评论
打印
The Power of Philanthropy
慈善的力量
by Darren Walker (who is the president of the Ford Foundation)
文/达伦·沃克(福特基金会主席)
In the year before the March on Washington,
向华盛顿进军的一年前，
Martin Luther King Jr. prepared a series of sermons that would become the book Strength to Love.
马丁·路德·金准备了一系列的布道，那些布道后来都被收入了《爱的力量》一书。
This was King at his most prodigious and enduring, affirming that we “are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality.”
这是金最惊人也最不朽的时期，他断言，我们已经“被困在相互依存的网络里无法自拔。”
And, among these 1963 reflections, he challenged the origins and objectives of charity.
在1963年的这些反思中，他对慈善的起源和目标提出了质疑。
“Philanthropy is commendable,” he wrote.
“慈善是值得歌颂的，”他写道。
“But it must not cause the philanthropist to overlook the circumstances of economic injustice which make philanthropy necessary.”
“但慈善家不应忽视经济不公这一问题，因为经济不公才有了做慈善的必要。”
King’s words acknowledge a central contradiction:
金的话触及到了一个核心矛盾：
philanthropy is a creature of our market system’s unequal benefits,
慈善事业原本是我们市场体系利益不平等的产物，
and yet charged with addressing its prejudice and exploitation.
其肩负的任务却是消除市场体系利益的这种歧视和剥削。
They also guide us toward a new gospel of giving, defined by new tenets.
他的话也指引我们走向了新的福音——有着完全不一样的要义的，给予的福音。
Modern philanthropy dates to the Gilded Age, when Andrew Carnegie proposed a radical idea:
现代慈善可以一直追溯到镀金时代，当时，安德鲁·卡内基提出了一个激进的想法：
the wealthy should give from their gains to aid “the masses.”
富人应该拿出一部分所得来帮助“群众”。
Many other families endowed foundations in Carnegie’s mold;
许多其他家庭也按卡内基的模式向基金会慷慨解囊；
the Ford Foundation, which I am privileged to lead, has directed billions of dollars to promote democratic values and human welfare.
我有幸领导的福特基金会就已拨出数十亿美元用于推进民主价值观和人类福祉。
Today, “the philanthropist” might more fully understand—as King did—
今天的“慈善家”或许能更充分地理解，像金那样，
that while many of our efforts are good and even righteous,
尽管我们的很多努力都是好意的，甚至是正义的，
the supply of charitable giving cannot possibly keep pace with the demand for it.
慈善捐赠的供给依然根本无法跟上需求的步伐。
We might recognize that philanthropy is not one thing,
或许，我们会意识到，慈善不是一件事，
but rather a continuum that spans from charity on one side to justice on the other—
而是一个连续体，一头是慈善，另一头则是正义，
and that we must bend economic, social and political systems, the systems that made us, toward the latter.
意识到我们必须让经济、社会和政治制度，这些造就了我们今天的社会的制度，朝着后者的方向发展。
King’s calls of 1963 still reverberate in every village and hamlet.
如今，金1963年发出的号召至今仍回荡在每个村庄每个角落。
They must echo in the ways we give, as well.
它们也必须得到我们伸出的援手的呼应。
译文由可可原创，仅供学习交流使用，未经许可请勿转载。
