SPEAKER_00 0:12

You're listening to the Philanthropisms Podcast with Roger Davis. Hello, you're listening to the Philanthropisms Podcast. This is the podcast where we try to put philanthropy in context. I'm your host, Rodri Davis, and this is the first episode proper in a series that we are running on the myths of philanthropy. And in this episode, I'm joined by Chiara Cataneo from Elemental, who helped to pull together and curate this series. And we're joined by Lisa Cowen and Dimple Abachandani. So Lisa is currently the director of the Haven Fund in New York City, which is a fund that helps to get money to community groups on the ground that are dealing with issues, particularly around immigration and the policies that are being enacted by the current administration in the US. She was previously the vice president of the Robert Sterling Clark Foundation for nearly a decade. She's a founding member of the trust-based philanthropy project and has written widely on philanthropy. And Dimple Abachandani is a philanthropy advisor and somebody who's been in the world of philanthropy and nonprofits for a long time. She most recently has been the author of a book, New Era of Philanthropy: 10 Practices to Transform Wealth into a More Just and Sustainable Future, which is a really interesting book, which I thoroughly recommend reading. I'll put links in the show notes to places where you can find that. She's worked widely, as I say, in the nonprofit and philanthropy sector. She was executive director of the General Service Foundation for a long time. She was the founding director of the Rise Together Fund, which is and she's previously led the Centre for Social Justice at the UC Berkeley School. I think that's probably supposed to be Berkeley. I sounded very British, didn't I? UC Berkeley School of Law. So yeah, it was great to be joined by Lisa and Dimple. And the theme that we're discussing, as you'll hear in a moment, is the idea of legacy and to some extent what legacy means and what that means in terms of particularly the kind of timescales that we uh do philanthropy over. But we also talked much more broadly about the um the idea of the role of philanthropy, what it means to take a reparative approach to philanthropy and lots of other things. Since you may have already listened to to the introductory episode with Mandy, Van Dieven and Chiara Cataneo that kind of accompanies the series. I won't spend ages telling you what to expect in this conversation. We'll go straight into it in a moment. And then I will be back at the end for the usual bit of housekeeping. So let's get on with it. And here's the conversation with Lisa and Dimple. Okay, great. Well, I'm here with Dimple Abich and Dani, Lisa Cowan, and Chiara Cataneo. Hello to all of you. Hello. Hi. Hi. Well, I think we're all at various different times of the day, and it's certainly evening here as we record this. And I think it's not, I think it's probably morning for at least uh some of you. So thanks very much for uh for joining me from every every time zone that you're in. Um so again, this is another one of the episodes in the Myths of Philanthropy series um that I'm working with Chiara and Mandy on, um, where I know you guys have kind of written a bit essays about some of the myths of philanthropy that you've been addressing that we're going to talk about today. Um, and we're talking particularly about legacy today. Um maybe the best starting point, Chiara, again, if you are happy to kind of say a little bit about what the actual what the myths that we're kind of addressing today are and kind of frame everything for us.

SPEAKER_01 4:01

Yeah, thank you, Rodri. So through the series, we wanted to really highlight some of the deep narratives that are shaping the design and the practice of philanthropy. And we've asked contributors both to shed light on these narratives and also to shed light on what is their experience and what are the ways forward, and how to address the faulty logics that these narratives have consequences on. So we're really turning an eye on philanthropy, whereas usually the gaze is to the outside narratives that philanthropy is contributing to address. Um, so some of the narratives that we addressed were uh scarcity, manufacturer scarcity, um, individualism, um presumed expertise, competition, risk aversion. And today we're very glad to address the issue, the narrative around legacy and time. And the core question that we will be exploring is what becomes possible when we reconsider the legacy that brought us here and the one that we want to leave. So this is the framing, the overall framing for this conversation.

SPEAKER_00 5:13

Great, thanks very much. And and yeah, to kick off, I guess one of the things that comes across in in both of your essays that you wrote, but and sort of particularly maybe is the focus of yours, Dimple, is about the idea that um, you know, philanthropy can't be about just sort of taking money from places that it has done harm and then doing good by giving a little bit of it away. Actually, we need to think of philanthropy much more as something that is reparative and actually has to be done in a way that kind of addresses those harms at a much more fundamental level. Maybe you could say a bit about the way in which you think we need to reimagine philanthropy.

SPEAKER_03 5:48

Yeah, well, first, thank you for having me on. Um I I recently put out this book, A New Era of Philanthropy. And my the core question I was looking at is kind of what is a philanthropy for these times we live in. And in some ways, the surprise of that book for me was that to figure out what is the philanthropy we need now and going forward, I really had to look back at how did we come to be here? And something that, you know, I think you've written about this, a lot of us have written about this, you know, going back to this kind of core text of the gospel of wealth, something that really stands out and was very clear is that modern philanthropy, the kind of purpose at the heart of it was really to kind of justify the accumulation of, you know, unheard of at that time amounts of wealth. Right. So, you know, Carnegie saying to his readers, I know this system where a few of us have all the resources and most of you are struggling. I know it's hard, but trust me, we have a great idea. We're gonna do this thing called philanthropy. We're gonna take care of you. So that you know, that idea kind of lives in our institutions today, and it lives in a whole set of practices. Um, you know, we are kind of in the US, in the philanthropic sector, we have gone through a year where the nonprofit sector and really civil society has been in absolute and total crisis. I mean, we have had rapid contraction. I don't know a single nonprofit that has not had to lay people off. And yet the sector has has continued for the most part, the philanthropic sector, to operate with these norms of prioritizing perpetuity and prioritizing um its own preservation over that of the sector, the field, our communities. And so um, you know, as we think about legacy, I think one of the calls both of the article that you're talking about and and of the book is that we really come back to our purpose and that we move away from a purpose that says our purpose just is to exist. We must be around forever, our purpose is perpetuity. Or like Carnegie, our purpose is to kind of hide or mask or guild over the harms that we are causing. Right? Those purposes don't serve anybody today, other than those with the most power. Um, instead, we need to really think of our purpose as being moving towards a future where everyone's flourishing and using these resources that we are stewards of or that we are in some way in relationship with, using these resources to build that future. So that's I to me, the we can think of it as repair. I I think you talk about it as a reparative thing. I really think of it as sort of reimagining a new what is this infrastructure of philanthropy? Like the really the purpose that it was built for feels really irrelevant right now. It feels like a fax machine. Um but it's it's still the need for resources is couldn't be more relevant, right? And so I think many of us who are practitioners um in philanthropy today, like the work of right now is how do we take this old infrastructure with its outdated purposes and practices and build it anew to meet this moment.

SPEAKER_00 9:56

Yeah, absolutely. And and Lisa, I'd love to come to you. Um, because we I mean, I'd be really interested in your thoughts on what Dimple's been saying, but also, I mean, so particularly we've mentioned already there the question of sort of timescales and the idea that institutions need to exist, you know, not just over the long term, but in perpetuity, particularly around foundations. I know that's something that you wrote about. Um, and kind of why is that such a problematic idea and kind of how can we move past that?

SPEAKER_02 10:22

Well, I mean, I would say one of the lessons that I really learned from Dimple over the years is that we have sort of let the money be driving us. Okay, we have 5% of this body here to dole out rather than sort of letting our mission lead us and say, what is the thing we want to do and what are the resources we need to do that? So that those are two very different propositions. And if we are really aligned on mission, then I think that speaks to how much we spend, which then speaks to how long are we around for. So that's sort of like one significant part of it. Then the other thing is like we're all out there operating our own little bespoke institutions without sort of consideration for what anyone else is doing, in a way that we would never fund organizations that were operating the way we do. And so, you know, as we again, like when we come back to our mission, when we come back to what's the change we're trying to affect, I think if we can do that in in coordination, not just with our grant partners, but with the other funders, I think that gives us a lot more data on on how much we should be spending it and what's the time period. And if you can do all of that, sort of having released this like preconceived notion that we are here, that our job as a foundation board, staff, whatever, is to spend 5% in perpetuity. You have such a limited, you know, scope of what you can do.

SPEAKER_00 11:47

And you mentioned there about sort of being the job of people in foundations. And I guess this touches as well on something I wanted to ask uh Dimple, which is with a lot of these conversations about sort of the ways in which philanthropy needs to be transformed, it often strikes me that the roles as we understand them within philanthropy, particularly sort of institutionally, and how we judge success and what makes you good at working in a foundation or running a foundation, don't really match up with what we're trying to do. So, do we need to kind of understand the purpose of those of us who work in philanthropy in a totally different way?

SPEAKER_03 12:19

Yes, yeah, yeah, absolutely. We do. And I think, you know, what's interesting is I think that people working in philanthropy are aware of that. You know, I've had um the privilege over the last few years of being invited in to talk to so many boards, to talk to so many trustees. Um, in some cases, you know, I've talked to boardrooms where every single trustee is there because of their blood connection to the initial holder of wealth, right? And one of the things I talk about in my book is that um, you know, in a contemporary, you know, rooted in today definition of effective governance, we have to have proximity to the work, right? And so I've been in these rooms where I am talking to people who, you know, by definition in my book, I'm saying there's something in your model that has to evolve. And instead of meeting resistance, what I have been struck by is almost every time trustees have said to me, it's always felt like something's not quite right about the model, about the role, about the way we envision this work. So what I've come to see, and then I've also seen, you know, after these conversations, I'll hear back. Sometimes it's a week later, sometimes it's two months later, I'll hear back. Here are the things we are evolving. You know, we're moving towards a mission-aligned spending policy, we're adding community members to our board. And so what that has taught me is that in this sector where we have so much power that people still need permission, they still need permission to change, even when we see that these roles and these kind of old purposes are very ill-fitting for today. People feel like, and I'm sure Lisa has experienced this too that you know, the trustee who thinks that wait, for me to do my job, I have to go against the staff and say, nope, we can't spend more. We have to hold on for 200 years from now or whatever, right? Um, so people's own sense of what it means to, for example, be a steward, I think these are things that are so ripe for reinvention and reimagining. So, you know, we're here talking about legacy, you know, legacy is not do you exist in the future? Legacy should really be in the future, what exists that your resources contributed to. Right? What did you, what did you today help build in the future that isn't your own reputation, your own name on a building, you know, but that's something that ensures that more people are flourishing. Um, yeah, these are all things that I think are ripe for reinvention.

SPEAKER_02 15:25

I I think that there's this like sort of just like small structural piece too, that if a board primarily thinks of itself as fiscal sponsor, to just open the aperture of what that means, that it's not just about where your money is and where it's going, but it's also about where did it come from. That part of your job is to really understand the history of your money and connect that to the present and future.

SPEAKER_00 15:46

And and I mean I'm really interested in this because I think that idea, you know, because historically there's sort of this idea that the left hand and the right hand are totally separate and you can make the money in one way and then, you know, actually sort of move to a different building and start thinking about giving it away. And I don't think that logic works anymore. But in practice, what does it look like? Because I mean, I've over the last few years sort of talked to lots of institutions, some of whom kind of acknowledge that, but basically think it's enough to acknowledge it. And then obviously there are others who go on a spectrum through to, well, you know, let's name this as a problem, but um, you know, we'll do something fairly nominal about it, through to those who fundamentally rethink what they're going to do and and sort of seek to make uh kind of repair harms that they've identified have been done, you know, through the process of wealth creation. How do you see this playing out at the moment in the sector when people do acknowledge that need to understand the where money's come from?

SPEAKER_02 16:39

Well, maybe I'll just start by saying when I when I first started working at a private foundation, I started in sort of any initial conversation I had with a prospective grantee or current grantee talking about where the money came from. And I didn't tell it, I don't think I told the right version of the story. I told the sort of like lascivious funny story about the family's history. But even just which, and I think it really should, you know, what I sort of came to understand is that it's not about the individuals so much, it's about the systems that they were working in, a more relevant, if less funny story. But even just doing that sort of like subpar version of it up front, so many people said to me, we have never had a foundation talk about where their money came from. Like that has just not been a part of the conversation. And by doing that, part of what I was trying to do is just say, hey, this is not my money. I'm not doing you a favor here. Like my job, which is like pretty easy compared to your job, is figuring out how to give, how to distribute this money. Um, but it's not mine. I'm not doing you a favor. You know, this is my nine to five, as that is your nine to five. So, so that even just that much of talking about where it comes from, I think is useful. And then, you know, and then I think there's like a pretty wide range of of how you do it, but um, but I think always talking about the systems that that allowed you to amass that wealth. And to the extent that you're able to talk about, like, you know, for a living donor or for your investments now, like what's it doing now? Like, let's, you know, if what is happening is that we're funding private prisons in the market and we are funding, you know, abolition over here, you know, I don't know what exposing that is a very confusing message, and it's also true.

SPEAKER_03 18:23

So I have mixed feelings on this one. I'm gonna say, so I do think it's so important that we not perpetuate certain stories about and and you know, foundations almost as a habit or as a um, I mean, every foundation has a website where they tell some story about what a great human being the wealth creator was, right? Um but I have to say, right like in this moment right now, I I so deeply want funders to turn their gaze externally, right? So so my impulse, like this whole, you know, look back and and you know, figure out where the wealth came from or talk about it. Like I just feel like the risk of that is that it's more like internal churning.

SPEAKER_02 19:20

It's a three-year like listening tour where you're suspending your making. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 19:25

And and that, you know, it's a listening tour with that ultimately the end doesn't ensure what I want to see, which is that I want all of us almost not to skip that storytelling, because I think it is important, but I want us to all actually come together under a new story right now, which says that um this model of warehousing private resources, most of which were probably gained at the expense of communities that you know that where people were harmed and so on. But this system of warehousing pri these private resources for a public purpose, but where the decision making about what is good for the public is private, like that that system holds doesn't hold our values today. You know, and I the reason I think that's important is that in some ways it allows people, I mean, there's in my time in philanthropy, one of the things I've learned is that every like wealthy person in a wealthy family thinks they're the exception. Everyone thinks that, like, oh yeah, like those people did something terrible. But like we are philanthropists because we're good people, and we've, you know, that's how our family is. And so I I think that that kind of way of thinking keeps people from seeing the broader system that they are a part of, right? So I just feel like the place that I want people to come to right now, and I think this is especially important because of this great wealth transfer moment that we're in. You know, so um I just feel like I don't want like a yet, you know, yet another generation of philanthropists to come in, you know, using kind of this vehicle um as like another way to kind of tell a story about how exceptional their families are. It's like every family is exceptional, you know, whether you have wealth or not. And and the opportunity is for people to come in and realize these resources can be a vehicle and an opening to solidarity. It it really can, that it can be a way that you can reach out across class, across race, in recognition. Of how we're interdependent as opposed to being lost in the exceptional details of your own story.

SPEAKER_00 22:09

And on that thing about the sort of wealth transfer and the development of an emergence of a kind of new generation of philanthropists, I mean, I'm always wary that there's a kind of danger of overstating the, you know, all next-gen philanthropists are X, Y, or Z, and I kind of they're not, you know, they're obviously very diverse. That being said, I mean, I know through my work I have been struck that there definitely feels like there is a kind of qualitative difference, at least in the starting point that a lot of these philanthropists are coming to it with, which is they kind of they are acknowledging that wider context around how wealth is created, and they're also, I think, more willing to engage with systemic critiques without seeing them necessarily as a kind of personal attack. I mean, is that your experience, both of you? You know, when you've engaged with next-gen philanthropists, do you think there is kind of, you know, we should be hopeful that there is a natural shift towards thinking about philanthropy in this way, or is that is there a danger of complacency in doing that?

SPEAKER_02 23:07

I mean, I would just say that I worry that the people who I talk to are only the people who will talk to me. Well, yeah, yeah. A lot of people who I don't hear their stories. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:16

Yeah, there is a danger of sort of furiously agreeing with each other, isn't there?

SPEAKER_03 23:20

But yeah. I I I will say I've seen both. I've seen, so I have seen a generation of um, like I've seen in this new generation a clearer sense that they're gonna be alive in the future that we are moving towards. You know, so I do think that um things like the climate crisis uh have a way of of you know implicating ever most people, regardless. I mean, unless you're, you know, the five people who are gonna fly to Mars or something. Like it's it's otherwise everybody else, you know, even people with resources see it coming and and and know that it's gonna be their future too. Um, and I think that's that is actually very different than previous generations of philanthropists who who felt like that regardless of the outcome of their giving, that they were fine. So I think that's it, that's a really important difference. Um, but the thing that I've also seen up close is that um our core narratives, and I mean, this is why I have such deep appreciation for Chiara and for Mandy and the work that they've been doing around narrative change, even this young generation that understands intimately the challenges in that you know we are globally facing today, the stories that they're getting, the narratives that they're getting about philanthropy as a as a tool for change, those tend to still be the old stories. Um, and so that's why I think um, you know, yeah, I I so I think we can't over as we can't assume that um an understanding of the urgency of now translates into an understanding of of philanthropy as a transformational tool.

SPEAKER_02 25:18

And it's it's also, I mean, maybe this is the same as what you're saying, but it's kind of a stuffy structure, right? It's like all these very polite people in their nice offices in suits, supposedly. And that doesn't feel very contemporary or exciting.

SPEAKER_03 25:36

So I mean, that was for me, that was a big motivation in writing this book, right? Was that um when I thought about the resources that we anticipate are going to come into the sector, and then I thought about like, you know, what young person sees themselves in this way, um, and and what a narrow set of kind of options we're giving people. I I really felt inspired to try to offer a vision of what it can be like to engage in philanthropy, not to build philanthropy, like to actually, you know, many of us I think say that kind of when we really look forward and imagine a future where there's widespread flourishing, that we don't really see a need for philanthropy, right? That this this won't be kind of how we take care of public good. But I feel like what we've what we have not spent as much time talking about and really nurturing is like what are the practices and stories that get us from here to there? That's what I'm that's what I'm really curious about. And that's what I you know attempted to try to put into a new era of philanthropy. That like, what is what is this new era that moves us past philanthropy? Um, and that actually moves us into deeper relationship with each other.

SPEAKER_01 27:02

I would like to ask a question about um to this point um of the structure and the infrastructure. So in this uh reconceptualizing philanthropy as uh not as charity, not as giving, uh what do you think are the and the reluctance, the two points the reluctance of philanthropy to fund infrastructure, um, and the reluctance of philanthropy to look at the narratives that you know to look within and look at the narratives that are affecting philanthropy? What would you say, like what are your reflections around what are the infrastructures needed to support these narratives, these new emerging, some emerging, some are you know already there, but sort of niche at the moment. Uh so what would be the infrastructure needed to support this um this narratives to you know be prevalent and preminent, predominant in philanthropy?

SPEAKER_03 28:06

Temple, you got sure. Yeah, you know, um I love your question because in in the second part of the gospel of wealth, Carnegie actually sets out his top seven list of places for funding. Um, and he doesn't label it this way, but but really most of what he's talking, what he's talking about, you know, he talks about building of parks and swimming pools, concert halls, churches, but just the buildings. Um you know, if you kind of look at it from today, most of what he's talking about is building the infrastructure of his time, right? But it was like all built infrastructure. It was like buildings, you know. And um, you know, I think today your question is exactly the right one. Like today we need to build new infrastructures. Um, but I would argue, and I say this in my book, that the infrastructures that we need are include things like relational infrastructure, right? So I I've you know, for many years funded narrative change, and what I've seen is that to fund narrative change is not to fund a story or a set of talking points. You actually have to fund the relational infrastructure that allows for that story to be disseminated, to come to life. And so, what are the relational infrastructures, the networks? Um, I you know, I belong to Solid Air Network. I'm I'm on the board of Solid Air, and we are a network of donor organizers. Um, and what I have seen in almost 10 years of being in that network is the ways that um resources move because we are in relationship with one another, because we are moving together. So I think something that we have to understand to build this new era of philanthropy is how to invest in relational infrastructure, to invest in people, right? Like I don't think what we need today are more buildings, but I think what we need are investments in the people who are doing this precious and hard work of building a more just future.

SPEAKER_00 30:31

Yeah, absolutely. I don't know, Lisa, if you've got thoughts on that as well from your experience.

SPEAKER_02 30:36

Well, I mean, one thing about it, and I think the reason why I sort of step back when the question is asked is that it's very nuanced, right? It's not like funding after-school programs. Uh, it's like it's hard to understand, it's hard to do, and it's hard to measure, right? So um the amount of like donor education you need to do in order to even begin to ask is really significant. I think about sort of the the traditional program officer role and how it has been sort of one of like measurement, oversight, et cetera. And as we are hopefully moving into more of a role of like support, allyship, fundraising, you know, like like really helping those organizations move and sort of like keeping them in line, then I think that the understanding of the need for this kind of infrastructure and narrative change becomes more tangible to the people who work in foundations. And then hopefully that helps with building it. Um, so you know, it's a it's like an iterative process, but but I do, yeah, I just think that again, the way sort of funders and their grant partners are in relationship is is hopefully starting to change. Not just the people who will agree to talk to me, but anyone who cares about sort of what the end goal of the work is, I think we have to move into partnership.

SPEAKER_00 32:09

And one thing I was really interested to ask on one of the other conversations we've had as part of this series, we were talking specifically about sort of individualism and how the idea of individualism in different ways had kind of really deeply influenced the way in which we do philanthropy. And it feels relevant here, I guess, in that we're talking about you know, the model certainly that Carnegie set, if he didn't establish it, he very much kind of cemented it, is the one where you know the individual philanthropic lone hero arrives with their resources and kind of brilliant ideas, and then that sort of solves all of the problems. But we've sort of institutionalized that in the form of foundations. Again, you know, it's kind of this individual organization will come in with its resources and work in isolation and somehow solve very complex, kind of entrenched problems. You know, this this whole kind of pervasive idea of individualism is that part of what we need to move away from and find ways of sort of thinking and understanding the work that we do much more collectively and kind of getting away from that sort of strong adherence to individual institutions and organizations.

SPEAKER_02 33:12

You know, my um my friend Lourdes Rodriguez, who's the head of the David Rockefeller Fund, said something to me uh recently that I cannot stop thinking about. And she was talking about funder seduco, that like as we are funding in our line, it's really important to know what is happening in your box and what is happening horizontally as well as vertically. And I just think it's it's so apt and it's so often overlooked. And when we start thinking about like, are you gonna last forever? Are you gonna spend down? What are you gonna do for your partners as you go? You need to know who else is in those rows that's helping you get that work done. So, you know, there's no, and also there's no external force that's gonna that's gonna mandate that we work together. So I think we have to believe it and then we have to talk about it a lot, and then we have to have a conference where we like deliver a funny panel on it, and then we need to have a comic of it, and then whatever.

SPEAKER_03 34:06

Um this is this is so important. I love that conception of it, the Sudoku. But um, but just going back to your point earlier about the role of program officer, I think that the smartest, most effective program officers, the work that they're doing is this work of understanding what is this ecosystem we belong to, right? How else can you understand where to most impactfully deploy your resources? Right. And then as we're talking about myths, you know, part of so so yes to your question about do we need to move away from individualism? And we need to really understand how that myth plays out in the sector. So where I hear that myth all the time is trustees saying, um, even if we spent more right now, even if we spent everything we have, Dimple, you have to admit we're just a drop in the bucket. And I I literally write about that in my book. And I had this experience of um being hosted by a very, very large um social justice philanthropy. And I was like about to go out on stage um to share, you know, thoughts from my book. And the person who was introducing me, we were talking about how their institution was responding to this moment. And he literally said this. He literally said, you know, we're we're we're not very good at rapid response, we have a hard time moving quickly, but even if we could do more, you have to admit that it would just be a drop in the bucket. That there is something about that story that goes beyond individualism to really actually, you know, taking away any responsibility for action. And what I have sort of my response to that story and what I've been saying to people is you aren't just a drop in the bucket, but like you are a drop that is part of a bigger wave, right? So, not to take away that you, you know, your central concern might be your own institution. Um, but even, you know, why do we see ourselves in buckets? Like we need to see ourselves as part of something bigger. And that's the piece that, you know, when we are in our own institutions, oftentimes the only way that we understand the wave that we are a part of is through our relationships. You know, Lisa is somebody who, when I was at General Service Foundation, we would often meet and compare notes. And um, I learned so much from the work that she and her colleague Phil and others were doing, funding leadership development, which to me is an example of that relational infrastructure, right? And so when we funded leadership, I never felt like we were alone or that our funding was just a drop. Like I understood that our funding was part of the same wave as Lisa's funding and as so many of our other colleagues.

SPEAKER_02 37:21

You know, I have this, I'm sorry, I just have this knee-jerk reaction when I hear someone talk about a drop in the bucket. I always go to this Rebecca Solnit quote, which is the fact that we cannot save everything does not mean we cannot save anything and everything we can save is worth saving. I just sort of think the drop in the bucket argument is irrelevant. I mean, I obviously get the overwhelm. We all get the overwhelm.

SPEAKER_00 37:42

But and I think that's exactly I was just thinking as you were talking to him, that it's I mean, in the Solnet reference, I think is exactly the right one in the you know, at the end of it's the institutional version of that individual problem that we all feel, which is a lot of these challenges out there, climate and all sorts of other things, are so massive that it's very easy to feel defeated and think, well, what possible difference could I make as an individual? But then as soon as you actually join up with a group of other people who feel similarly, you get the sense that, oh, actually that that's the only thing that can ever make a difference. And I suppose it's kind of how do you make sure you get the equivalent for foundations of them finding all of the other people who sort of similarly care about things. One of the other things I really wanted to ask, we've kind of talked as we're thinking about how philanthropy could change to be more reparative or to kind of uh have you know a kind of more radically redistributive function, or or however we want to frame it. We talked a bit about how philanthropy as it currently stands might need to change in the in things like you know, rethinking the timescales that we do it over. But I also wondered whether actually just thinking about philanthropy as it currently is is too is sort of too limiting full stop in that do we need to look beyond philanthropy and sort of expand our understanding of the toolbox that's available and sort of blur the lines between philanthropy and things like political activity. Actually, is it unhelpful that we draw firm dividing lines around these? And that if we've got the fundamental goal in mind, actually we should be more agnostic about the tools that we're we're using, and that if you know the way that we framed philanthropy gets in the way of that, maybe we need to change the way we frame philanthropy.

SPEAKER_03 39:21

I think we need to change the way we frame philanthropy, but I think we need to change it, sort of expand more than just the money, the capital. Right. So um I think funders do a terrible, they just don't do a good enough job using all of their own kind of humanity and furtherance of the work. And so, yes, maybe we need to do more political giving, and but I I I I feel like when I think about my own experience of transformative giving, there's always a there's always a relationship in the mix. There's always um when I was in a when I was you know, when I was in roles where I was actually moving money, the thing that made for grant making that was meaningful was always just a feeling of care, you know, and um and this sense that, you know, so often the people that I was moving resources to, they would be they would be honest with me about something that they said they weren't honest with other funders about. Um and some of that was because they might have been people I'd known for 20 years or people that you know I came up with, like not just as a funder, but as someone in, you know, who was doing similar movement work. But but the point I guess is just that I was never like moving money based on a proposal or something that was written. And um and you know what I noticed is that the bigger the pot of resources that an institution has, like as you kind of go from say like medium small to medium-sized family foundations to these, you know, huge, large foundations, what gets put into place is all this protocol in practice that is actually about taking the human out of it. And I think that's part of why. I mean, I've admitted I've not gone deep into it, but I feel like I see all over LinkedIn all this stuff now about how you can use AI to do your philanthropy, or like, you know, and so I think what we forget is what we're doing is so much more than just moving capital.

SPEAKER_01 41:44

Right? That what we're yeah, and this made me think of something that Lisa mentioned in her essay about, you know, the the the um assume the assumption that rich people know best, and and so that there is a presumed expertise of rich people to also know what is the the best future for all of us, and and what the commons should be should be, should look like, and what is the structure that our society fundamentally should have. And so I was wondering if you wanted to share reflection on on that, on that, you know, the myth of individualism and the myth of the the rich individual being able to shape uh the future and then the design of philanthropy having to sort of just go in the direction of that future, and how on the other side, as Dimbo was saying, we can have a philanthropy that incorporates multiple visions of the future and a collaborative way forward towards that future.

SPEAKER_02 42:58

I mean, one of the things I always say is that if I had been a true radical, I would have been a tax lawyer. Um, you know, I think that if and I I have the next sentence I'm gonna say, I have no idea how you would actually do it. But I like, what if we just put all of philanthropy into tax reform? What if people paid their proper taxes? What would and we had a government that properly cared for its citizenry in the United States? Like what would be left that philanthropy would need to take on? I would much rather have that conversation, you know, because I I think we are just like faced with all these false choices now. Is it RD money? Is it visioning the future? Is it feeding kids? You know, nobody's feeding kids. So how do you how do you overlook that? So that's one experiment I would love to run. You know, another thing I think about a lot, and this isn't exactly an answer, but like while I'm in, you know, make believe land, is I sometimes think that it would be the Best possible grant making to just transfer a foundation to transfer its endowment to its grant partners, right? Because they would then be forever set. And you could take the money we're skimming off the top to pay foundation staff and offices and our fancy lunches and whatever. You know, I just so is that a different form of philanthropy? I think that there are sort of more, a lot more exciting experiments we could make than sort of assigning our arbitrary pots of money to the problem we particularly care about.

SPEAKER_03 44:34

I love everything you just said, Lisa, and I want to build on it to say that we don't have a just and functioning tax system in the US. And we've actually very much been going in the wrong direction on that front. But we absolutely funders today can deploy resources towards building power in communities who can then advocate for that. Right. So it's not where we it's not we're not there yet. And yet I think philanthropy can be and must be one of the tools that we use to get to a place where we don't have these false choices. And I'll just share, you know, I I had the opportunity to share my book for an audience of Australian funders in Sydney. And during the question and answer session, my favorite question was someone stood up and said, um, in a context where you have a fair and high functioning tax system, um, and it ensures that everyone in the society has a base level of you know, being able to live, they have health care, they have housing. Um in that context, then how do you think about the role of private philanthropy? And I it I just had no words. I was like, must be nice. Um and so, you know, I mean, I came up with an answer. But but really what I came, what I took from that question was the inspiration for us, those of us who are working in philanthropy, to keep moving towards that as a North Star, right? To never um think that these resources can replace a just tax system. And you know, frankly, in in the US, that was really tough this past year, right? As we all faced, you know, just the, and we're still facing like the the complete collapse of safety net, the defunding of really all the bare systems of care that we had in place. I think um a lot of funders wondered, like, oh, are we supposed to step in? And there's not like a right or wrong answer, but I think the thing we can't forget is that the highest value thing we can do is to fund in ways that move us towards that fair tax system.

SPEAKER_02 47:15

And I wonder, Kiara, your question about like sort of rich people and their expertise, if that changes that positionality a little bit. You know, if you're not asking me for food, but for research to drive a better car that we'll all drive, I I've lost the example here, but I think you're, you know, I think if we're not talking about covering bare necessities, there can be a different relationship between, and if we're more honest about the fact that that my foundation's money, you know, in this moment, that my foundation's money came from sort of starving the tax system, then how grateful do you need to be to me?

SPEAKER_00 47:55

I think one of the most interesting developments of the last few years has been the emergence of philanthropists who kind of acknowledge precisely that and see it as necessary alongside the philanthropy they're still doing to spend part of it's part, or in some cases almost all of their time, campaigning on taxation precisely because they're, you know, they're saying there's no way that philanthropy can ever meet the requirements of justice. We need to get to a point where we have a fair level of taxation and redistribution first, and then work out what we do with philanthropy after that. And as you say, I think you know it's it's a thought experiment at the moment, and it probably will be for quite some time, but it's an important one because I think it gives real insights into that question of what we see the role of the desirable role of philanthropy as being. I'm aware that we're coming up on the hour, uh, and I I don't want to keep anybody too long. So um, I was just gonna wrap up by, I mean, I sort of occasionally hate these questions, but I thought I would ask one this time. Just what for each of you, kind of what you what's the sort of one thing that you would ideally like to see happen in philanthropy over the the coming years that would sort of give you hope that we're moving in the right direction?

SPEAKER_03 49:02

You know, um we are taping this podcast in a moment of real crisis in the United States. Um and I mean our our democracy is on the line and the defenders of it are both the people, um, as we see in sort of the streets of Minneapolis. Um, but behind the people, there's also really critical organizational infrastructure. It strikes me as just so wrong that in this moment those people who are putting everything on the line trying to save our democracy are having to also write funding proposals or reach out or lay off staff members because they don't have the resources they need. And so in the short term, what I you know long for is for everyone who's actually fighting for our democracy to be fully resourced, like immediately without having to jump through hoops. Um, for them to not only have the capacity that they need in the moment, but to actually have the space to increase their capacity in this time of crisis. Um, that was my wish all of last year, and we didn't get there. Um, but I hold out some hope that as the stakes become kind of undeniable, that funders will see that. And this is one of those moments where the ask is to do your part. If each of us really does our part, then we can be that wave. You know, we can stop being those drops.

SPEAKER_00 50:43

Yeah, absolutely. At least I don't know were your thoughts on what you would you would like to see.

SPEAKER_02 50:47

Yeah, I mean, it's hard to hard to narrow it to one. Um, and I nor do I disagree, obviously. But you know, when I started working at a foundation, I used to say, like, oh, I went to the other side of the desk. And I think what I would wish is for us to like just all get on the same, like for philanthropy to come out from behind that desk. You know, we have no muscles for for threat or fear. We've never been threatened before. And with just the amount of threat that philanthropy has been in under the last year, I don't think we've really come out swinging. Um, so what I hope is that now we have like experienced that. We are seeing heroes in the street, we are you know understanding the threat we're under, as Dimple said, and that we can like get it together and really get information with with the people on the front lines. And that means that means more money. That means like funding to the need, not funding to the limit of the endowment or the limit of the payout. And I I don't know, just like, you know, so many of us do the job like the person who came before us. And I think if we could um I think if we could actually fund like what the moment demands of us instead.

SPEAKER_00 52:02

Yeah, absolutely. I think, I mean, great thoughts on on which to end. Just remain to say thanks ever so much to to all of you. Thanks, Lisa, thanks, Dimple, and thanks, Chiara, uh, for joining me. Uh, it's been really fascinating conversation. I wish you all the best in all of your work in the future, and I hope some of the optimism that we've talked about there at the end uh ends up being justified.

SPEAKER_02 52:22

Thank you so much. This was a dream. This was great. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 52:34

Great. Well, my thanks again to Lisa and to Dimple for coming on the podcast. It was really great to have a chance to talk to both of them. Uh, it was a really fascinating conversation. I hope you all enjoyed it. I'll put links in the show notes to places where you can find out more. You can read the original essays that Dimple and Lisa both contributed to the Myths of Philanthropy series, also where you can find about Dimple's book and other things Lisa's written. If you're interested more broadly in issues around philanthropy and civil society, do obviously check out the website at whyphilantropymatters.com. You can find lots of articles, long reads, shorter sort of guides to issues in philanthropy, all the back episodes of this podcast, and much, much more. Um, if you like the podcast, uh do leave us a nice review wherever you get your podcasts. Um, and please do give a recommendation if you think there's anyone else that might also enjoy it. And if you've got ideas for topics that I could cover in future, or people I could speak to, or even series just like this one that we could run in the future, do get in touch. You can find my contact details on the website. Uh, other than that, just remains to say uh thanks ever so much for listening, and I will see you next time. Bye.