LAST CHANCE: Big Philanthropy vs. the ‘Big We’
The large foundations and mega-donors known as Big Philanthropy do as much to divide America as unite it, says Hali Lee, founder of the Asian Women Giving Circle and co-founder of the Donors of Color Network. It’s the charitable actions of average Americans — through mutual aid, volunteering, and giving circles — that can knit us back together. That’s Lee’s argument in her new book The Big We: How Giving Circles Unlock Generosity, Strengthen Community, and Make Change.
Join Lee on Tuesday, May 20, at 12:30 p.m. ET when she’ll talk to Chronicle of Philanthropy deputy opinion editor Nandita Raghuram about how a communal approach to philanthropy can help bring people together amid rising loneliness and polarization.
Register here for this free event.
Coming in June: Author Barbara Kingsolver Visits The Commons
In many of Barbara Kingsolver’s novels, characters who are very different from one another are thrown together, forced to interact, and maybe even form tight bonds. In her most recent, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Demon Copperhead, Kingsolver exposes readers to the diversity of people and experiences within Appalachia, a region often flattened into superficial portrayals that fuel what she describes as “urban-rural antipathy.” Through the novel, readers from the region can see themselves depicted in a more nuanced way, while outsiders can gain insights into an overlooked part of the country.
Join Chronicle of Philanthropy deputy editor Nandita Raghuram on Tuesday, June 3, at 11:30 a.m. ET for a conversation with Kingsolver on the ways fiction can put a name, face, and story behind the people and places that politicians, pundits, and the public often ignore. And she’ll share a bit about her own philanthropy, including Higher Ground, a home she and her husband established for women recovering from addiction.
Register here for this free event.
News and other noteworthy items:
- In a new report, the SNF Agora Institute argues for a global approach to renew trust in democracy, noting that its decline is a worldwide phenomenon. “We see erosion happening on democracy in the U.S.,” says Agora fellow Scott Warren in an interview in the Substack Filibuster, by Andrew Lentini, “and it’s increasingly clear that there are global trends behind it as well. The U.S. is not alone, and there’s a lot to learn from the rest of the world. We need to listen more.”
- Sam Pressler and Pete Davis write in After Babel — the Substack of author and social psychologist Jonathan Haidt — of a “quiet revolution in civic life.” Pressler, a practitioner fellow at the Karsh Institute of Democracy at the University of Virginia, and Davis, co-founder of Democracy Policy Network, argue that periods of great technological dislocation often spark community renewal movements “to re-order, re-humanize, and re-knit our communal lives.” Such a movement is underway, they say, but needs to be nurtured. “This doesn’t happen automatically. We must own our agency by actively choosing to do the generational work of imagining, organizing, and building new civic possibilities.”
