Giving Compass' Take:

• Steven Bonsey shares his approach to donating during the COVID-19 pandemic and the current social justice movement. 

• Are these shifts appropriate for your giving? How can you best respond to the challenges of this moment? 

• Find out why you should increase your payout during COVID-19. 

For those of us holding concentrations of wealth, this seems like a good moment in which to let some money move into a hurting world in the flow of Spirit. And in a hurry. What might that look like?

The pandemic, with its disproportionate impact on people of color both in infection rate and economic effect, coupled with the spectacle of widespread police violence especially against Black people, has exposed longstanding systemic inequities in our country.  As one who has garnered the proceeds of systemic racialized advantage, I want these inequities to inform my response to this moment.

As Michelle Alexander recently wrote, “In part, we find ourselves here for the same reasons a civil war tore our nation apart more than 200 years ago: Too many citizens prefer to cling to brutal and unjust systems than to give up political power, the perceived benefits of white supremacy and an exploitative economic system.   If we do not learn the lessons of history and choose a radically different path forward, we may lose our last chance at creating a truly inclusive, egalitarian democracy.”

How can I take a step forward now on a “radically different path” with my money?

For me, this is not a new question in this moment.  I have been pondering the question for some time, and I come to this moment with some criteria for my own response.

First, I want to do something to alleviate the harm of an economic system built historically upon the stolen lives and labor of African people and their descendants, and the stolen land, dispossession and genocide of Native American peoples.  I want to move money in a way that strengthens the economic power of Black and Native American people.

Second, I want to move money in a way that acknowledges connection across historic division while it enhances the political power and sovereignty of Black and Native American people.

Third, I have come over time to the conclusion that the most effective means of moving money for economic empowerment is to work very close to the ground in communities emerging from systemic exclusion, funding those organizations that are best equipped to put funds most directly into the hands of individuals, families and small businesses.  People, after all, are the best judges of what will work for them.

Read the full article about moving money by Steven Bonsey at Wisdom & Money.