Coming soon!
A Ceremony for the End of Philanthropy
A new bookcast written and performed by Karen Pittelman. Produced by Jake Sorgen. Music composed by Karen Pittelman and produced, arranged, and performed by Jake Sorgen with pedal steel by Mike Robinson.
Episode 1: Introduction
The bad feeling. I’ve never quite been able to shake it, even after 25 years in philanthropy. Of course, there are plenty of critiques of this institution—and we’ll cover them all. But I also work in social justice philanthropy, exactly the kind of practice meant to answer those critiques. Still, I’ve always felt in my bones that something was off, though I could not name it. Maybe you’ve felt it too?
Episode 2: Philanthropy’s Paradox
What is philanthropy? What does it do? To document the source of the bad feeling, I have to begin where everyone who’s ever written anything about philanthropy begins. With a definition. But that proves to be a lot harder than you might expect. Philanthropy is slippery. It all boils down to what I call philanthropy’s paradox: in order to maintain its power and legitimacy, philanthropy must both protect the status quo and challenge it at the same time.
Episode 3: The Domain of the Wealthy
Philanthropy has bad boundaries. Bad boundaries with government. Bad boundaries with business. Philanthropy doesn’t even have a clear line between what its donors keep and what they give away. Yet philanthropy still insists its boundaries are just fine, and that, in fact, it’s a part of the “third sector” of civil society, independent from the sectors of government and business. And pretty much everybody in the field goes along with this—even though they know it’s completely absurd.
Episode 4: How Philanthropy Fails
Between philanthropy’s messy boundaries and its frustrating paradox, is it any wonder that this institution has been pissing off critics for centuries? So we come to a brief-as-I-could-make-it-though-not-particularly-brief-but-bear-in-mind-I-am-trying-to-cover-over-250-years review of the long and illustrious history of talking shit about philanthropy. The thing is—if philanthropy has always failed at what it claims to do, why do we keep maintaining it?
Episode 5: How Philanthropy Succeeds
Philanthropy calls itself the “love of humanity.” But what does that really mean? With philosopher Sylvia Wynter as my guide, I go back to the 12th century to discover that when philanthropy says “human,” it only ever means the chosen. And when it says “love,” it only ever means to choose. It turns out that for centuries,