Knowledge for knowledge's sake.

It's time to fund the darn solutions.

Hey folks. This is the 11th edition of The Great Near. Today’s post is an introduction to next week: an observation of a trend in the social sector where we replicate research and other analyses. This often comes at the expense of burnt-out community leaders who are tired of pointing to obvious problems and their solutions. In the next post, I’ll share crowdsourced strategies for rethinking our obsession with knowledge.

In my intro to The Great Near, I talked about W.E.B Du Bois’ ingenious research and data visualizations on African-American life and at the turn of the twentieth century. (Buy this book, you won’t regret it.) His work offered a new look into Black wealth in post-slavery America that revealed the disparities between Black and white America. Today, it’s a reference point for the origins of a racial wealth gap that not only persisted but grew out of control.

Du Bois emphasized economic emancipation for Black communities as a means to freedom. To break that down: without owning capital, specifically through Black banks and businesses, there would be few means to accrue wealth and participate in the economy as equals.

(Interestingly, Du Bois also believed that “wealth” was not the only antidote. He argued that cooperatives—businesses owned and run jointly by members—had more potential to build solidarity and strength in communities. Go figure.)

Mehrsa Baradaran’s research on Black wealth through American history in “The Color of Money” uplifts what Du Bois and other BIPOC leaders have argued for generations: investing capital in Black, Indigenous, and other marginalized communities of color is the best way to achieve economic equality.

Despite historic consensus among these leaders on the need for investment, funders continue to demand data and other evidence-based analyses to drum up proof of inequities and their solutions that are so obvious to people of color.

Rodney Foxworth, CEO of Common Future, explains it like this: 

“When people ask for evidence or data from BIPOC organizations, nine times out of ten there is already significant research to prove the point. The desire for knowledge is born in resistance to what’s already been articulated. People of color have to keep validating the issues because folks in power don’t actually want to do the deep work that is required to change systems. Having been in so many conversations with funders and participating in research, it’s unfortunate to see so many reports get shelved somewhere just to be replicated a few years later.”

There are too many examples to count. Research questions that you probably know the answer to before reading the findings. Do you think that emergency savings and improved credit might help communities avoid using payday lenders? Do we need more supportive ecosystems for Black-owned businesses? (Yes and yes)

Then there are analyses that get repeated over and over from different angles. Here’s a profile of Minnesota small businesses, an analysis of impact investing in the Twin Cities, a report on the economic status of Minnesotans, and the brilliant work of ConnectUP! Institute that ties so many of these insights together. I’ll spare you the other reports, but trust me that there are many. Recently a colleague shared an anecdote where leaders in the Twin Cities actually turned down funding for the same analysis of small business needs, which speaks to how little knowledge is shared or acted upon in funder circles. Not all organizations have the same financial independence to say no.

In my research for TGN, I constantly come across “groundbreaking” reports that only slightly tweak the surveys, framing, or boundaries around the exact. same. information. These analyses usually come from the desks of overpaid consultants, with funding from bloated foundations, and the support of nonprofits that rely on these partnerships to amplify their brand and influence.

But I don’t blame us. This report co-authored by Echoing Green and Bridgespan not only put forth data proving that there is a racial disparity in funding for organizations led by people of color, but also provided talking points to nonprofit leaders that likely shifted substantial funds to BIPOC communities as a result. For the record, here’s a similar report from ABFE on philanthropic funding for Black-led organizations that reported the same disparities and other worrying trends (emphasis mine):

“Several of the BLO leaders, who participated in this scan, expressed concerns about the physical safety of themselves, their respective staff, board and supporters; digital and intellectual safety concerns that could cripple their abilities to function effectively; and fears of losing existing and/or future opportunities for funding due to sharing their data and experiences.”

I have so much respect for Echoing Green and ABFE, but I can’t help but wonder why funders couldn’t hear these voices before—why we need data that seems so obvious if you a) follow history through the lens of thinkers like Du Bois, or b) live as a person of color.

Perhaps well-intentioned funders have tunnel vision about finding “the” solution. This leads to polite refusals to fund organizations that can’t produce rigorous evidence for their work or proof of historical injustice in their community. Their hands are tied. Board members require this. Internal processes require that. So it goes.

Perhaps there is more satisfaction in a report than an advocacy campaign that may not yield visible results for another five years.

Perhaps, to Rodney’s point, folks don’t actually want to do the deep work.

There’s enough critique about how funders operate (hats off to Vu Le), and in response, a growing movement of philanthropists practicing trust-based philanthropy. I’m more curious about what gets funded. Specifically the social sector’s obsession with field scans, ecosystem analyses, white papers, surveys, reports, and “general knowledge curation,” amounting to a wild goose chase to produce funder-approved evidence of the obvious. A strategic consultant and close collaborator of Common Future observed the following:

“I worked on a million-dollar project with a corporate foundation where recommendations for local investment sourced from dozens of community leaders were presented to the program officers. We asked if anything stood out to them and they told us no, none of the takeaways were new or surprising, but it was exactly what they needed to justify their strategy. As if that were justification for hours of underpaid labor in the community that the project required.”

Seeking knowledge is rational if innately human. I’m aware that this argument may not play well in a moment of anti-intellectualism and alternate facts, but I’m not promoting an end to evidence-based research. I’m just proposing a more thoughtful, (read: equitable) approach to the ways we curate knowledge and proportional investment in the solutions.

Jed Emerson, a leader in impact investing, is quoted to have said, “We fund endless studies to guide us toward a vague truth. Still the answer remains: We simply do not know.”

But communities do know, even if the answer isn’t packaged in a five-point plan or investment opportunity. What if we leaned into trust? What do we have to lose by shifting more capital to communities of color? I’d bet this approach would be less paternalistic and more prudent than a relentless search for answers.

Next week, I’ll share ways to rethink, not disavow, our obsession with data. If you have thoughts on this, I’d love to hear from you: caitlin@commonfuture.co

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What’s Up This Week? 👀 ✨

Caught my attention

Stop what you’re doing and go listen to this interview of Nikole Hannah-Jones and Ta-Nehisi Coates by Ezra Klein. They get into the fight over U.S. history, the ties between journalism and democracy, and more. It’s an honest conversation between some of our generation’s greatest minds. I finished it and hit rewind.

A bit of sad news for the community ownership movement. Community leaders lost their bid for The Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza. This commercial property in Los Angeles came up for sale in 2020, prompting local community groups to mount a strong organizing effort to purchase the mall. Oscar Perry Abello has a brilliant piece on this. Downtown Crenshaw Rising eventually raised over $115 million, the highest bid for the property, but their bid was denied in favor of local developer Harridge Development Group, “which has financial backing from Russian American billionaire oil tycoon Leonard Blavatnik.” You can read more in Colorlines.

I’ve talked about MoneyStuff before, but I especially enjoyed/shuddered in disgust at this piece explaining how the wealthy fund their lavish lifestyles by borrowing against their wealth instead of spending down their assets and paying capital gains tax. This isn’t new, but it demonstrates a startling trend where loans made by wealth management arms of major banks are waaaay up in comparison to consumer and corporate loans. Also covered: how banks are moving away from credit scores to using proprietary data. Some banks are asking what consumers plan to use loans for and rating them higher for “credit-positive” purchases… like Peletons. This is definitely what we asked for when we said reform credit scores. 🙄

John Oliver’s recent segment on the wealth gap. He focuses on land discrimination and the ways that state-sponsored racism (redlining, land seized through eminent domain, GI Bill discrimination) has produced the racial wealth gap. It’s comedy, but also a fantastic overview of these issues.

A deep dive

A new report from the Council of Michigan Foundations (CMF) on donor-advised funds. DAFs work like this: rich people make charitable contributions to an account administered by a third party, receive an immediate tax deduction, and recommend grants over time. The catch is that there is no timeframe for which that money must be deployed. This report concludes that in 2020—perhaps the year where public scrutiny on DAFs and the need for philanthropy were highest—22% of DAFs paid out less than 5% and 35% paid out nothing at all. Edgar Villaneuva and others have made compelling arguments for years that “DAFs Are a Monument of Wealth and Power That Must Come Down.” This report is just another data point to make that case.

Someone you should know about

You should know about…WEPOWER! From the desk of my colleague Melonie Tharpe, Common Future’s Senior Program Director:

“I love WEPOWER’s approach to tackling systemic issues in St. Louis. They bring together the power of organized communities and put pressure on policymakers to support better schools and community benefits agreements while building their own economic power. They layer existing products like Kiva loans and business accelerators with elements of cooperative and collective ownership, even building an equity fund that keeps BIPOC founders in charge of invested companies and encourages higher wages over higher returns. They model exactly the type of layered approach that we need.”

until next time,
Caitlin