Cuts to national aid budgets, from Washington to Paris, have caused soul-searching across the philanthropic sector over the past year. Alongside the concern over whether individual donors can fill the gap left by retreating government agencies is a question of whether a community that supported such interventions has failed to persuade the public that they matter.
“We are currently losing the argument, and that is very damaging,” Gates Foundation CEO Mark Suzman told Semafor recently.
When governments retreat from big problems, “the problems don't go away,” the International Rescue Committee’s CEO David Miliband has noted. That makes investments in solutions by individual philanthropists, NGOs, and corporations more needed than ever. And those groups are stepping up, often with innovative approaches that combine philanthropy, policy, and the power of business.
Michael and Susan Dell’s $6.25 billion donation to create investment accounts for 25 million young Americans was a prime example: These “Trump accounts” can be paired with contributions from the US Treasury, and many companies are matching the Dells’ funding for employees’ children.
More philanthropists are partnering with industry to catalyze systemic reform in environments where traditional market incentives fail. And impact investing pioneers like Acumen founder Jacqueline Novogratz have shown how philanthropic capital can support market-based solutions that sustain themselves financially over the long term.
“We will not solve our toughest problems without a systemic rethink and philanthropy can play a catalytic and critical role,” Novogratz says.
The age when philanthropists were seen as solitary solvers of the world’s problems is over. The future of philanthropy will be one in which foundations and individuals help galvanize coalitions that are as large as the problems they seek to solve. As Alice Walton, the daughter of Walmart’s founder Sam Walton, told Semafor, "Philanthropy can support change, it doesn't create change.”
