Open Source Philanthropy

Woke up this morning to the news that Warren Buffet has decided to join with his friend Bill Gate by donating a large portion of his personal fortune to several philanthropic organizations, including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (which is already, I've heard, the best-funded private philanthropic foundation in the world). I heartily applaud the generosity of these self-made billionaires, and share their desire to create a better world by improving the health and education of the world's most vulnerable inhabitants. Yet I also have an odd concern which is difficult for me to articulate, mostly because it still isn't quite clear in my own mind.

Bill Gates and I are about the same age, and grew up within a few miles of one another in the suburbs of Seattle. In fact, if my mother (with the encouragement of my public High School vice principal) had gotten her way instead of my dad, Trey and I might even have been classmates at Seattle's Lakeside Academy. We have a few mutual friends (most notably one of my early mentors in the ministry and his wife, who, like Melinda, are also both Duke alums), and...well, I don't want to make too much of this either. Let's just say that, like a lot of people around the world, I've always been kinda interested in what the world's Chief Geek has to say for himself, and tend to take him pretty seriously when he speaks.

So, what's my odd concern? I guess simply that despite its good intentions, a charitable organization as large as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation might somehow have unintended and unforeseen consequences regarding the nature of philanthropic activities in general. Is it just paranoia, or some sort of dark, melancholic tendency of my own to see the glass half-empty rather than half-full? Maybe. Hell, probably. But let me put it another way. If the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation does for personal philanthropy what Microsoft did for personal computing, will that be a good thing or a bad thing? Or if it turns out (as I suspect it will) to be a little of both, what can be done to emphasize the former and minimize the latter?

Not that I'll have any real say in the matter. But here's the deal as I see it. Any time there's a large amount of money up for grabs, the temptation to try to "game the system" is never far away, while the firewalls intended to prevent that abuse of trust can potentially become even worse than the abuse itself. So what can be done to prevent or minimize this problem? Transparency, obviously...along with democratization, decentralized decision making, diversification of activities...in effect, an "open source" philanthropy which builds a real partnership between "developers" (the philanthropists) and "end users" (the intended beneficiaries), and allows the "clients" of the philanthropy the maximum amount of input and control, while still recognizing that a certain number of false starts and outright mistakes are probably unavoidable. Or at least that's how it seems to me. In the meantime, congratulations to all concerned regarding this magnificent expression of generosity and compassion. And may the accomplishments prove worthy of the dream....