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Contribution type: New Concept
Concept: Philanthropy
Name of the contributor: Elisa Ricciuti
E-mail of the contributor: elisa.ricciuti@diceimpact.com
The word Philanthropy comes from the ancient Greek Phil- (love) and -Anthropos (human, humankind) and it is generally defined as “the love of humanity”.
In a very broad approach, the term is used as a synonym of “giving”: money, in-kind goods, time or skills (for the latter two, it is referred also as “volunteering”). It is usually connected to anything concerned with a charitable activity. In recent decades, though, with inequalities soaring globally and the persistence of mechanisms of wealth accumulation grounded in social injustice, the term is more commonly used with a narrower approach, referring to the «capital provider» side of charitable organizations: high net worth individuals putting their wealth into a very Western-centered post-industrial institutional setting: the “foundation”.
This means that philanthropy and its narrative has gradually been colonized. From a form of solidarity between people, existing throughout the entire planet, rooted in very diverse history and cultural processes, in different spiritual or religious ethos, strongly community-based and continuously evolving, the concept has passed to a stable, freezing ‘donor-recipient’, ‘giver-asker’, ‘wealthy-needy’ relationship. By colonizing the language around philanthropy, it has lost the richness and the importance of multiple values it brings into the world way beyond money, such as: relationship, trust, generosity, connectedness, collaboration, co-creation, empathy and many other colorful ways of shaping the concept coming from indigenous traditions all over the planet.
This is why philanthropy, as it is understood today, carries a lot of colonial baggage — and why the way we talk about it needs to change. Efforts to reclaim the true nature of philanthropy are gaining space today: we need a radical change in the way the concept takes shape and a reflection on the narrative of power and agency situated in the philanthropic relationship.