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NEWSLETTER
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President's Message, Spring 2016
When I retired from the Foundation in 1996, our exceptionally able grants administrator and colleague Laurice Sarraf put together a list of all the grants I made or signed off on during my 18 years at the Foundation. These grants spanned nearly two decades of the Foundation’s work in human rights and social justice, governance and public policy, and international affairs, as well as support for rural development, the social sciences and economics during my initial stint in Brazil.
I am struck both by the bold effort that list represents and saddened by how many of the deep-seated problems we tried so determinedly to address at the time are still with us, often in transmuted and sometimes more blatant form. I am also reminded, as Michael Lipsky points out in his piece for this Newsletter, that successful grant making is a collaborative effort, requiring trust, cooperation and commitment among grant seekers and grant makers, program officers and grants administrators, multiple funders, and public and private actors.
Now, trying to make sense of the growing inequalities, social divides and political turmoil that surround us across the globe, I find myself asking: Are the problems simply intractable? Are our resources too limited? Are our actions too narrow or stove-piped? Are our time horizons too short?
These questions are not for philanthropy alone. A host of national and international institutions, including the United Nations System, grapple in seeming perpetuity with questions of peace and security, racism, ethnic conflict, social justice, public welfare, good governance, immigration and climate change, to name but a few of the challenges that continue to vex us.
There is no question that we have made progress, though too often promise seems unfulfilled, deep-rooted problems seem insurmountable or the darkest instincts of humankind appear to be overwhelming our better instincts. We are at this moment living in especially complex and perilous times in which the economic and political processes and institutions that have shaped our adult and professional lives no longer are believed by many to function for the majority or, for that matter, the general common good.
Economic disparities and social inequities appear starker than ever, despite a century of experimentation with diverse development and governing models. Representative democracy itself seems particularly in play, as outsized economic interests vie with insurgent popular constituencies for control of party machineries and the gateways to political power, and sharpened political discourse threatens civility and the public order.
It is with this in mind that I so look forward to LAFF at 25, the May 17 colloquium and reunion that Ford’s president, Darren Walker, is enthusiastically hosting at the Foundation. It will be a time to collectively take stock, celebrate the work we have done and enable us to think together about the role of philanthropy in general and the Ford Foundation in particular as it experiments with innovative approaches to the root causes of inequality that give rise to so much grievance and anger.
Understanding history, as Darren has pointed out, is critically important to this enterprise, since it helps us understand the evolution of the problems that are still with us, and provides lessons that can orient the Foundation’s, and our own, efforts going forward.
Your presence and contributions at the May 17 celebrations will greatly enrich our discussions about the Foundation’s past and future work. It also provides an opportunity to help shape LAFF’s agenda for the next 25 years. Please make every effort to join us. I look forward, along with Darren, to seeing you in May.
Shep Forman
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