fundamental right of donors to choose what to do when it comes to deciding how to give their money and where. So here they say the history of philanthropy is a history of using private capital to supplement, not replace, other approaches to investing in and supporting a prosperous and just society. A critical way philanthropy does this is by helping to make pluralism possible, and then they say philanthropy as a whole makes its greatest contribution to democracy when all foundations and donors engage in the unfettered pursuit of their own mission, interests and prerogatives. Now that sentence there is one that I want to kind of highlight, double underline, you know, red flag, because I think that in a way to me is one of the most problematic parts of this, particularly the word unfettered, which as we'll see is a pretty kind of values-laden word, and also I'm not sure really reflects the reality of the situation as it is, let alone how it should ideally be. But anyway, this that's the case for donor freedom, and then added on to that as well, I think is a sort of separate but linked plea for civility as well. Um so they say here uh philanthropy can and should become skilled at effectively engaging in disagreements on approaches or even outcomes. This is because, as stark and rancorous as our social divisions may be, to best serve society we must commit to productive, not destructive negotiation. So there's these kind of three parts. There's the the threat to pluralism, there's um the defense of um the primacy of donor choice and and freedom, and there's uh the plea for civility. They're all kind of component parts of this wider case that's being made for the importance and the value of plurality, which we'll we'll explore in a bit. Um but the the pushback to this, I mean, some of it is is sort of difficult to argue with on the face of it. I mean, the a plea for civility, for instance, for people generally as a default, sort of respecting other people's views and engaging with them in a positive way, seems unproblematic. But actually, I think what we'll see on on that one in particular is that it's often used as a kind of coded way of actually undermining the ability of organizations to engage in advocacy or campaigning or to sort of speak out on issues. And I think similarly, some of the other um points that are made in this that on the face of it seem unproblematic or uncontroversial, actually, when put in the proper context, do raise some quite um serious concerns. And that's why the response to this has been quite fierce and there's been a lot of pushback. So there have been quite a few articles written and people speaking about it and writing about it. Um, one of the ones that came to attention most quickly afterwards was uh a blog written by uh Vu Lee, who's a blogger who writes the Nonprofit AF blog, uh very sort of popular non-profit blog in the US. And he essentially said, you know, this is philanthropy's version of the all lives matter response to the Black Lives Matter movement, um, a kind of you know very unhealthy both sides of an issue where there shouldn't really be two sides to it. So he said in that, um, these basic cases, not all philanthropy is good. There are donors and foundations that fund anti-trans hate groups, ones that back white supremacist movements, ones that support efforts to suppress votes, and ones that work to ban abortions and cause pain and death to millions of people. These donors and foundations cannot and should never be equally respected as donors and funders who are working to advance trans people's rights and humanity, protect voting rights and access, fight white supremacy and restore the rights to abortions. So this we'll come back to this you know in a lot more depth, but this is essentially the case that actually the ideal as put forward of plurality is problematic because in its pure form it means that we have to allow certain things to be inside the tent of the philanthropic sector or civil society that actually we shouldn't, because they are just morally wrong and therefore you know shouldn't be seen as um the the kind of mirror image of things that do actually respect rights and and push society forward in a positive way. There were also other interesting responses. So there's a letter from Edgar Villanueva, the philanthropy activist, who's been a guest on this podcast before, um, making kind of similar criticisms of this idea that you know plurality should be the ideal held above all others. Uh, also a really interesting piece by Philip Roik in the uh in Inside Philanthropy, putting this whole debate in the context of the sort of Francis Fukuyama end of history idea and and criticising this this sort of um uh classical liberal approach to pluralism within the realm of philanthropy, which I thought was a really interesting perspective. Uh, and also I think um one from Phil Buchanan at the Centre for Effective Philanthropy, again making some of these similar points, um, albeit a kind of more tolerant, I think, of the idea of pluralism, but also calling into question the basic premise of the letter in the first place, the idea that uh pluralism is even under threat in any meaningful way. So I want to dig into all of those um in a moment. But first I want to talk about just the practical question of who actually signed this letter and why, which I think is one of the things that's confused people most. So let's talk about that in a second. Okay, so let's sort of get into running through some of the the different kind of points about uh this letter and kind of unpick it and put it in context. As I say, the first thing is is quite a kind of present context uh point, which is to look at who it was that actually signed the letter. And this was one of the things that immediately just sort of slightly confused people because the the coalition of people that had signed the letter was odd if you if you know the uh the US non-profit sector at all. And in terms of who those people were, um so there was Kathleen Enright, who um is from the commun uh the Council on Foundations, which is a big membership body for foundations over there, Heather Templeton Dill from the John Templeton Foundation, Sam Gill from the Doris Duke Foundation, Brian Hooks from Stand Together, which is a sort of philanthropy infrastructure body. Um, and then the two, I guess, that sort of drew most attention. One was Darren Walker, um the president and CEO of the Ford Foundation, who's a very well-known figure uh in US non-profit and global sort of philanthropy circles, and then Elise Westhoff, who um was uh and still is at the moment the CEO of the Philanthropy Roundtable, although she's uh announced that she's standing down. And if you don't know this context, the philanthropy round table is a sort of philanthropy body that's pretty sort of right-leaning or conservative uh leaning. And and seeing, particularly Darren Walker and Elise Westhoff on the list of signatories together made people sort of wonder what the thinking was behind all of this. I think it's pretty apparent that part of the thinking was to bring together uh this disparate group of people uh was designed to show that there is a kind of consensus behind this issue and behind the idea that there is a value to pluralism and thereby sort of show through doing um their argument essentially, but actually it kind of ended up confusing people slightly. I think there's nothing wrong with that idea, and actually pulling together unusual coalitions of people can be very powerful, and this is a point that Phil Buchanan uh makes in in the the blog that he wrote about this, but actually, you know, in in this case it was confusing, particularly because I think at least Westhoff in particular has made some very strong statements about um you know kind of uh wokism and cancel culture, and clearly that is her point of view. So I think she brings that to the the table when it comes to this question of philanthropic pluralism, and actually I think unhelpfully kind of colours the debate from the outset in in those terms, and that makes it seem like that is this is essentially a version of oh, you know, you can't say anything anymore in philanthropy, whereas I actually think it's more nuanced and complex than that, or at least I think some of the other people signing up to it view it in more nuanced and complex terms, but perhaps the idea of joining forces with the philanthropy round table slightly backfired in that it it sort of meant that some of that nuance and complexity got lost. Um, but anyway, that that's I think kind of just looking at the question of who actually signed it. I think the the other thing I wanted to to cover up front before we go into some of the more substantive points about the the pros and cons of the idea of philanthropic pluralism is whether the idea that you know the the basic premise of the letter that uh philanthropic pluralism is under threat holds any water? Is it actually just a total straw man? And this is a point a new number of people have s have made, which is yeah, absolutely. I mean philanthropic pluralism up to a point is is a good thing, although as we'll see, I think most people would agree that there probably do need to be some constraints on it, and actually in reality there are constraints on it. But but who is it who who has suddenly emerged that is sort of threatening pluralism? Um there are you know vague kind of insinuations and references in this letter to donors and funders having to kind of tow the line or to to s step in line with with some kind of agreed consensus. Um, but actually nobody's really doing that in any meaningful kind of legal sense or stopping foundations and donors doing whatever it is that they want to do in the same way that they've always been able to. Um and so I mean it feels a little bit like one of those uh arguments about free speech, which I think is an analogy that we'll come back to uh a number of times through through this podcast, where people are essentially, you know, sort of saying, Oh, I you know, you can't say anything anymore without risk of being cancelled. And it's often older white men going around radio and TV shows to you know to very large audiences complaining about the fact that nobody will allow them to say what they think anymore, um, you know, ignoring the fact that actually they continue to have very large platforms. And I think there is a danger that that this argument could be read in the same way where it's actually you know a group of organizations and and leaders within the non-profit sphere who are perfectly capable of doing what they want and and kind of you know uh holding their own values and pursuing their own ideas, um, but but somehow kind of feeling as though they are uh under threat um and kind of making a a case that that they they uh can't do what they want and say what they want anymore. Uh perhaps there is a a kernel of truth in the idea that society at the moment I think has become more polarized and in some ways less tolerant of the idea that you can engage with people with whom you disagree. I think you know it's it's easy to talk about filter bubbles and the you know the effect of social media, but I think there is some truth to that, and it's something I find certainly in my own work on philanthropy that I'm constantly coming up against, which is it's quite often difficult to deal with complex issues that don't necessarily have clear right or wrong answers. And I, you know, I should say right now that's not necessarily the case with some of the examples that get put forward in the context of these arguments around pluralism, where I think there are pretty clear morally right or wrong answers. But I think one of the challenges in a lot of debates about philanthropy is it does very often quite quickly become tribal or degenerate into people feeling as though they need to kind of go go into bat for one side or the or the other rather than feeling as though they can uh kind of confidently allow people to express uh views that are opposite to their own and engage with them and understand, you know, why they might have different views and allow that that is legitimate, and then why it is that they disagree with them and then they are free to criticize them, you know, strongly if if needs be. But I think you know there is an element of truth that it has become more difficult to do that in some ways, but I don't think that amounts to a kind of oh, you know, cancel culture is running rife in philanthropy arguments, and I do think you have to be very careful about insinuating that kind of thing.

SPEAKER_03 17:47

Back where I come from, there are men who do nothing all day but good deeds. They are called Philip uh filip uh good deed doers.

SPEAKER_06 18:29

Right, so let's try and get to grips with some of the the sort of substantive points about pluralism and kind of unpick them and try and think through um you know where this might take the debate in the future. And I should say I'm you know, maybe I should have said up front, I'm not gonna offer you any clear-cut or easy answers here because actually fundamentally I don't think there are any clear-cut or easy answers. This is this is a tension that sits at the heart of our understanding of philanthropy. Uh it always has done, I suspect it always will do, and there are trade-offs to be made and choices um and things that need to be balanced. All I'm gonna try and do is help you maybe sort of think through some of the issues, and then you can make your your own decisions um uh about where you come down on some of these questions. So the first argument in favour of pluralism that gets put forward in this this letter, albeit in a kind of implied form, but you do hear it elsewhere as well, is essentially an indirect one in some sense. It kind of says, you know, not necessarily that pluralism a good thing in and of itself, but that it is a consequence of allowing donors to have freedom and liberty uh and the ability to choose. Um, the result of that, because people have you know a very wide spectrum of different interests and different motivations, is that you naturally get a highly pluralistic philanthropic sector and civil society, and that's a good thing, uh, and therefore pluralism must be a good thing because it's a reflection of that fundamental liberty. I think it's important at this point, and it's something I kind of hinted at before, to say up front that the idea that that philanthropic choice is unfettered, as as it was put forward in the letter, I think that is a bit misleading because uh philanthropic choice isn't unfettered in a number of different ways. I mean, first of all, what you can or can't fund is uh is constrained by law in terms of you know you can't fund things that are actively illegal, and that might include things that promote hate speech or that promote you know violence against certain groups, and that is a good thing. It it's also constrained in the sense of even within those things that are legal, some things are given privileged status by virtue of the fact that they are allowed to be non-profit in the eyes of the government, uh, and that is you know either a reflection of uh the tax code as it is in the US, or in the UK it's a reflection of sort of wider charity law where it's kind of independently regulated, and those institutions then get a certain legal status that gives them tax advantages, but also reputational benefits. So actually, our you know, our choices about what we can fund philanthropically, and particularly if we're talking about tax advantage philanthropy, are constrained by government, and presumably you know, the the government then makes those choices as a result of you know a democratic process of of elections and and representation. And and maybe it's you know, is that okay then because the government gets to decide it and we're happy with the the fact that that is, you know, broadly speaking, democratic. And the thing that people are objecting to is the idea of constraints being imposed on a donor's ability to choose that are undemocratic, i.e., you know, they're not being um imposed by government or anyone else that has been elected in a democratically fair way, they're being Imposed in some other way, although again, as I say, this comes back to the sort of straw man point of who it is that's actually doing that. I think the thing about this this conception of liberty as the the first principle of philanthropy and kind of respecting donor freedom is that, well, first of all, it it it reflects a particular view of philanthropy that focuses very much on the micro-understanding of it. So what I mean here is that there are there are kind of two ways of uh well, at least two ways of looking at philanthropy, and I think they give quite different sense of what the the the primary goals are, and actually it's in it's in the move between these two different ways of looking at things that a lot of the problems lie. So there's a micro way of looking at philanthropy where philanthropy is about the choices of individuals to about how to freely give away assets that they own for the public good. And from this point of view, a lot of the emphasis does end up being on the individual's right to choose and issues of liberty and freedom. But when you zoom out to the macro level and you add up all of those individual acts of philanthropy together as an aggregate, philanthropy becomes something systemic that kind of sits alongside the state of the market as a means of allocating and redistributing resources within society. And and when you look at it from that perspective, I think the the balance naturally shifts towards thinking in terms of issues of justice and equity and fairness. And these things, you know, this kind of respecting the right of the individual to freely choose and wanting to have equity and justice and fairness at a systemic level, they pull in two different directions often, and it's it's in that move from the one to the other that's a lot of the debate and the difficulty lies. Just to kind of uh cement that idea of the micro and macro, there's a a good quote I think that captures this well from um Rob Reesch, um certainly in in the book about philanthropy and democratic societies that I'll put a link in the show notes to, where he says philanthropy can refer to both actions and institutions. We can think of philanthropy both as a form of individual giving and as a complex economic and policy structure, as the institutionalised practice of privately funding the production of public benefits. If regarded from the first agential perspective, philanthropy stands apart from other forms of giving, such as gift giving to friends and family and from spending for private consumption. If looked at from the second structural perspective, it stands apart from alternative institutionalized mechanisms of finance such as taxation or market exchange. So they're making that that sort of point about the the difference between those two things. And I think the difficulty here is that the argument for pluralism that is based on the idea that donor freedom is sacrosanct above all, ignores the reality that there is this inherent tension between these two different ways of looking at philanthropy. And that is something that most people working with philanthropy actually have to balance at all times, particularly when you're talking about it at a policy level. I think if you just respect the right of individuals to choose to do whatever the hell they want, and you don't pay any heed to some of those sort of systemic uh issues around the desire to ensure some level of equity of equity and fairness and justice, then you are prioritizing one conception of philanthropy over the other, and and it's unbalanced. So I think you know that that kind of um betrays a certain narrowness of of understanding um for a start.

SPEAKER_04 25:35

Yet the day is not far distant when the man who dies leaving behind him millions of available wealth, which what he for him to administer human life.

SPEAKER_06 26:21

The next uh idea that I want to sort of pull out from this debate that I think is perhaps the kind of the one that really gets to the heart of things most, is the the idea that pluralism is not just something that happens as a consequence of individual freedom and and the donor's right to choose, but it's actually a desirable end in itself because it's the thing that provides the substrate for diversity of thought and approach uh to exist. So you allow a thousand flowers to bloom, and this then leads to innovation and social progress. And this is an idea that you hear get put forward a lot as the sort of fundamental defense of philanthropy, and particularly of foundation philanthropy, is the idea that actually they play a vital role in driving society forward by generating new ideas, and and you know, this is sometimes sort of put forward as a kind of uh playing a key role in a healthy battle of ideas that generates you know new directions for society to go in. And there's also a point that we'll come back to in a moment about a particular value in giving voice to marginalized views within a kind of majoritarian democracy. Um, and this idea of the value of uh philanthropy, uh philanthropic pluralism as a way of generating new ideas and allowing kind of unusual points of view to get a hearing. It goes back a long way. Um, particularly, I mean, it can be traced back further, probably, but a good starting point is to look at the work of John Stuart Mill, um, who, particularly in an essay that he wrote in 1816 three, I think, uh called Endowments, looked at this question of how you could justify the role of endowments, particularly perpetual ones, because this was the big source of debate at that time was a concern about the sort of the dead hand of the donor uh and uh perpetual endowments being undemocratic and and sort of uh producing intergenerational injustice. But Mill said, and I think this is one of the key points, so he said, because an endowment is a public nuisance when there's nobody to prevent its funds from being jobbed away for the gain of irresponsible administrators, because it may become worse than useless if irrevocably tied up to a destination fixed by somebody who died five hundred years ago, we ought not, on that account, to forget that endowments protected against malversation I think that means misuse. I mean malversation is not a word we use anymore, but anyway, but he says, let's not forget that endowments protected against malversation and secured to their original purpose for no more than two or three generations, so obviously time limited, would be a precious safeguard for uncustomary modes of thought and practice against the repression, sometimes amounting to suppression, to which they are even more exposed as society in other respects grows more civilized. So, you know, this is the basic case for foundations and philanthropy as a sort of bulwark against conformity of thought and approach that it's insinuated here would be imposed by you know the state otherwise. And I think there are lots of other people who make similar points. So there's a good quote from uh Thomas Hare, who was a sort of social reformer and early pioneer of social science in the late 19th century, and he said, Um, I regard endowments as an important element in the experimental branches of political and social science. No doubt the nation at large may take on itself the cost of such tentative efforts, but this involved taxation, and the assent of the majority to increase taxes could not be justly demanded by philanthropists or projectors, and certainly would not be obtained until their speculations had taken such a hold upon the public mind as no longer to require an exceptional support or propagation, and then the key bit here. The most important steps in human progress may be opposed to the prejudices not only of the multitude, but even of the learned and leaders of thought in a particular epoch. So again, uh what I mean, first of all, let's note that he used the phrase leaders of thought, which is dangerously close to thought leaders. So I think Thomas Hare would have done quite well on inspirational LinkedIn posts, but putting that aside for one moment, you know, making the point that actually the important role of philanthropy that can't be played by government uh trying to do this through taxation, is that it is able to kind of engage with um things that go against the grain and sort of run counter to the status quo and thereby to produce new ideas and new approaches that can eventually it's hoped to move society forward. And this has been a really influential idea, I think, in terms of the understanding of the role of philanthropy and its kind of its legitimacy within the US, and actually is kind of enshrined in case law, certainly in sort of Supreme Court precedent. Uh, and this is I think is really interesting. I'll we'll read a bit of this. So I apologize that I'm reading some quite long quotes here, but you know, people uh far cleverer than me have taken the time to uh think about these things and choose their words very carefully, so I think it is worth doing that uh in between me sort of uh extemporizing and rambling on. But there's a case in uh 1983 called um Bob Jones University versus United States, which went up to the Supreme Court, and in this um in the the final sort of decision, uh there was a majority decision, and then a separate um there was one dissenting opinion, and then there was um Supreme Court Justice Lewis Powell agreed with the overall decision but wanted to write his own separate um uh statement on it because he essentially sort of thought the decision was right, but there were some things that concerned him about the way in which uh charitable status uh in the US um had been viewed. And he said, uh even more troubling is the element of conformity that appears to inform the court's analysis. The court asserts that an exempt organization must demonstrably serve and be in harmony with the public interest, must have a purpose that comports with the common community conscience, and must not act in a manner that affirmatively at odds with the declared position of the whole government. He said, Taken together, these passages suggest that the primary function of a tax exempt organization is to act on behalf of the government in carrying out governmentally approved policies. In my opinion, such a view ignores the important role played by tax exemptions in encouraging diverse, often sharply conflicting activities and viewpoints. As Justice Brennan's observed, private non-profit groups receive tax exemptions because each group contributes to the diversity of association, viewpoint, and enterprise essential to a vigorous pluralistic society. Far from representing an effort to reinforce any perceived community, common community conscience, the provision of tax exemptions to non-profit groups is one indispensable means of limiting the influence of governmental orthodoxy on important areas of community life. So again, reflecting, I think, both sort of Mill's view and Hare's view that the value of pluralism is that it allows um sort of unorthodox, contrarian, you know, non-majority held views to have some space, and that acts as a kind of counterweight to the potential risk of government imposing a sort of orthodoxy on everyone. I think the this this has been a very kind of influential um statement uh here that's had quite a lot of uh impact on the thinking about the US non-profit sphere. I think it's really telling in the context of the current debate that we're having about pluralism to note that this statement occurred in the context of a case that regarded the non-profit status of a religious university. That the case basically was challenging the non-profit status of this university, um Bob Jones University, because it uh well it completely excluded black students until 1971, and then for a period between 71 and 75, it allowed black students in, but only if they were were married, and even after that, it allowed unmarried black applicants, but they weren't allowed to uh engage in interracial marriage or interracial marriage or dating. So it had very, very problematic segregationist views about interracial relationships, and the reason that this came to court was people you know sort of challenged the fact that you were allowed to exist as a non-profit and to have that tax advantage status while holding views that ran counter to the the the laws and the values of the day. And I think the point here is to note that this statement from Lewis Powell uh is acknowledging, you know, this is, I should say, in the context of him acknowledging that the decision to strip Bob Jones University of its non-profit status was the right one because you know what they were doing was unarguably uh highly problematic. But he is, you know, at the same time making this defence of pluralism, which again on the face of it actually is quite a reasonable defence of the value of pluralism. But it you know, it often seems as though defences of pluralism need to be made in the context of relatively kind of indefensible examples of things that people want to you know defend under the rubric of pluralism. And I think this reflects something that kind of concerns me about the whole debate, and it again it's similar, I think, to the debate about free speech, which is a slight suspicion that arguments about the value of philanthropic pluralism tend to be sort of much loved and leapt upon by people who find it easier to defend that broad principle than they do to defend their actual views. So, again, similarly in the case of free speech, you'll often hear you know people who've got relatively sort of you know represent reprehensible views or views that they know are not going to win widespread support, instead arguing, you know, oh well this is important, you know, arguing for the value of free speech and their right to say that, which is fine and they're allowed to defend that. But again, it's sort of telling that rather than defending the actual thing that you're saying, you feel that it's easier to defend your broad right to say it. And again, in terms of pluralism, I think making the defense of your right to engage in a particular activity or to hold uh particular values rather than actually defending that activity or those values, again, it sort of says something about your awareness of where you sit within the kind of wider uh spectrum um of kind of philanthropy and civil society. And just to finish off this this thought, um I think this idea, this kind of million idea, not million, million, as in, like John Stuart Mill, of the the value of pluralism as a way of generating kind of uncustomary modes of thought is one that very much comes up in the debate about the role of think tanks, particularly, um, and whether or not they should uh kind of have charitable status and be allowed to enjoy philanthropic support, because often the case that is made for why they um deliver uh some kind of then public benefit that makes them an appropriate focus for philanthropy is precisely that they are, you know, they are kind of engaging in this battle of ideas, and by generating these different points of view, they they sort of provide the means for people to um decide on what are the the best ways to to take society forward. I think it's also just finally worth saying, um, and this is something I'll come back to um at the end briefly, that one of the things that the um the Lewis Powell statement there in Bob Jones University um United States Supreme Court ruling makes clear is a crucial difference in this whole debate between the US and UK is the status of public benefit where there isn't actually a specific requirement to demonstrate a public benefit for a non-profit in order to have non-profit status in the US, where it's a essentially a tax designation, whereas in the UK, in order to have uh charitable status, you do have to demonstrate uh that you have a public benefit. And actually, in in the context of some of these debates about pluralism, that potentially removes some of the most problematic edge cases, which are the ones that tend to end up generating all of the debate, because if there are things which clearly don't deliver a public benefit but are allowed to have non-profit status and thereby kind of sit within the realm of philanthropy, they're the ones that tend to attract a sort of fierce disagreement. Whereas if actually there is a separate sort of prior legal requirement in order to have a demonstrable public benefit, to an extent the government and the judiciary has already kind of accepted that responsibility for determining what does or doesn't make it into the sphere of philanthropy. Um so I think that that is an important difference to note. Um, and and you know, whilst this is definitely not a debate that only exists or is only relevant to the US, it does have a specific US context.

SPEAKER_03 39:28

At Meeting of Industrial Leaders in Washington, here's Julius Rosenwald. Most people are of the opinion that because a man has made a fortune, that his opinions on any subject are value. Don't be fooled. I believe a man is rich. There is ample proof to the future.

SPEAKER_06 40:00

Okay, now I just want to follow on from that previous uh stream of consciousness about pluralism and the the value of generating a diversity of thought and ideas, and focus in on a sort of related or possibly even a kind of sub-set of that idea, which is the argument that pluralism in philanthropy is a good thing because, in particular, it means that philanthropists are able to back marginalised causes and groups, and that this is really important in the context of a democracy because it allows you to overcome the tyranny of the majority in a sense, which is sort of the idea that actually, in a majoritarian system where everything is determined by you know the greatest number of votes through an electoral system of some sort, it's fair in one sense, but it's also unfair on groups who are never going to have the sufficient numbers to ensure that their interests and uh our kind of uh priorities are are expressed through that system. And and lots of people have noticed have noted this as one of the things that is a kind of point of value of philanthropy and of voluntary activity. And so the historian R. J. Morris has a formulation of this that I really like where he says, looking historically, he says, one major contribution which the voluntary society has made to ordering the complexities of urban and industrial society has been its contribution to the history of outgroups, groups which were excluded from a significant share in the legitimate structure of power. The middle classes, women, and the working people of the labour movement all used voluntary societies at different times and in different ways to formulate new identities and values, to experiment with new forms of social action and relationships, and to provide support and help for each other. They all went on to make and sustain a claim for a share in that legitimate power that goes with recognition and status within a dominant ideology, with an easy and uncontested place in public life and open access to the power and resources of the state. And there's there's another version of this that I think is really interesting from um uh Friedrich Hayek, the the economist, where he he says, We cannot attempt to recount here the long story of all good causes which came to be recognised only after lonely pioneers had devoted their lives and fortunes to arousing the public conscience, of their long campaigns until at last they gained support for the abolition of slavery, for penal and prison reform, for the prevention of cruelty to children or to animals, or for a more humane treatment of the insane. All these were for a long time the hopes of only a few idealists who strove to change the opinion of the overwhelming majority concerning certain accepted practices. So both of these quotes are essentially referring to something that I often think of as the cycle of kind of taking ideas from the margins to the mainstream, which is a really important function of Fluntby, and I think one of the sort of strongest arguments for its value is that actually, when you look historically at many of the major sort of milestones of social progress, so um the battle for universal suffrage, um the abolition of slavery, ending of child labour, um, the uh battle for LGBTQ rights, um, uh the legalization of gay marriage, lots of these different things. There's broadly a sort of cycle in which these ideas start out being only kind of held amongst minority groups within a society, and then through the voluntary activity and association with at first very limited um philanthropic support that might come from solely within that community, and then over time from kind of from outside the community, the ideas gain public awareness and then slowly sort of public acceptance, and then they become something that goes on the political agenda until eventually pressure builds up and and you get social and policy and legislative change. And in order for philanthropy to play that role, particularly at that early stage when it is running often sort of counter to public opinion and political. Political opinion, it needs to be able to go against the grain and against the status quo. And that is where people would argue that pluralism is vital because if we constrain the plurality the pluralism of philanthropy too much, there won't be the space for those outliers and those organizations and individuals that do run counter to the status quo. And if we allowed either society or the philanthropy sector or government to set the parameters too tightly around the allowable boundaries of philanthropy, we would be fixing at a particular point in time where ideas could go. And actually, that's you know, history shows that that is uh you know a dangerous road to go down because we don't necessarily have everything right at the moment. In fact, we absolutely certainly don't. And so in order to allow that space for progress to occur, we need to allow you know pluralism and that sort of freedom to to breathe. Of course, uh, this is the positive version. Um, and the the absolute crux of that question is is it always a good idea to allow marginalized views um to get more oxygen and more more publicity? You know, what if those views are actually marginalized for a good reason, if they're sort of extreme right wing or left-wing views that you know promote ideas of hate or or kind of discriminatory ideas? You know, should we allow the same principles to apply to those? You know, obviously I don't want that to happen, but can is it possible to uh determine from the outset uh a way of allowing in only those things that that we decide are good and keeping out those things that we think are bad. I don't know that it is because obviously it's only with the benefit of hindsight often that we're able to say which of the things are the ones that were desirable and which weren't. And again, actually, if if we said, oh well we need to decide up front whether this cause is um uh you know is a good one or not and allow it the space to exist within a pluralistic civil society, the problem is then we're we're need to make that determination now, and the whole point is that you know actually when some of these things have to sort of run counter to uh to the the views and values of the time. So, you know, certainly with things like the the anti-slavery movement or or universal suffrage, if we had taken a straw poll of the populace, and certainly in the early stages of those campaigns, and said, Oh, do you think it's a good idea if we allow organisations to exist which campaign you know for for these causes? Absolutely not. The public would not have been in favour of it, and there would have been no chance of those things getting off the ground. So I think that's why the the idea uh of of kind of constraining those things up front is problematic. And this the core point here is that in a lot of these debates about pluralism, we need to be really careful not to fall into the trap of kind of um being in favour of things when we come up with examples that are things that we like, and then being against them when they are things that we don't like. So there's a good statement of this, I think, from David Callahan in his book The The Givers, where he's talking um about the sort of the role of philanthropy in a democracy, and he says, when donors hold views we detest, we tend to see them as unfairly tilting policy debates with their money, yet when we like their causes, we often view them as heroically stepping forward to level the playing field against powerful special interests or backward public majorities. These sort of a la carte reaction don't make a lot of sense. Really the question should be whether we think it's okay overall for any philanthropists to have so much power to advance their own visions of a better society. And I guess the question here for me is, you know, do those arguing against pluralism think it's a price worth paying to lose philanthropic support for some of the things that they do agree with or to make it impossible for philanthropy to fund those things, um, as the price of preventing philanthropy being able to support those things that they think are problematic. Because if not, it essentially amounts to an argument that you're saying, well, no, I don't want to constrain the things that I like, I want to constrain the other things, but then that's that just becomes a sort of moral absolutism. And I don't know on what basis you know I or anyone else gets to make that determination. As I've said, I think potentially you can allow government to make that determination on the basis that that at least has some sort of uh special democratic status, but I don't think often that's what we're talking about. Um, we're not really talking about government's role in defining the non-profit sphere. We're talking about some people arguing that their particular view of what is or isn't acceptable within uh the boundaries of philanthropy and civil society is the right one and someone else's is is the wrong one. So I I think you know that to me is quite a difficult um position to maintain.

SPEAKER_00 48:59

Genius billionaire playboy philanthropist, genius billionaire playboy philanthropist, genius billionaire playboy philanthropist, genius billionaire playboy.

SPEAKER_06 49:30

Okay, having finished the the previous section, sort of saying actually some of the arguments against pluralism, I think, can uh be undermined by the the suspicion that actually they're being driven by a kind of subjective view of what is or isn't okay, whereas actually we need to take a more objective uh assessment of whether or not philanthropy as a whole should be allowed to fund things on the basis of kind of free choice or whether we should constrain that choice more in a way. I do want to acknowledge that actually all of you know one of the dangers in this debate again is that there is often a gap, I think, between the the theory, which on the theoretical side, actually pluralism tends to look pretty sensible and alluring, and the the practical reality, which is that I'm not sure we ever do get the pure version of pluralism in reality that's often put forward in some of these theoretical arguments. And this is a point I think that some of the critics have made that you know, yes, pluralism sounds lovely and nice and that's wonderful, but there is a certain naivety to these arguments, because in reality, for instance, there are say a lot of bad faith actors who are engaging in our you know in arguments around plurality not because they genuinely believe in them, but again because it just suits their own self-interest to do that. I think also there is a sort of underlying assumption to arguments about plurality that everything will be fine and dandy because if we allow full proper plurality, there'll be some sort of balance uh in the system and and that everything will kind of even out. I I previously in a blog that I wrote years ago, I compared this to a scene from The Simpsons, which you may or may not have seen, but where Mr. Burns um you know uh thinks that he's getting ill and he goes to see a doctor, and the doctor, you know, he sort of says you're absolutely fine, and Mr. Burns says, Oh, I don't have any diseases then. Then the doctor says, No, you have all the diseases, and he explains this as what he calls three stooges syndrome, where essentially all the germs are sort of trying to cram through a door, but because they're all there, they're they're holding each other in check. And and I often feel as though this is the way that you know philanthropic pluralism gets presented, which is it's fine because there, you know, as long as there's people with left-wing views and right-wing views, and kind of problematic views on this side of the spectrum and on the other side of the spectrum, it'll all kind of balance out broadly. But in reality, of course, um money and power tends to skew both politically. I think it's there's certainly evidence that shows that um money from elite philanthropy uh on the whole goes broadly more towards sort of right-wing uh causes, but also more broadly towards the status quo and vested interests. And so, you know, this is a point. So Ben Whitaker makes this point back in 1974 in his book The Foundations, um, where he says a convincing rationale for foundations requires more than the standard incantations require regarding the virtues of pluralism and innovation, which all good philanthropoids recite on arising and retiring. A conviction that the theoretical concept of independent foundations is a potentially beneficial one, is not the same as believing that their present operation should not be drastically improved. Currently, their efforts are too often open to the criticism that they're principally used merely to lubricate the machinery of the status quo, for almost all the people who control foundations belong to segments of society whose privileges predispose them to be basically satisfied with its present structure, and indeed frequently to have a vested interest in preventing any seriously radical reforms. So I think that's a really good statement of this gap between theory and reality, which is, yeah, it's easy to buy these arguments theoretically, but the reality is if the people who actually control all the resources and the the institutions clearly sort of more aligned with the status quo and vested interest, then this argument that actually uh, you know, particularly the arguments in favour of philanthropy playing a vital role in kind of overcoming the tyranny of the majority, don't really hold water because that's going to be, you know, those cases are going to be very sort of few and far between. There's another good version of a similar point in uh book by the political uh scientist Joan Roloffs called Foundations in Public Policy. It's actually the subtitle is The Mask of Pluralism, so it's easy to see where she stands on this. But she looks a lot at the these kind of arguments around pluralism. And the point she makes, she says critics of the pluralist interpretation of US politics argue that the system's not, as it is claimed, open to all interests, for the powerless rarely organise. They're deterred by lack of resources, the demands of everyday life, the rational calculation of costs and benefits, a culture of passivity andor a hegemonic ideology that prevents them from even recognising their grievances. So the point is, you know, it's easy to say, oh, it's you know, pluralism, and actually we'll get lots of organizations representing kind of marginalized views as well as a vested interest. It's all balanced out. But that that is a hopelessly naive view because that's not how things work in practice. A linked point, I think, just to sort of finish off this idea about the potential danger of naivety when it comes to pluralism, is this might be an argument for promoting or prioritizing a view of civil society that is more based around smaller organizations and institutions with a broader base of support rather than big money philanthropy, institutional foundations and kind of large institutions. So there's an interesting article that's just come out actually by the legal scholar Matthew Harding. He's writing about the wider question of philanthropy and justice, but he he does say in one point he says that the million view, so again, the John Stuart Mill vision of philanthropy generating a diversity of innovative and independent viewpoints on questions of governments and policy, is one that seems most easily realized by a multitude of relatively modest associations and entities operating in accordance with their own preferences, convictions, and beliefs. Such a scene may be contrasted with a civil society dominated by the interests and agendas of a few rich philanthropists. In the latter picture, diversity is likely to be hampered as the voices of smaller, more modestly resourced organizations are drowned out. Innovation might also suffer as organisations funded by the rich achieve scale and consequently grow bureaucratic and inflexible. Once again, the point that emerges is that in the world where plutocrats enjoy political power through their philanthropic activities, the problem to be addressed is not so much the practice of philanthropy itself as the concentrations of wealth that plutocrats enjoy in the first place. And so I think you know that's basically making the point that this ideal of pluralism, particularly the one where it's about kind of generating a diversity of ideas, is more likely to work in practice if we make active efforts to promote a vision of the philanthropy world and the philanthropic sector that promotes sort of wide range of organisations that enjoy a broad base of support. And again, just to kind of back up this point, there's a passage in Emma Saunders Hastings' uh book, Private Virtues, Public Vices, and Emma's a political philosopher who's been a guest on the podcast before. Um and she says, you know, the value of pluralism is frequently invoked as a reason for embracing philanthropy in general and for favouring some private role in the provision of public goods. On this rationale, nonprofits and philanthropy can act as counterweights to government orthodoxy by supplementing or offering alternatives to government supplied goods. There are some obvious problems with this justification as it applies to elite philanthropy. Elite philanthropy may be no counterweight at all. It often influences or acts in concert with government rather than supplying independent alternatives, and it may further amplify voices that are already overrepresented in government action. But mass philanthropy might seem to be less vulnerable to these objections, and so to represent the best of both worlds. High volumes of small dollar amount donations might supply both pluralism and a measure of democracy in the sense that more people's preferences count. So I think there's some agreement there from people writing about this that pluralism itself is not an idea without merit, but that it won't necessarily happen by itself, and that actually the way in which the philanthropy sector is currently funded and the general sort of landscape of organizations within it might not be maximizing the potential for philanthropy to to play that that sort of positive role through pluralism. Okay, uh well, I could keep talking about this phrase because it's it's well, it's fascinating to me, but it's also it's you know there's a lot of depth in it, as you say, and I feel like we're only really just sort of scratching the surface. But I just wanted to give a little bit of thought now to the question of how we might constrain pluralism. So assuming that we uh kind of buy some of those arguments and we think actually, you know, unfettered pluralism, if it even exists, as I've said already, is not a good thing, and that we do need to, even if we think there's value to pluralism, it needs to be a kind of constrained form of pluralism. How would we do that? Well, you know, as I've said, you know, we already do have constraints. We've got law, so what's allowable in law, and then we have um what the rules are that determine whether something has non-profit or charitable status. But what more can we do beyond that? So, you know, we could change the definitions that we use to define the acceptable sphere of civil society. So that's essentially kind of acknowledging that point that government has the role in kind of determining, certainly in terms of determining what makes it into the s the realm of the non-profit or the the charitable through the the rules that determine what the eligibility is for that particular status. And as I said before, that's uh probably has more strength here in the UK where that charitable status comes with a public benefit test and it's not just a tax designation. Or you know, the other option would be to leave government out of the picture and you could constrain further by achieving some sort of consensus within civil society itself. So this would be the situation in which some things are kind of technically allowable, but we all choose not to do them or decide that we're gonna shun them because they're bad. But that's basically where we're at, I think. That's that is the problem that we are facing in this debate and why there is so much kind of um consternation. So the problem is we're never going to achieve consensus of that kind, because I think the sort of ferocity of the debate that has uh emerged in the US around this question of pluralism shows that the idea that that everyone is ever going to agree on what are all of the things that we should allow within the the sphere of the philanthropic or civil society is is a pipe dream. So I think you know that that's essentially kind of begging the question. The the other dimension that I want to throw in, because I think it's really relevant and it's uh kind of forward-looking, and I think will bring a new dimension to to some of uh some of these debates, is the the increasing role that technology platforms play in philanthropy. So there's been a huge growth in kind of online giving, you know, in the US and the UK, but also in other emerging markets like China in particular and places like India, where new non-profit platforms have uh have emerged that specifically exist to enable people to give philanthropically, but even more so uh commercial platforms, so payment providers and social media platforms are kind of adding giving functionality into to what they do. And as these platforms capture a larger percentage of the overall amount of giving, their role as de facto gatekeepers becomes more and more important. And this is really relevant to plurality, because again, if we're we're asking who who is it, you know, where could we could we find a way of constraining the limits of of what uh of what the philanthropic sector uh encompasses that doesn't necessarily require government to do it, and if we've said well we can't get consensus from within the world of uh of civil societal philanthropy, actually that's potentially a role that these platforms could play because they do you know essentially get to decide what does or doesn't make it onto their platform, and if people are increasingly reliant on those platforms to do most of their giving, that then becomes almost, as I say, a kind of de facto way of of kind of drawing new boundaries around civil society. But this, I mean, this is pretty evidently problematic in the sense of you know there are big questions about what rights platforms have to do that, where their legitimacy comes from, on what basis are they taking decisions about what does or doesn't make it onto the platform. And you know, this is a big area of debate. We've had uh some discussion on the podcast about it before, talked to to lots of people about this whole question of platform neutrality and and you know what role platforms are increasingly playing in shaping giving, and I think this is going to be a hugely important new dimension of this debate around plurality. So I guess the the final bit just to clear things up is to say, you know, where does all of that leave us? I did caveat up front that I wouldn't necessarily give you any clear answers, and that's not because I'm being mean, it's both because I think these questions don't have any clear-cut answers, and particularly because I struggle to find them myself, I'll be honest. I'm sort of fundamentally broadly liberal-minded, and I think I I have a relatively high tolerance given the nature of the work I do for kind of engaging with ideas and values that I don't necessarily agree with, but I'm also keenly aware of the practical reality of not needing to be naive, as we've outlined, and realizing that there is a danger that liberality and a willingness to engage can be abused, and that you therefore become part of the problem if you end up legitimising points of view that are put forward by you know badly intentioned actors? There, you know, there are definitely things that philanthropy supports that I personally would rather didn't exist, and I would love it if they you know weren't things that existed and got philanthropic support. I guess the question is, you know, is that enough then for me to think I can question their fundamental legitimacy in the sense of saying, not that I disagree with them and I think they shouldn't exist, but that actually, you know, at a deeper underlying level, there is some sort of principled reason that they shouldn't exist. I'm not sure that I that I can in that sense. And and this is where I go back to you know David Callahan's point. Um I always think you know the thing to do is do the thought experiment of take the worst possible example of currently legitimate legal philanthropy. So for instance, for me, uh an organization, say that was promoting um climate change denial ideas, and and ask myself the question, you know, do I think it's the acceptable price of allowing some of the things that I would agree with, like much more radical kind of climate, uh climate change kind of addressing uh organizations? If I kind of acknowledge the fact that if if I'm saying my my side of this is legitimate, then people who have a different point of view, even if I think that point of view is wrong and illegitimate, is it the acceptable price of me being able to have the things that I want and allow them to be funded, that other people are allowed to have the freedom to fund things that I do disagree with? Or or is it not? And if it's not, which I think that's where we come to in this debate on pluralism, for some people it that price is too high, in which case should we constrain the ability of people to fund some of those things that we disagree with? And how should we do that? And we've talked about a few options, and if if in the course of doing that, some things that we do think should be within the realm of civil society and able to achieve philanthropic support are no longer able to, is that a price worth paying? I mean, that's that is to me kind of the essential question here about pluralism, because I think pluralism always comes at a cost because as soon as you kind of embrace the idea of pluralism, you have to accept that there are unfortunate. going to be things that then come within the the sphere of uh of philanthropy or civil society that you don't like as well as many that hopefully that you do. I think the a couple of other thoughts on we haven't talked so much about the specific point around civility. So this this was essentially the idea that actually you know if we accept the idea of plurality to some extent then there's a separate point to be made about when people or organizations with different points of view are engaging with one another they should do it in you know in a in a civil way that kind of is based on on respect. And again I broadly I kind of on paper I agree with that idea. It seems like an admirable ideal um and I tend in my own work to try and do that. I'm not really given to polemic uh for the sake of it although it's you know it seems like it would often be quite fun. And there are things that I could easily be polemical about but I don't always think on a lot of things that it's necessary for me at least the most positive way to go. But I do also acknowledge that there's a genuine concern that the calls for civility um can become a means of sort of taming organisations or the sector when actually in reality they're quite legitimately challenging ideas and views that they don't agree with. And this is certainly something we've seen a bit of in the UK recently where there's been one of the threads in a lot of pronouncements about charitable campaigning and advocacy from commentators and policymakers and and the charity commission as a regulator has been a sense that charities need to be polite and gentle and so they're free to disagree but they have to do so in certain sort of you know nice soft kind of constrained ways. I think the problem with that is history doesn't really bear out the idea that that's how social progress happens. It's not generally something that happens when we're all just super duper nice to each other because unfortunately if what we're if social change is about in particular case is about overcoming the status quo, those in power don't tend to just sort of politely hand that power over when they hear a compellingly argued case. So actually it does take kind of much more vehement disagreement and you know often sort of kind of tactics of direct action and protest and that kind of thing. So if you look at the history of something like the suffragettes as I've already said the idea that they would have achieved what they'd achieved if they had just had lots of you know tea meetings and polite conversations with the men who didn't even think they had a right to to exist in the political sphere rather than engaging in concerted campaigns of you know often extremely controversial direct action. Not sure that bears out a lot of historical analysis. So without wanting to be too much of the yes and I think absolutely we should be willing to to willing and able to engage civilly with people who we might not necessarily always agree with and you know to work alongside them sometimes. But also I think we have to allow that within civil society on some issues things are going to get combative and again that's actually fine if if you genuinely believe in plurality and as many of the people who put forward the the ideal of plurality do, that it's about fostering a battle of ideas. Well that metaphor of a battle is quite telling uh in that it's you know battles again don't generally tend to be about people sort of sitting around having a polite disagreement and then hugging and making up it's about kind of quite violent disagreement and combat. So again we that might be the expectation that we have to apply if we're going to truly kind of believe in the idea of plurality. And I guess you know that's that to me is the core is that I think a starting assumption should be that plurality is well both a practical reality. I guess that's one thing is that we can argue about this all we want but the reality is that these things do exist and actually have a fairly pluralistic philanthropic sector as it stands. And also there are strong arguments for it as a theoretical ideal but we also need to be willing to allow that everyone has a right to challenge not just individual examples of philanthropic organisations or individuals doing things, but the right to challenge the idea of plurality. And at the end of the day if that ends up having the effect of influencing the government or you know the the powers that be to redefine the boundaries of philanthropy and the laws that govern it so that the it reshapes the the philanthropy sector or the charity sector um accordingly so that some things do get left out then so be it. That's that to me seems fine. And maybe that is where the effort needs to be directed from those who are currently uncomfortable with the sort of pluralistic version of philanthropy have that as it stands is that they need to challenge at the level of uh sort of government policy and the law around legal status. And you know as an example that is where a lot of the debate in the UK at the moment around um private schools comes um because many of those have charitable status and some people vehemently disagree that this this is an okay thing but you know it has to be an argument about the the sort of the charity law and how that is interpreted rather than just arbitrarily stripping individual organisations of their charity status because I happen not to agree with it or somebody else doesn't. So again it has has to happen at a sort of principled level I think for this to work okay well that is uh some uh heavy thoughts for you but hopefully you know food for thought as well and some things for people to to think about there I will put links in the show notes to lots of things uh that you can read that I've referenced uh and some things that I've written that kind of touch on on this sort of stuff. If you're interested in this kind of discussion of of philanthropy I'd kind of you know putting it in wider context and trying to dig into it deeper do check out the website um whyphilanthropymatters dot com. I'd also take the opportunity to recommend my new book which is called What is Philanthropy for which is out with Bristol University Press and and covers a lot of these kinds of issues and it's pretty short and and affordable so please do check that out if you're interested. If you want to follow me on Twitter you can do at Rodri underscore H underscore Davis or at for literacy where I do more sort of history stuff and a bit more kind of stuff around theory of philanthropy. Other than that it just remains to say like subscribe tell all your friends about it if you've got thoughts uh you know get in touch on social media or drop us an email you can find the email on the website and I will see you next time.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:04

Bye, I'm gonna go ahead and