Atelier WeekNotes w/c 10 July 2023
Next Frontiers in Philanthropy. Edmund Hillary Fellow drinks.
I am writing newsletter of #weeknotes of starting the Atelier of What’s Next (What’s needed, What’s ready? What can we do? What next?). For my rationale for starting the Atelier see here.
This week is:
Next Frontiers in Philanthropy.
Edmund Hillary Fellow drinks.
Next Frontiers in Philanthropy
Step: 0/DETECTING. Theme: Transforming systems. Transforming societies.
Tuesday had a huge conference on 'Next Frontiers - Unlocking resources in this time of crisis and possibility' (announcement, event website (accessing specifics requires registration), Twitter stream). The main backers were foundations from the more radical end of things in the UK (eg Joseph Rowntree Foundation). The conference's way of describing themselves:
"We will bring together innovators and changemakers across the philanthropic and investment worlds, to learn from one another, make new connections and discover ways we can influence greater change, together.
We want to preserve the radical ambition of 2022’s conference, exploring approaches in investment and philanthropy that are actively challenging practices that prop up aspects of current systems that are not serving people and the planet well.
We will highlight financing and funding practices that have the potential to invest in - and even speed up - a transition towards a regenerative, fairer future."
It was a deeply interesting event, with a huge amount to learn from. And it also, at points, annoyed me (which, combined with a family crisis, meant I left after lunch and missed the afternoon). It has taken me a few days to find ways to not just be the older cynic. After all:
"People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it" -- Unknown.
Let's try to unpick all that. Headlines:
The big picture is: this is what high-quality movement building feels like.
Overarching message: philanthropy has a special role and responsibility in the deep transformations the world needs right now.
The philanthropy sector is struggling with that burden.
The direction of travel: handing power over; relational and psychologic engagement; experimentation; investing in the (often boring) enablers; regenerative is hip.
A still-maturing niche with shadow sides.
How can we dream forwards in practical, hard-nosed ways?
What to do with the big, mainstream, status quo-protecting foundations and the bad faith actors?
The big picture is: this is what high-quality movement building feels like.
It was amazing to have that many people (500?) sharing knowledge, and inspiring each other, from such a small 'c' conservative sector. Big testament to the organisers. Huge, huge praise to them.
Overarching message: philanthropy has a special role and responsibility in the deep transformations the world needs right now.
It was a given for attendees that the world is on fire, and that profound changes are needed. Johan Schott caught the mood when he spoke about the need for a second Deep Transition. The first was the Industrial Revolution, which shifted not just the technological basis of society but the very weave of our way of being (at least in the rich places). Now we need something of the same depth (all the way down to our way of being, through our culture, our political economy, our key economic sectors, and how we live our lives).
Philanthropy has a special role and responsibility because it has resources, and the discretion to redirect them fast than governments, and without the status quo self-interest of the private sector. In addition, much of the philanthropic wealth was gained by putting the world in peril.
Plus, I didn't hear anyone say explicitly, but who else is there? In the 20th century there were several institutions which had the resources and scope to incubate difference and political movements. Trade Unions are a shadow of their past. Universities are education machines with funding cut to the bone, and their remit to explore what conservatives don't like under threat.
Billionaires can fund what they like, and they overwhelmingly like supporting the status quo. As Cory Doctorow says, not only is every billionaire a policy failure (because how can such a concentration of wealth be healthy?), but every billionaire is a factory for producing policy failures.
The philanthropy sector is struggling with that burden.
Just because you feel the responsibility and have resources (at least, compared to many others in civil society), well, that doesn't mean you know what to do. Much of the talk was of how difficult that was. Lots of reasons:
Clarity on legal permission (on stewardship of assets, and on more obviously capital P political activity).
Trustees who don't feel that responsibility.
The sheer difficulty of coming up with viable programmes of activity when you are trying to change, well, everything. Where do you start? How do you know that it is worth doing?
If "The master's tools will never dismantle the master's house" (Audre Lorde), and philanthropy is part of the master's house, and uses the master's tools, then what can it do?
In addition, the UK investment market has re-trenched. So, investments are down, which makes funding stuff harder.
The direction of travel: handing power over; relational and psychologic engagement; experimentation; investing in the (often boring) enablers; regenerative is hip.
The event was the day after Lankelly Chase announced it had decided to wholly redistribute its assets over the next five years. As the CEO explained, it took them years (and a change of Trustees) to get to that decision, which was deeply informed by just how entangled they feel their way of being and doing is with the mainstream structures. Therefore, they need to disband themselves, and move their resources over to those who can act for the new, rather than from the old.
This was loved in the conference hall. But I've seen snarky responses on Twitter (in fairness, perhaps a reaction to the use of the phrase Colonial Capitalism) and a few months ago (when rumours were flying) one charity CEO I spoke with was dismissive of them 'just giving up'.
That handing over of power was of a piece with a second thread: moving to a mode with long-term relationships with fundees, rather than officious transactional ones.
Connected to that was one of the best contributions (from Nkem Ndefo of Lumos Transforms), about how trauma and shame are playing out in society, and in the decision-making in foundations. The implication is a need to acknowledge these two in particular, and to generate the way of being for ourselves that we are not trapped by those complexes.
Inevitably there is a need for experimentation, which it seems still brings most organisations out in hives.
Perhaps the best session was on the need for a boring revolution (to use the Dark Matter phrase). The legal and governance plumbing on which every transaction relies. Organisations can only do what they have legal space for. Organisations can only make decisions that are as good as their governance (the trustees, the management habits and routines, the distribution of power, and so on).
Sidebar: every failing organisation I've ever seen has had a strategy that was out of sync with the world, but that strategy was there because upstream there was a failure in governance. Out of touch people with too much power or too little self-awareness. Or a voting system which meant no change was possible (the Coop in the 2000s and 2010s). And so on.
It has been clear for a few years that 'regenerative' is on the way up as a term (see eg Daniel Wahl's intro piece). 'Sustainability' has become corrupted and co-opted by the status quo. Regenerative stands for something bigger and better, beyond sustainability. Often the surface argument for it is: nature is regenerative; we are part of nature; we are in crisis because our cultures and economies are out of sync with nature; therefore we need regenerative cultures and economies (and X and Y and Z and so on) to address the polycrisis.
All of which is lovely. Except. Nature is not regenerative. After a shock or any period of time, an ecosystem does not try to go back to how things were before. Evolution goes on a random walk from where it is now. If conditions are similar to the past, then the same sort of ecosystem will come about. If conditions have changed, then the past ecosystem will not be restored. Something new will come.
I think part of regenerative's appeal is that it carries a nostalgia. We can go back to how things were when things were better. But nature doesn't do that. And we can't do that.
i think we need to be thinking and acting in terms of being generative. Going forward from where we are, doing what we can from here. But I'm in a minority of one on this.
A still-maturing niche with shadow sides.
Right. Now on to some of the things that annoyed me: a cliquey in-crowd; naively simple statements that are sorta in the right direction but also collapse under scrutiny; and a medium which undermined the message.
It is sorta inevitable that an early niche is quite inward and missing some key groups. There was an amazingly diverse range of speakers by gender and race, but working class folk were rare as speakers or attendees.
Also, were there many trustees or people from family offices of mainstream foundations? In a way they would be a bad fit for an the event was aimed at building a movement, and so for those already started or curious to do so. But still.
The sense of being in a bubble was, for me, reinforced by a lot of vibes thinking. Claims I sorta agree with but without grounding in stories or stats evidence, and so lots of contributions felt very hand-wavy.
For instance, the opening speaker some great ideas (expressed in lots of lists). Lots of exhortations and claims, about centring people and communities. In 20 minutes she told zero stories about other people or organisations. She mentioned some of the organisations her organisation funded. But she didn't give us any sense of what they were doing from their view. And neither did she use many charts using stats of the wider world and the difference they were trying to make to those status quos. Big exhortation after big exhortation left me cold.
Another example. A recorded contribution to one panel criticised philanthropists for just standing there when next door's house is on fire, and there is bucket at their feet. Just pick up the bucket! This got ripples of applause, and even the great Indy Johar used that to frame all his remarks as chair ("when are we going to pick up the bucket?").
But it is a very revealing analogy. "For every complex problem, there's a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong." H.L. Mencken.
Picking up the bucket is not always the right thing to do, even when there is a fire. For instance, with the Great Fire of London they relied too much on buckets! "The use of the major firefighting technique of the time, the creation of firebreaks by means of removing structures in the fire's path, was critically delayed due to the indecisiveness of the Lord Mayor, Sir Thomas Bloodworth.”
It is not clear there is a fire, and, even if there were, there definitely is no bucket. The polycrisis is not a clearcut problem with a clearcut solution. Our situation is more like a predicament, as Chris Martenson says: "problems have solutions; predicaments have outcomes. A solution to a problem fixes it, returning all to its original condition. Once a suitable solution can be found and made to work, a problem can be solved. A predicament, by contrast, has no solution." (As you can tell, this bucket analogy, and how well it was received in the hall, really, really annoyed me.)
All of which reminded me of this Oliver Wendell Holmes quote:
“For the simplicity on this side of complexity, I wouldn't give you a fig. But for the simplicity on the other side of complexity, for that I would give you anything I have.”
Such naive simplicity is sorta inevitable as folks are groping their way out of a the failing dominant patterns, and trying to generate some new patterns that can flourish into the future. The important thing is to work through the complexity, which means being able to challenge the vibes thinking in constructive ways.
Which leads to my final annoyance: the speakers were on stage, and no questions were allowed from the floor. Just the chair and the speakers reinforcing each other.
I was pretty allergic to the mismatch between content and medium, being told that "we need to be relational and break down power dynamics" by people who were literally physically (and sometimes metaphorically) taking down to us.
Again, understandable as a way to bring the curious along, and to not have old cynics like me interrupting those who are trying. But still, how about a morning of panels sessions and an afternoon of open space? Or just some different modes, which allow for good-faith, generative challenge?
Especially to allow the community to have some of the local tolerance for novelties and differences which Kevin Kelly says are needed for a scenius, where “Scenius stands for the intelligence and the intuition of a whole cultural scene. It is the communal form of the concept of the genius.” The other factors that nurture the scenius were apparent already happening (mutual appreciation; rapid exchange of tools and techniques; and network effects of success).
One panel did pick on this tension, between protecting the new flower before it buds while also getting on the task at hand. Put another way:
How can we dream forwards in practical, hard-nosed ways?
A challenge for any attempt at transformation in any field.
What to do with the big, mainstream, status quo-protecting foundations and the bad faith actors?
The Koch Brothers are not disbanding their climate denier-enabling foundation. Goldman Sachs and Bank of America foundations gave over $600,000 to ultraconservative groups (while the banks made a big show of their support for LGBTIQ in pride month).
The big and nasty (or just plain big and small 'c' conservative) foundations are not going away. One fear I have about a movement of disbanding is: who is left who can face up to the concentrations of 'bad faith' power? Could that be a good purpose for the well-intentioned foundations: to fight back agains those who self-servingly maintain the status quo, and ensure there is space (or maybe just good ruins) for what can be next?
WHAT NEXT? Couple of follow ups:
A heartfelt thank you to the organisers. I know I have ranted on some things that annoyed me above (buckets!). But the event was an exceptional contribution to the changes we need.
Look for things to go into the Atelier which are the (boring) enablers.
Look to play with 'generative' as a defining frame.
Edmund Hillary Fellow drinks
Step: 0/DETECTING*. Theme: Transforming systems. Transforming societies.
This week had one of the occasional drinks for Edmund Hillary Fellows based in the UK.
The Edmund Hillary Fellowship (EHF) is "a community of 500+ innovators, entrepreneurs and investors committed to New Zealand as a basecamp for global impact." Thee explain their purpose as
"to partner with Aotearoa NZ to find and build solutions to our toughest challenges. Our vision is that Aotearoa inspires global leadership and solutions for future generations, built on principles of Tangata Tiriti and values of Sir Edmund Hillary. Together, we are driving change for a better future for our planet and people."
I became a fellow just before COVID (long story) but didn't take the chance to relocate (even longer story). There are about 15 based in the UK and Ireland, out of 500 or so. And this week we had 3, in total.
Which isn't a lot. But it is what it is.
The amazing Larissa Michelsen was visiting from Aotearoa New Zealand, which was the excuse for the drinks. We were joined by Phoebe Tickell of Moral Imaginations. Always great to hear what inspirational people are up to.
In particular, Phoebe's work on Camden Imagines looks pathbreaking to me. "Over the last 12 months Moral Imaginations has been working together with Camden Council to design and deliver Camden Imagines: a project to build municipal imagination in Camden. We are really excited to share the fruits of our labour with you in our new report Imagination Activism in Camden." Go read!
WHAT NEXT?
Go back to EHF about creating a stronger hub in London (with more regular mixing).
Follow Phoebe's Moral Imaginations work, especially on more-than-human participation in decision-making.