By Dumi Gatsha
The past few weeks have shown how destabilized we are globally. Globalization has become too heavy for the modern neocolonial empire. As multilateralism, rules based order and global trade no longer serve the interests of those in power. We are seeing generations of progress wiped away by brutal military forces on one extreme end, whilst ideologies, knowledge, and history are destroyed on the other. We see the destructure through abuses in elected offices at all levels: from sporting code regulators, parent-teacher associations, or either of the three arms of a government. Transgender rights, overseas development assistance and intellectual property law trends reflect the regressive shifts in Global geopolitics. We are all at risk of compromised global health security, climate degradation, and state-sponsored gender disparities.
We are held at ransom by a global elite that has thrived off of capitalism, racism, and digitalization. The frontiers of social, activist and change movements haven't been absolved from this crisis. As the barriers to enablement, resources and funding remain largely pooled in the global minority. Asset managers, Donor-advised funds, and private foundations remain vehicles of tax inequity, avoidance, and wealth hoarding. This diagnosis can be applied to any context where war parallels corporate profit and economic growth propels failed governance. Somewhere amidst all of this, rests philanthropy in plateu. A system replicating the world as we know it: centers of knowledge and power, yielding to the whims of the elite, educated, and well heeled.
There are countless theories of change that are reported as “successful”, leaving an impression that progress can be sustained beyond resourcing or project lifespans. Those theories of change have no meaning in a world that enacts anti-LGBT and anti-abortion laws. Neither a world where safeguards for diversity and inclusion are politicized and revoked through state and corporate machinery. We are witnessing atrocious crimes in real time, documenting injustices via social media in a world where aggressors and perpetrators deploy violence with impunity. Activists and caregivers are exhausted. Social structures are slowly being dismantled and removed from any forms of mutual aid or solidarity action. These are the moments grassroots activists warned against. These are the hallmarks of a world with no peace for those most marginalised.
As the world burns, grant application windows, requirements, and eligibility take away much needed time for organising. The increased heat warnings and cyclones in Southern Africa only aggravate the socioeconomic conditions for the many problems movements try to solve. Yet climate related opportunities rarely weave in queer or reproductive inequities. The coup de tats in West Africa brought economic renaissance domestically whilst enacting over-regulation of civil society and socially restrictive laws that target women and LGBT populations. Philanthropy remains unimaginative, held up in the hubris of self-serving strategies whilst INGOs navigate self-preservation. Remaining with growth targets and maintaining annual distribution percentages; it is intentional to keep ways of working and grant making business as usual. The hierarchy and value chain must be maintained so they can save face, income floors, and for a “rainy day.” The question is whose rainy day and what kind of rains?
Shifting power remains aspirational. As long as money and capital are not yielded and transferred, the risks and harm to communities will continue. Whilst there aren't any dividends paid out in grant making and partnerships; controls remain pre-determined to normative development aligned programming. This leaves little room for disruptive impact and change. Disruption would mean working ourselves out of activism and philanthropy ceasing to exist. It would mean recognising activism as work deserving of meaningful compensation and social protections — even at grassroots levels. It would look like a reparative system returning exploits and extracts to communities. Valuing circular social structures that do more healing and nurturing of the planet and all people. Systems that support our sense of becoming and belonging without reserving these for those who can assimilate or navigate to adopt. It would mean all of us can be saved from a rainy day without someone deciding whether one of us is deserving or not.
As the year of turmoil continues to unfold, those of us deemed undeserving of solidarity or sunshine remain in abundance. We will resist for our own survival, and rest for our own sanity. No one has saved us from our own people, governments or corporates — neither do we expect to be saved. We continue to share our stories and joy with the hope that the world will become kinder one person at a time. Whilst our dignity and personhood may be stripped from us in moments of inequity and injustice; our humanity remains in tact. This was captured harrowingly beautifully by Nomzamo Winifred Zanyiwe Madikizela Mandela: “you are interrogated for 7 nights and 7 days without sleep… God provided a mechanism I had never thought of at the time. I reached a threshold where the body could not take the pain anymore, then I would faint. Those were the most beautiful moments. The body rested and when they threw a bucket of water to wake me up… I got up, I was so refreshed and I started fighting all over again.”
We continue to dream and cultivate our world as best as we can, with the little we have wherever we are. We have accepted that philanthropy, especially that which extends from global capital, will never have the capacity or compassion to meet us where we are. After all, communities remain behind when the donor, enabler, investor, INGO, or development program leave our countries. We will continue to speak truth to power, as capitalism continues without an end in sight. Toni Morrion's masters narrative beautifully captures how I view philanthropy's plateau. Void of any transformative disruption or imagination — whilst performing all the right words, keeping the same partners, co-opting participation and representation to maintain its systems. Its practitioners drawn from across development, volunteer, and civil society pipelines bear the hallmarks of Audre Lorde's masters tools. However, as a part of neocolonial Empires and in Gad Saad's words: philanthropy is bound to implode from within due to its own excesses. We will still be there to recreate, rebuild, and heal towards a queer, climate, and gender just world.
Dumi Gatsha (they/them) is the first ever gender diverse parliamentary candidate in Botswana, former facilitator of the #ShiftThePower UK Funders Collective and founder of Success, a grassroots organisation working in the nexus of human rights and sustainable development.
