post capitalist philanthropy
context
since 1980, about 46% of all economic growth has gone to the richest 5% of humanity. (world inequality database, 2017) only 5% of this new wealth over the same period ended up in the hands of the world's majority - 60% of humanity. (woodward, 2015, pp.43-52)
therefore, by definition, growth (within this system) actively creates economic inequality. economic growth requires that an ever-shrinking minority of people extract more from the natural world and from the bodies of an ever-expanding mass of people.
also, every dollar of wealth created heats up our planet, as the global system is built upon an extractives-based fossil fuel economy. more growth requires more energy, which requires more demand for fossil fuels and makes it even more difficult to decarbonize energy systems. to the extent that capitalism requires growth, it generates and exacerbates climate change and ecological breakdown.
capitalism invariably leads to what ecological sociologist william catton calls overshoot. he states: "human beings, in two million years of cultural evolution, have several times succeeded in taking over additional portions of the Earth's total life-supporting capacity, at the expense of other creatures. each time, the human jpopulation has increased. but man has now learned to rely on a technology that augments human-carrying capacity in a necessarily temporary way - as temporary as the extension of life by eating the seeds needed to grow next year's food."
within the context of the existing operating system, no amount of reform, whether it be green investment or otherwise, can change the structure and trajectory of the self-terminating, exponential function of growth-based capitalism.
there are big challenges with all kinds of renewable energy, see: the great simplification.
scientists and policy experts almost unanimously agree that we will not be able to meet the global targets for keeping global warming to less than 1.5 degree celsius by 2050 if we carry on with the status quo of our economic system. (buis, 2019) our current trajectory has us on track for a three degree rise in temperature before the end of the century. it is important though to note that these are conservative estimates, from organizations like the United Nations, the World Bank and other establishment entities, who are incentivized not to alarm the general population and disrupt the current equilibrium.
we cannot even fathom what a planet warmed by three degree celsius will look like. it will wipe out 30% to 50% of existing species; sea levels will rise by two to ten metres; more than 1.5 billion people will be displaced as climate refugees. we will experience massive global droughts, uninhabitable oceans, and runaway, cascading feedback loops. we read about the climate crisis, live through its catastrophes, and we often plainly see how capitalism is driving us towards extinction, and yet we are still somehow disconnected from its very real near-term implications. this human attribute has been described by psychologists as "temporal myopia" - a time-blindness rooted in our evolutionary problem-solving capabilities. (van der wal, van horen and grinstein, 2018)
despite the stark material reality of these cascading collapses, economists, bankers and the financial orthodoxy continually reiterate that within the current debt/growth system, we must grow the global economy at 3% a year to avoid stagnation and/or recession. this is because growth has to exceed interest rates in order for the debt-based money (which is loaned into existence) to return both principal and interest. three percent may not sound like much, but it requires a doubling of the global economy every 23 years. we have already crossed six of the nine planetary boundaries and are in the midst of the Sixth Great Extinction: a doubling of the global economy is now a material impossibility. (wang-erlandsson, tobian, van der ent, fetzer, te wierik, porkka, staal, et al., 2022)
as such, we have to create new contexts and structure that shift our entire civilization's approach to consumption and production. if this wasn't enough, we have the amplifying urgency of time itself, we have perhaps ten to twenty years left of our consumption-based way of living on this current trajectory. the conservative scientific consensus is that we have ten years to cut global emissions in half to stay under 1.5 degrees of warming. at the current rate, widespread uninhabitability for human life will occur by 2070, although this is already occurring in many places in the global South and may happen even sooner in the global North. (chi, kohler, lenton, svenning & scheffer, 2020)
of course, this is a linear timeline and human response and integration to each successive phase of the coming transition(s) will (co)determine how these changes play out; however, economists tell us there will not be another doubling of the global economy; ecologists warn us that we have crossed critical thresholds and continue to do so with no signs of slowing down; and energy and policy analysts remind us that this brief window of fossil fuel abundance, sometimes called the carbon pulse, is already coming to an end. (hagens, 2019)
philanthropy believes it is part of the solution. and sometimes it is. however, we believe that the philanthropic sector requires a radical re-imagining of its purpose, capabilities and possibilities for intervention in the wake of the current context.
we believe that the wealth currently concentrated and privately held in the hands of increasingly few (and within the unaccountable, occluded sector of philanthropy) is truthfully the world's shared, collective endowment, which includes many aspects of wealth beyond money. this shared wealth has been built on the backs of countless generations and an accretion of human, and more-than-human, destruction and sacrifice. we see ethical, moral and karmic implications in the choices each of us make, and especially the decisions of those in seats of power and privilege in times of exponential change and collapse. rather than wealth holders having an inherent right to make decisions on how this communal wealth should be allocated, we see a burden with disproportionate responsibility that has consequences that cannot be understood from our current vantage point.
as such, one of the key inquiries of this book is how we might redefine collective responsibility. how do we create systems that invite others, especially those most affected by the decisions of philanthropy, to co-steward the future of wealth? what are some of the personal implications of being a money hoarder at the end of our current epoch? what does it mean to be a gate-keepr in a time of great suffering? what does it mean to be an ally to those that history has forsaken? what does it mean to support the efforts of those our ancestors harmed as redemption work? we do not hold the answers to these questions, nor do we posit that these are the only questions that matter. rather, we are suggesting that contemplation is in order. there is more to this business of philanthropy than meets the eye.
neoliberalism and a theology:
*people across all positions in the political spectrum might disagree with these declarations (blatantly put), but in practice, these are the premises of the political/economic systems we're living in.
neoliberalism is more akin to a theology than an economic ideology. it provides answers to the major inquiries or first principles of an institutional religion including:
ontology - selfishness and competition are our human nature, and this nature can only be regulated by a god-like invisible hand.
epistemology - humans are masters of the material world, mediated by rational thought, in an upward march towards "progress".
ethics - the pursuit of self-interest, market growth and economic maximization is the goal of individuals and society.
cosmology - humans are entitled to extract and conquer the natural world and other beings.
metaphysics - humans are distinctly separate from the natural and special.
aesthetics - the human, especially the white male, holds the "objective gaze" of reality and beauty.
political philosophy - hierarchically organized capitalist nation-states that compete through economic growth are the most ideal and efficient models to organize society.