Over the last several weeks, I have been reading Global Development 2.0 (Lael Brainard and Derek Chollet, editors, published by the Brookings Institution, 2008) which asks the question: “Can Philanthropists, the Public and the Poor Make Poverty History?”
The book comes to the conclusion that, as our President-elect would say, “Yes, we can.”
The book, in twelve chapters by twelve different authors, lays out the argument that to Make Poverty History will require unusual and at times uncomfortable alliances between the public and private sectors, between the traditional players and the new players, businesses and not-for-profits.
For my money, the best chapter in the book is the second one, “Fighting Global Poverty: Who Will Be Relevant in 2020?” (And, no, it’s not because I make a cameo appearance.)
The reason it is the best chapter is that it takes the reader on a journey through all the players and their motivations. It explained a lot to me about what I experience every day in my job as president of Episcopal Relief & Development, but am struggling to navigate. How is one meant to engage all of the old and new players with their different strengths and weaknesses, which now include the government, celebrities, billionaires, foundations, corporations, and social entrepreneurs?
Let’s assume that all of these players come to the table with the same primary objective: fighting poverty. In my experience the challenges arise in the secondary objectives. What do I mean by that?
Take Episcopal Relief & Development—we want to fight poverty—that is our mission. However, we have very clear views about the best way for us to do that. Namely, we want to empower our global church partners to fight poverty in their local context. We therefore are willing to invest in capacity building and institutional development with our church partners. We believe that the payoff in program sustainability and long term impact is worth that investment. We are strengthening the church’s ability to carry out its mission to serve the poor. That is our secondary objective.
The U.S. government through its aid programs also wants to fight poverty. It also wants to advance U.S. interests and that has an impact on how and where it chooses to fight poverty. Celebrities what to fight poverty, but they also want to burnish their “brand” to their audiences. Corporations want to join the fight against poverty, but they also sometimes want to advance business objectives as well.
None of this is necessarily bad. We just need to be transparent about it.
More importantly, and for this I credit the “new philanthropists,” we all need to be focused on impact. If everyone can become aligned around impact, the secondary objectives of each of these parties recedes into the background.
My one critique of the book, is that I’m not sure the editors give the faith community enough credit. Indeed, Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life, is quoted making this point in the book. However, the editors never pick up on it. I think that faith-based initiatives get discounted or overlooked. Why is this? Perhaps it is because faith-based initiatives are often very heavily volunteer driven and thus seen as non-professional. Partially it may be because they are not spending huge amounts of money blowing their own horns and in many instances are trying not to leave foot prints. Faith-based initiatives and organizations are often uncomfortable proclaiming their servant hood. That’s a good thing, but it does often mean that faith-based initiatives are not always at the table when discussing how we are going to Make Poverty History.
President Bush, to his credit, understood the importance of engaging the faith community in the battle against poverty—both in the U.S. and abroad. I expect that President-elect Obama, with his background in community organizing and ties to the faith community, also understands this.
Let’s hope so, because it is going to take EVERYONE to Make Poverty History.
Share
RSS
