Amy Schiller’s criticism of philanthropy is not that it is fundamentally wrong but that it needs to focus less on utility and more on beauty, writes reviewer Hilary Pearson.
The Price of Humanity: How Philanthropy Went Wrong and How to Fix It, by Amy Schiller. Melville House, 2023; 217 pages; ISBN 9781685890223
This is a passionate book with a possibly misleading title. Humanity, argues author Amy Schiller, has a value beyond price. And philanthropy is important. Indeed, it has a unique role in helping humans live fully human lives. Her criticism of philanthropy is not that it is fundamentally wrong but that it needs to focus less on utility and more on beauty.
It’s an interesting perspective from someone whose politics are on the progressive left and with a strong commitment to equality and democracy. But Schiller, an American scholar with a background in fundraising, makes her case vigorously and persuasively for a philanthropy dedicated to human flourishing. Her book is an appealing read, flowing as a good speech does, with well-chosen anecdotes and memorable rhetorical passages.
Schiller . . . makes her case vigorously and persuasively for a philanthropy dedicated to human flourishing.
The first part of the book is a familiar critique of Western philanthropy as an essentially utilitarian pursuit that serves the benefactor as much as it does the recipient. Schiller traces this perspective, as other scholars of philanthropy have done, back to early Christian thinking, which replaced the classical Greek and Roman view of philanthropy as an obligation of the wealthy to the community as a whole and a demonstration of civic virtue and patronage. The Christian view directs philanthropy as almsgiving specifically to the poor in return for which the giver receives a benefit – in this case, salvation or a reward in the afterlife.
Schiller sees this as the beginning of a wrong turn for philanthropy from relation to transaction. She points to many examples in which giving has become increasingly commodified in our modern capitalist economy. She is sharply critical of those who have turned giving into a form of shopping, citing the gift catalogue of World Vision Canada (not alone among international non-profits in offering such a catalogue) and the false promises of one-to-one, donor-to-recipient giving through digital platforms such as Kiva and GoFundMe. In her pointed phrase, this is a form of “performative panhandling.” She is critical of the commercial association of products with charitable causes. We have all seen such examples of marketing that link the purchase of a product with a charitable purpose: coffee, cosmetics, clothes. Schiller mentions the (RED) project as a notable example of brand linkage to philanthropy, with ties to that most comprehensive of all shopping platforms, Amazon.
As Schiller says, the language of marketized philanthropy treats the prospective donor as an investor or a shopper more than it does as a giver.
Schiller also notes the push toward metrics and business language to describe the effectiveness of charities working on complex issues such as poverty reduction. She points to one of the largest foundations in New York, the Robin Hood Foundation, which trumpets its use of metrics and mathematical calculations to prove to its financial-industry donors the soundness of the choices that it makes among New York charities working to mitigate poverty. As Schiller says, the language of marketized philanthropy treats the prospective donor as an investor or a shopper more than it does as a giver.
One of the most extreme forms of this cold-blooded calculation of philanthropic effectiveness is “effective altruism,” the philosophy expounded by Will MacAskill and Peter Singer and now brought into disrepute by the actions of Sam Bankman-Fried and his associates. Although effective altruism’s logic, taken purely as a philosophical argument, can seem attractive (saving the most lives possible now, ensuring the survival of future humans), Schiller is withering in her assessment of this philosophy. In her view, “the promise of efficiency is a poison pill, normalizing a definition of humanity as human survival, not human flourishing.”
Philanthropy is the financial mechanism for supporting the creativity, imagination and plurality of collective human life.
Amy Schiller
This is a central point in Schiller’s argument. Yes, survival is the first imperative for any human being. But is it enough simply to survive? In a society in which one’s survival needs for food, housing, security, and health are met, more is needed to enable humans to flourish. Who or what can best help us flourish? This is where Schiller turns from her critical evaluation of marketized giving and begins her advocacy of philanthropy as a liberating force for the full development of our priceless humanity. “Philanthropy,” she argues, “is the financial mechanism for supporting the creativity, imagination and plurality of collective human life.”
How can this be, when the wealth that enables philanthropy in our modern world is created through the exploitative practices of a capitalist economy? A few people can accumulate extraordinary riches while the majority work hard to make a sufficient income. Our society is characterized by growing economic inequality. Schiller readily agrees, but she puts the onus for changing this on governments and political leaders, not on philanthropy. Giving cannot counter injustice. But in her view, giving can create opportunities to affirm one’s humanity.
Schiller believes that the most powerful thing philanthropy can do is liberate spaces and experiences from the profit motive and make their benefits available to all.
Counter-intuitively, Schiller uses the example of Andrew Carnegie, one of the 19th century’s richest men, to make her point. Carnegie was known for his ruthless exploitation of the labour force in his steel mills. But he is also known for his philanthropic action in building public libraries all over America (and some in Canada) with free public access, intended for all regardless of income or class. He insisted that these libraries be constructed as beautiful spaces, indeed as “palaces for the people.” Over a hundred years, these libraries have been important to millions of people who wanted access to books, to beautiful common spaces, and to community services. Schiller believes that the most powerful thing philanthropy can do is liberate spaces and experiences from the profit motive and make their benefits available to all. “Structures that endure and continuously offer universal access and activities of study, contemplation, creativity and togetherness offer a template for how philanthropy can uniquely encourage love of humanity – by establishing spaces that are counterweights to and refuges from the free market. Furthermore, they offer examples of philanthropy that serves the most vulnerable, without isolating and objectifying them.”
Another controversial example that Schiller uses to support her argument is the philanthropic funding of the reconstruction of Paris’s Notre-Dame cathedral after the major fire of 2019. This provoked enormous criticism at the time, with many arguing that such philanthropy should be directed to the relief of the poor rather than the building of a cathedral. But a cathedral in its way is another “palace of the people” – beautiful, accessible, and uplifting, food for the spirit if not for the body. As Schiller says, poverty and cathedrals are not zero sum, one or the other, as objects of philanthropy. While Schiller agrees that social injustice must be addressed, not least because it threatens philanthropy’s legitimacy, philanthropy has neither the capacity nor the legitimacy to overcome it. This is the role of the state.
Philanthropy should affirm the power and rights of all people – by demanding their right to bread while protecting their access to roses.
Amy Schiller
Schiller uses a well-known political slogan, “bread and roses,” to frame her discussion of the complementary roles of government and philanthropy. We humans need bread, but we want and need roses too. In other words, human sustenance is both literal and spiritual. Human beings have a right to have their basic needs met. They also have a right to feed their spirits through education, art, play, and worship. Schiller believes that we must aspire to create a society in which government and philanthropy are complementary, a society that “uses the strengths of government to provide things we need to exist, so that philanthropy can focus on things that help us live.” As she puts it, “philanthropy should affirm the power and rights of all people – by demanding their right to bread while protecting their access to roses.”
Having said this, Schiller understands that the state must impose limits and create incentives to make philanthropy possible for everyone. She doesn’t assign philanthropy only to the wealthy. Any individual can make a philanthropic contribution to the common good. And any individual should feel and have the capacity to do so. She sketches out suggestions for changing the American tax code to incentivize individual giving by lower-income taxpayers, to tax the wealthy more fairly, and to regulate philanthropic vehicles such as donor-advised funds, which allow donors to claim a tax benefit without making a gift to public good. Much of this has been said before. Oddly, Schiller does not refer to Lucy Bernholz, a thoughtful scholar and critic whose 2021 book How We Give Now makes similar observations and provides a more detailed set of policy prescriptions. But Schiller does not ground her argument in research or policy analysis, as Bernholz does. Instead, she is making a more personal and rhetorical argument for a philanthropy that in her view is better than the commodified or dispassionate philanthropy that dominates capitalist societies.
Schiller want us to embrace “magnificence” as the guiding principle of philanthropy. It is a term rooted in an Aristotelian philosophical and ethical argument about the virtue linked to aesthetic expenditure on a large scale. This then becomes an argument for philanthropy, whether coming from the poor or the rich, to create what Schiller calls “a robust, beautiful, fully inhabited public world. The magnificent giver spends money on spaces and events where the entire community can participate in their grandeur. Magnificence is the virtue that encourages us to create ‘the common material of civilization itself.’”
This is a provocative vision of the best uses of philanthropy. What Schiller is arguing for is a democratic, shared, and aspirational conception of philanthropy that distinguishes it sharply from the individualized and transactional giving with which we are familiar. “The project of philanthropy is to make the earth more of a home and to encourage inhabitants of the spaces and institutions it provides to feel at home in the world. Ours is a world for humans. It should serve all of us not the few who can exploit the many for maximum profit. The money we use to build the common world communicates our belief in that world and in all who inhabit it. It affirms the value of humanity beyond price.” It’s a vision that is predicated on the assumption not only that human survival is taken care of but also that all can agree and participate in what is commonly held. Perhaps too idealistic in today’s world, but it’s appealing none the less.
