Views on Charity

It is an unremarkable November day, and a Facebook badge addresses me personally assuring me that ‘with my help’ we can fight back against the ebola virus. Other posts ‘celebrate’ the flourishing of follicles upon otherwise bald upper lips as part of ‘Movember’. In the mailbox are festive appeals from Barnardo's and the British Red Cross. On the walk to work I pass by smiling bucket-shakers for Children in Need and sellers of Royal British Legion poppies. Passing through a tube station I spot posters demanding that I ‘text FIGHT’ to join in the battle against cancer. In the news is a report of the latest resurrection of the Band Aid single.

This, I would venture to suggest, is but the tip of the leviathan iceberg that manifests itself in the waters of contemporary society. I use the term 'leviathan' intentionally, for it was the philosopher Thomas Hobbes who held the view, to which I find myself subscribing, that charity exists to lighten the burden of compassion of the wealthy man.

It is my contention that our current relationship with charity is indicative of more general socio-political developments; that it many instances it runs counter to our notion of a dignified, innovative, rational culture; and that, contrary to conventional wisdom, it could actually be a flawed and inefficient approach to tackling worthy causes.

I am fully aware of the polemical nature of such views, given that in the 21st century secular west, offering counter arguments to the charitable consensus is one of the last remaining taboos; standing firm amidst the rubble of past controversies to have been demolished by the liberal wrecking ball. Today, anyone who might dare speak against the overwhelming tide of 'good nature' encapsulated by charitable endeavours is branded a heretic, an obstinate contrarian, selfish for their own wants and thoughtless for those of the less fortunate. Put simply, to criticise is just bad social 'form'.

Given the saturating scale and nature of charity exposure, the pressure to think and act in unerringly positive approval, not to mention the scorn exerted by the faithful on the dissenting few, is evidence, in my view, of a form of benevolent totalitarianism (or if you want a terrible neologism, 'charitarianism'.)

According to government statistics, the 2013 annual income of the sector was £59.9bn. This is a huge 43% increase since 1999 when it was a mere £23bn, and what other area of the economy could boast such growth?!. The existance and expansion or a burgeoning charity sector works to build up an irrational submission to covert forms of authority, bombarding the ordinary man/woman with impulsions to act and not think too deeply about the substance or worth of those actions. In effect, it works to marginalise and coerce the ordinary man/woman into an apathy in which they meekly invest in necessary illusions.

One primary illusion is Rousseau's view that, '...it is contrary to natural right that a handful of men be glutted with superfluities while the starving multitude lacks necessities'. In principle of course, Rousseau is absolutely right, and it is this consensus that charity justifiably aims to derive gain from; however, it ignores the fact that society is structurally at odds with such a moral principle. Take the classical problem of homelessness and destitution...

Homelessness is an aberration in a wealthy nation, nonetheless it is one that is tacitly permitted to exist. This is because at a subliminal level the homeless serve to instil in us the sense that 'there but for the grace of god go I'. In a society predicated on order, obedience and everyone 'doing their bit', they are perhaps the most potent visual reminder of what awaits should you fail to fully comply and slip through the cracks in society's paving stones.

At a fundamental level, capitalism demands the existence of an underclass of poverty in order that people will accept wages set just high enough to avoid suffering the same fate, but with just enough insecurity to enshrine subservience. If the liminal reality of the homeless person's plight is disturbing and regrettable (which it surely is), the spectacle is most definitely an intrinsic and necessary tenet of a competitive and dynamic society. Not so much, as Albert Camus' protagonist in 'The Fall' describes as 'the oppression that the oppressed inflict on decent people', but as a deep psychological balm of reassurance that their continual obedience is justified. A homeless person slumped in a doorway is, on an imagistic level, the most powerful propaganda weapon in the benevolent state's arsenal.

Another critical illusion is the axiom that your charitable contributions make a tangible difference. This is not to denigrate or undermine the many good intentions of the individual who may well be altruistic in their actions. But it is an interesting social phenomenon to identify, that as, over the last 2 or 3 decades, people have become evermore discontented with political elites - membership falling, election turnout falling, ideology stagnating, apathy rising - the charity sector has grown exponentially.

I believe that as people have felt they have less influence over or stake in society they have had to alleviate a residual sense of alienation, hopelessness and insignificance through charitable means. In a 'polyarchy' (a system of elite decision-making and public ratification), people's democratic vote is essentially as meaningless as throwing change into a collection bucket or sponsoring someone to run a race.

Of course, it is a truism that whilst an individual's donation may be pointless, collectively it can make a difference. But here is where I think our approach to charity has become distorted by the adoption of neoliberal capitalism since Thatcher. No one in their sound mind would argue that we shouldn't provide funding for cancer treatments, or veterans of combat, or disabled children, or elderly care homes. So what does it say about a political establishment that has turned these and countless other worthy causes over to the public, relieving themselves of the burden of providing for them?

Governments, to all intents and purposes, have devolved their social responsibility to the charity sector and empower them to effectively tax people on the basis of their good will. Instead, governments use their tax revenues to fund the development of Trident and other nuclear weapons, aircraft carriers with no aircraft, illegal wars and subsidies to big business (namely, all the unpopular things that they know the public wouldn't donate money for).

In lockstep with the privatisation of industry, the state's abdication of its social responsibilities has left the charity sector to develop in a system solely defined by commercial imperatives and the dictates of the free market. Organisations of all stripe and agenda have become 'registered charities' to relieve them of the pressures of operating entirely through the drive for profit. In order for a company to subsist on the basis that isn't solely commercial, with shareholders demanding appeasement, their only option it seems is to apply for charitable status. So what does this mean for the sector?

What it means is that charity has been manipulated and encouraged to adapt itself to the laissez faire capitalist system of the economy as a whole. According to government statistics, of the £60bn annual revenue in 2013, £53bn went to charities with an income of £500,000 or more. This works out as 6% of the sector receiving 90% of the capital. Since it goes against most moral principles to make a value judgement on worthy causes, these figures demonstrate that the system in which the sector has been left to grow like ivy is flawed.

In this capitalist realm, charity has been forced to become commercialised, to the extent that ethical causes are offered as consumable goods to be plucked from the shelf and displayed with a pious sense of pride. In such a competitive market charities have to invest more and more labour hours, focus and money coming up with innovative new marketing strategies or advertising opportunities, or just thinking up gimmicks, as with the 'ice bucket challenge' earlier this year (what was it supposed to be raising awareness of? I guarantee the majority will have forgotten already...)

They have begun to be exposed for dubiously unethical decisions and practices; for instance, Comic Relief allowing funds to be invested in arms manufacturers and tobacco firms), and more recently, Save the Children deciding to honour Tony Blair with a major award.

The expansion of the charity sector runs in parallel with the shrinking of the state as it has surrendered evermore power and influence to the whims of the market. As it has done so, tax has become so lambasted that even the suggestion of a tax increase policy is considered electoral suicide. Instead, successive governments seek to proudly proclaim that they have slashed tax burdens for the public. As they have sought to drag down tax thresholds, all the while promoting the idea of a cohesive and inclusive society (Blair's 'Third Way', Cameron's 'Big Society', Miliband's 'Together'), they have encouraged and relied upon the charity sector to fill the void and collect all that additional tax revenue to allocate to worthy causes that government deems unworthy of investing in.

So how could we approach charity in a more sensible, honest and dignified way? The obvious thing would be for government to mandate on the basis that the public deems such causes to be worthy, and therefore to allocate funding accordingly. If as a society we agree that cancer treatment should be invested in, and support provided for war veterans, then that investment should be made instead of their respective charities having to rely on the varied good will of the population. How would this extra government funding be paid for though?

In this regard, we could do well to look to Islam. As one of the Five Pillars of Islamic law, zakat is the giving of 2.5% of one's savings to the poor and needy as part of tax. Therefore, everyone pays towards these causes based on accumulated wealth. Of course, should people wish to voluntarily allocate more of their income to causes personal to them they should be able and encouraged to do so; in Islam this is known as sadaqah.

Although not without its flaws in terms of management and allocation, in 2012 Islamic financial analysts estimated annual zakat spending at more than $200bn per year, far more than global humanitarian aid contributions. This was also borne out by polling into comparative individual contributions across British society in which Muslims came out ahead of Jewish, Protestants, Catholics and atheists by a considerable margin.

The Economist has mooted the policy idea of removing or reducing the state pension from those on higher rates of income, thereby relieving the pension burden and helping to reduce the nation's debt, 'for the top-fifth of pensioner households, who have an average private income of £65,000, the state pension pays for holidays and golf-club fees'.

Naturally, this would be an unpopular policy for those affected, but perhaps they should be encouraged to forego their pension by selecting a charity to support instead. Equally, there should be more emphasis placed on flexible working, with people incentivised into taking on voluntary roles or doing charitable work with tax credits. The more charity work you do (actually doing something rather than sitting in an office thinking up the next 'ice bucket challenge'), the more tax credits you would be entitled to.

Although making a public disclosure or spectacle of personal charity-giving is undignified, I don't doubt that many will have read this essay thinking 'just how much do you do for charity then?' The answer, regretfully, is not very much, although I hope this will change in the future. Each month I probably spend anywhere between £15 - 30 on second-hand books at the fabulously well-stocked Oxfam shop on Marylebone High Street. I'm confident that this gesture is negligible compared with many people, but I'm equally confident that it is probably a lot more than many others.

But really, it isn't the act of giving itself I take issue with at all, but instead the current 'spectacle' that the charity sector has been obliged to develop in order to compete in a free market economy. I feel that if we want to live in a civilised, compassionate and reasoned society, we could do far better in terms of how we incorporate charity into our lives without so much of the piety, commercialisation and lack of dignity together with an awareness of the intrinsic illusions that embody the benevolent totalitarianism of modern charity.