Does effective altruism drive private cross-border aid? A qualitative study of American donors to grassroots INGOs

Abstract

Given the multitude of outlets to which individuals can give their time and money, why do Americans donate to international causes? This research ties into larger discussions about the changes in the aid architecture and the role of private aid in particular. The contributions of the article are twofold. First, we seek to better understand how certain individual donors come to give to international development aid. Second, we discern altruistic motivations and behaviours attached to this giving and to what extent elements of effective altruism might explain them. Effective altruism emphasises rational and moral decision-making prior to donating in order to judge a donation’s cost-effectiveness – that is, to ensure that the effect of a donation is maximised. We use qualitative data from over 50 interviews with individual donors who give overseas across dozens of grassroots international nongovernmental organisations, participant observation, organisational archival documents and social media content. We find that donors who give to international causes give in response to needs overseas, as effective altruism would suggest. However, the ways in which they experience and calculate needs overseas are distinct from the cause prioritisation proposed by effective altruists.

Keywords:

• Giving overseas
• aid generosity
• philanthropy
• private aid
• effective altruism
• grassroots INGOs
• GINGOs

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 We have also elsewhere used Allison Schnable’s term ‘GINGOs’, grassroots international nongovernmental organisations, to describe these organisations (Schnable 2015; see also Davis 2020; Appe and Oreg 2020a).

2 For a well-rounded explanation of citizen aid, see the 2019 special issue of Third World Quarterly (Number 40, Issue 10) called ‘Citizen Aid: Grassroots Interventions in Development and Humanitarianism’.

3 As many have noted, NTEE codes are not without limitations (Schnable 2015, 318; Fyall et al. 2018). Some organisations are categorised based on the policy domain of their project(s) (eg youth, agriculture, etc.). Thus, there are many nonprofits doing international work and which are not coded as Q organisations only. See Appendix A.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Susan Appe

Susan Appe is Associate Professor of public administration and policy at Rockefeller College of Public Affairs & Policy at the University at Albany, SUNY, USA. Her research focuses on government–non-profit relations and the dimensions and evolution of the non-profit sector. She examines how government policy influences and shapes non-profit organisations/NGOs, how and why non-profit organisations form networks and their implications, and the relationship between civil society, foreign aid and development. She is currently working on research projects related to diaspora philanthropy as well as about the roles of public administration and non-profit organisations in mass atrocity prevention. Since 2020, she has served as co-editor-in-chief of VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations, an interdisciplinary journal and leading academic outlet for research on the third sector, publishing on topics related to civil society, non-profit organisations, social enterprise, volunteering and philanthropy.

Ayelet Oreg

Ayelet Oreg is Lecturer at The Louis & Gabi Weisfeld School of Social Work at Bar Ilan University, Israel. Her research focuses on altruism and maternal generosity. She explores the motivations for and process of bodily gifts, in particular formal and informal human milk donations. She examines the role of identity in organ and monetary donations and focuses on philanthropic giving as a means of coping with trauma and loss. In another line of research, she studies diaspora philanthropy and identity.