The plan benefits from critiques of the current charity model (Reich, 2020a; Gridharadas, 2019; Brecher, 2017; Editors, 2019). Anand Giridharadas in Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World, argues that philanthropy tends to serve the interests of the donors rather than the recipients. It is often used by the wealthy to avoid paying their fair share of taxes and to maintain their power and privilege. It is used to co-opt and silence dissent, and to promote a false narrative of progress. He cites the accurate Bahá’í perception that “social change is not a project that one group carries out for the benefit of another.” Wealth operationalised through charitable vehicles, can even undermine democracy itself (Reich, 2020a).
Citing research by Isham et al (1995), Hjerppe (1997) reports that “An increasing number of development practitioners agree that the participation of the intended beneficiaries improves project performance” (Isham, Narayan and Pritchett, 1995). Participatory governance improves service provision, enhances decision-making, and assists organisations to achieve their objectives (Wellens & Jegers, 2011). The effects of participatory democracy on productivity, commitment and wellbeing are now well documented (Bartling, Fehr & Herz, 2014; Bó, Foster & Putterman, 2010). |
Therefore the plan is to establish a strategic organisation that will transfer organisations from private or public ownership into cooperatives which would be democratically run by workers and/or consumers, or through universal membership. The beneficiaries rather than the doners will decide for themselves how their needs will best be met. What makes this proposal unique, is that the donations to it would be in the form of organisations, either entire organisations, or branches split off, to be transferred into cooperatives in their own right. Hence the strategic organisation will be termed Don't Give Them Bread, because doners will be giving the entire bakery.
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