Stewardship Isn't Easy

'Tis the season for giving, but J.K. Rowling says, Don't Give Your Time or Money to Orphanages [bold added]

(Time photo)

[Western volunteers and donors] brought foreign money into the country and we do know that some orphanages are set up literally to exploit children. The children are the bait for foreign donations and a volunteer experience, and the money is going into the pockets of the people running the orphanages....

I suppose I would say there are three big things that people can do watching this.

The first is and I’m sure by now very obvious, don’t volunteer in orphanages. Don’t give your time to propping up a system that we know does real, serious harm.

And then there’s the financial aspect. If you have money to give when you are travelling, put it into local businesses because that helps communities. That’s something real you can do when travelling. Don’t go and visit orphanages.

If you want to support charities or projects, just do a bit of due diligence and make sure you’re dealing with the root causes here: look at poverty and building community services and so on.

The last thing I’d say, and what we would love to see as an organisation, is to see businesses amending their social responsibility policies. We’d love to see those corporate policies changed to make sure they’re not supporting so-called orphanages or child institutions. That is something hugely powerful that everyone can do.

Comments:
1) Westerners, and Americans especially, are suckers for good sob-stories, more so now that there are visuals. (By the way, me too.) Just use the same level of due-diligence that you would use for your investments.
2) Actually, more due-diligence because there is no SEC regulating charities. With U.S. non-profits there's some limited oversight by the IRS, but assume there's none with overseas organizations.
3) J.K. Rowling argues that capitalism is the best way to pull people out of poverty ("put it into local businesses"). Of course, identifying these local businesses can't be easy either.
4) Giving away one's wealth should require as much effort as earning and saving it, that is, if one cares about how the donations are used. Stewardship isn't easy.