In the past month, I’ve read two books that probably were not the best choices for consecutive reads, but they have kicked up a lot of thought, mostly questions, about the best levels of insertion for intervention on social issues.
The Spirit Level by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett outline how thoroughly corrosive the practices that establish economic inequality are in Western society. Certainly, low-income workers and those living in poverty experience the effects of such disparity in a much more extreme fashion; the ultimate cost of this institutionalized gap that is growing wider is to restrict the quality of living and life experience had by all, including the wealthiest few. From life expectancy to education attainment to crime rates, all can be quantitatively tied back to the financial gap between the wealthiest and poorest Americans in chart after graph after chart. The capitalist backbone of our society, which relies on consumption, with little consideration of the social and environmental costs has short changed us all.
The solution isn’t nutritional counseling to address obesity or stay in school campaigns, those are all bandages on the bigger issue that would require sacrifice and major philosophical and lifestyle shifts for society at large to resolve. Despite globalization, the flattening of communications and the urban migrations that move us closer and closer to more intimately sharing our day-to-day experiences with strangers and acquaintances and distant relatives, we don’t seem to be at that tipping point for an empathy that connects our everyday struggles with those in our community and connects those struggles with the overarching rules that bind us in society. A shift in awareness could shift the possibilities.
In the interim we have philanthropy, which seeks to make up for many of the disparities we currently accept as a fact of life. The somewhat recent emergence of Philanthrocapitalism is well documented in a book by the same name, subtitled How Giving Can Save the World. Though Bishop acknowledges that inequality allows for the growth of extreme wealth in the hands of a few; he dismisses discussion of making adjustments to capitalism when applying that wealth and business practices to social issues can have an impact on those in need when billionaires are committed to giving back.
Philanthrocapitalism has caught on in a big way. Warren Buffet and Bill Gates launched The Giving Pledge a few months ago, an effort to receive public commitments from America’s wealthiest to give away the majority of their riches. As of a few days ago 40 billionaires had made public commitments for a variety of reasons. But is it enough for the wealthy to funnel funds toward pet causes, particularly in an economy that will likely stagnate for Main Street Americans for years to come?
Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek says no (via Andrew Sullivan).
Though “admirable” that the charitably-minded seek to “[remedy] the evils that they see …their remedies do not cure the disease, they merely prolong it. . . The proper aim is to try and reconstruct society on such a basis that poverty will be impossible. The altruistic virtues have prevented the carrying out of this aim.”
Zizek went on to say that “it is immoral to use private property in order to alleviate the horrible evils that results from the institution of private property.” In fact, from his point of view, billionaires moving into the realm of philanthropy are merely “repairing with the right hand what we ruined with the left hand.”
Is it enough to address single issues that stem from the most basic inequalities resulting from our current brand of capitalism? Do we have a responsibility to treat the root cause regardless of how difficult it would be to make change there?
If your doctor consistently gives you medication for your pain, without investigating and resolving the cause of that pain, the ailment could linger or fester to something worse. If philanthropy is a means for mitigating the symptoms of larger societal issues, can we ignore the fundamental inequalities that create the environment for the other issues that spring forth? Or is it some sort of placebo that gives us a false sense of accomplishment that we’re doing something to make a difference?
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