Philanthropy, in one form or another, has been evident in South Africa for many years. Soon after the 1976 Soweto uprising, corporate pioneers Anton Rupert and Harry Oppenheimer established the Urban Foundation as a private sector initiative to address poverty and encourage the development of an African middle class. In more recent times, people like Donald Gordon and Allan Gray have established significant philanthropic initiatives and formed partnerships which have built schools and hospitals, provided bursaries for materially disadvantaged students and seed capital for black entrepreneurs, and so on.
The new black elite has also been under pressure to give, and while some of them claim their lack of complicity in apartheid absolves them from any such obligation, many have responded. Some initiatives, like the Ploughback Trust, harness the collective resources of successful black entrepreneurs and professionals, while post-1994 individual economic success stories like Cyril Ramaphosa, Tokyo Sexwale and Patrice Motsepe have all established foundations through which they channel considerable resources to worthy causes.
The findings from this BoE Private Clients survey show that giving by high net worth individuals (HNW individuals) remains widespread. Findings show that 93.5 percent of those interviewed have given in one form or another. Many of those were found to give smaller amounts, typically on a charitable basis. However, the survey also showed that the tradition of strategic philanthropy established by the early South African philanthropists has been carried forward vigorously in recent years. But giving in South Africa has never been the preserve only of the rich. A survey carried out in 2003 indicated that ordinary South Africans were giving collectively about R930 million per month towards poverty alleviation and development. At the time, this represented 2.2% of the national wage bill, and was the second largest contribution per annum to poverty alleviation and development in South Africa after state investment.
Giving by the poor, however, is distinctive in two ways. First, as a result of their lack of resources, poor people tend to give time more than money (volunteerism). Second, unlike the more individually directed giving by the rich, giving by the poor is more collectively organised, being facilitated through stokvels, burial societies, collective buying clubs and the like.
Strictly speaking this giving by the poor is not philanthropy, in the sense of the voluntary giving of surplus resources to the poor. Rather, it is the poor themselves sharing inadequate resources within marginalised communities in order to survive their circumstances. Nor is this form of giving strictly speaking voluntary, since it is informed by patterns of obligation defined by the extended family, which serves as the basic social unit in many poorer communities.
Two final reflections are warranted. First, there are some who believe that social grants create dependency, inhibit innovation and entrepreneurship and should therefore be abandoned. This would be disastrous. Social grants are absolutely crucial for the survival of the poor and marginalised, especially in rural areas. So there is little doubt that charitable giving, as revealed by The Giving Report 2010, makes a valuable contribution. However, this form of giving is likely to address immediate symptoms of poverty rather than longer-term systemic change.
Secondly, philanthropy on its own cannot secure development and the alleviation of poverty. Indeed, it is worth noting that poverty, inequality and underdevelopment have worsened world-wide, even as civil society and philanthropy have greatly expanded. It is increasingly recognised, however, that philanthropy can have a positive systemic effect when it is partnership-based and integrated with accountable, people-oriented political and economic systems. The survey results showed some evidence of such partnerships, as well as of considerable contributions of time. This form of philanthropy holds the promise that those who have succeeded in generating their own wealth, will go on to assist others in making a sustained and positive societal impact.
Adam Habib is Deputy Vice-Chancellor: Research, Innovation and Advancement at the University of Johannesburg. This article draws on some of the findings from the book Giving and Solidarity, coauthored with David Everatt, Brij Maharaj and Annsilla Nyar, Resource Flows for Poverty Alleviation in South Africa [Adam Habib and Brij Maharaj eds, HSRC Press, 2007]
Source details: Nedbank Private Wealth Giving Report (2010)