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<p class="MsoNormal" style><b><span style="font-size:24pt;font-family:Times">John Hilary: UK charities have lost their radical soul</span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">War on Want's
executive director explains his sharp critique of NGOs in his new book The
Poverty of Capitalism.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">John
Hilary is not afraid of the big questions. As the executive director of <a href="http://www.waronwant.org/" title=""><span style="color:blue">War on Want</span></a>,
widely considered one of Britain's most radical <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/society/charities" title="More from the Guardian on Charities"><span style="color:blue">charities</span></a>,
he often speaks out on issues – from what he calls apartheid Palestine to the
nature of global capitalism – that few other UK NGOs will touch. His new book, <a href="http://www.plutobooks.com/display.asp?K=9780745333304" title=""><span style="color:blue">The Poverty of Capitalism</span></a>, carries in its title
conscious references to works by <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/karl-marx" title=""><span style="color:blue">Karl Marx </span></a>(The <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/society/poverty" title="More from the Guardian on Poverty"><span style="color:blue">Poverty</span></a>
of <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/philosophy" title="More from the Guardian on Philosophy"><span style="color:blue">Philosophy</span></a>)
and socialist historian <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/mar/06/ep-thompson-unconventional-historian" title=""><span style="color:blue">EP Thompson</span></a> (The Poverty of
Theory).</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">Published
last month, the book tracks what <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/profile/johnhilary" title=""><span style="color:blue">Hilary</span></a> condemns as the failures of corporate <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/globalisation" title="More from the Guardian on Globalisation"><span style="color:blue">globalisation</span></a>
and the rise of popular resistance movements worldwide. In what could seem a
deliberate attempt to set himself even further apart from other NGO bosses, it
also presents a sharp critique of mainstream British charities, which Hilary
condemns for choosing to cosy up to corporations and governments, rather than
align with grassroots movements such as <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2013/jun/17/la-via-campesina-food-sovereignty" title=""><span style="color:blue">La Via Campesina</span></a>, the international
federation of peasants' groups.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">"I
think this is a particularly British problem," says Hilary, sitting in the
basement of the refurbished London warehouse that serves as War on Want's head
office. UK NGOs have become very strong and very powerful, but the sector, he
says, is today overly professionalised and too focused on technical,
incremental change. It has "lost its political analysis, its
transformative ambition, and any radical soul", Hilary adds.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">Instead
of challenging the UK government, which Hilary characterises as increasingly
regressive and reductive in its approach to <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/global-development" title="More from the Guardian on Global development"><span style="color:blue">global
development</span></a>, charities are giving it "such an easy ride"
and appear to have been "seduced by power".</span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">War On Want protesters outside of the
flagship Adidas store in Oxford Street, central London, during the 2012 London
Olympics. Photograph: War On Want </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">It
was not always like this, he says, pointing to the 1980s when mainstream UK
NGOs joined global movements such as those against apartheid in South Africa.
At that time, Oxfam and Christian Aid were, along with War on Want, challenged
by the <a href="http://www.charitycommission.gov.uk" title=""><span style="color:blue">Charity Commission</span></a> for having positioned
themselves politically in what Hilary describes as active solidarity with
groups on the ground. "Liberation struggles were once meat and drink to
the international NGO community," he adds.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">Today,
big NGOs are increasingly taking a seat at the table alongside government and
business. Development-speak is littered with references to partnerships and
multi-stakeholder initiatives. Hilary refuses to accept this as evidence of
progress and argues instead that even the most positive of such initiatives
eventually give sway to the demands of the most powerful.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">The
<a href="http://www.fao.org/cfs/en/" title=""><span style="color:blue">Committee
on World Food Security</span></a> (CFS) is one of the boldest experiments in
this area, bringing NGOs and farmers organisations to sit alongside diplomats
and company representatives to try to hammer out consensus on how to tackle
food and farming challenges. While praised by many as the most inclusive global
governance forum, there was palpable anxiety among some civil society delegates
at the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2013/oct/10/world-food-security-talks-hunger" title=""><span style="color:blue">CFS summit in Rome last month</span></a> that
the very vocabulary of partnerships and stakeholders can gloss over and even tacitly
accept the stark power imbalances between those at the table. After a week of
negotiations, <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2013/oct/14/un-biofuels-food-violations" title=""><span style="color:blue">civil society groups refused to endorse the
committee's final recommendations on biofuels</span></a>, saying the result
defended the interests of industry rather than the needs of small farmers in
poor countries.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">Hilary
has complained about mainstream UK NGOs before, and particularly around the IF
campaign launched before the 2013 G8 summit, which War on Want said had been
stitched up with the UK government and therefore refused to join. In The
Poverty of Capitalism, which Hilary insists is not a theoretical book, he puts
these complaints into context and charts how numerous attempts in recent
decades to regulate and hold to account transnational corporations have given
way to voluntary initiatives and corporate social responsibility projects
instead.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">The
high water mark of voluntarism came with the <a href="http://www.un.org/geninfo/bp/enviro.html" title=""><span style="color:blue">1992 UN Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro</span></a> which
"affirmed the principle of voluntary self-regulation as the dominant model
in place of corporate accountability", he writes. This "wholesale
abdication of responsibility", according to Hilary, has helped turn the
issue of corporate accountability into little more than a public relations
exercise.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">Hilary
winces at the suggestion his book will further isolate him from other UK NGOs.
While often brought on to panels and called into debates to give the
alternative view, Hilary is not the only one unhappy with the state of British
development work. A group called the <a href="http://progressivedevelopmentforum.wordpress.com/" title=""><span style="color:blue">Progressive Development Forum</span></a>, for example, of
which Hilary is a member, brings together those working in the sector to debate
how to reframe conversations away from aid, charity and philanthropy and
instead revive narratives of global justice and the need to tackle structural
drivers of poverty and inequality.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">"The
way the British public is being taught to think about international development
is still through the prism of the Live Aid generation, the idea of the generous
giver and the grateful receiver," says Hilary. "As NGOs, we have a
responsibility to look at how we are framing that story, and if we continue to
reaffirm that basic charitable framing, of aid, philanthropy, generosity, then
we will continue to reproduce supporters and donors who expect that."</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">Recent
campaigns on tax, for which some large UK charities have taken a leading role,
are a potential exception, says Hilary. "Tax campaigning is an important
example of the sort of structural campaigning that used to be absolutely
normal. Think about the 1980s, and all the stuff that was being done on debt,
linking up the debt crises in Latin America with the high street banks here,
all the stuff that was done on trade and investment campaigning."</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">But
while tax also offers an important opportunity to link struggles in developed
and developing countries, the focus has to go beyond tinkering with the system,
Hilary insists. "It's absolutely the right direction, but it needs to be
more ambitious."</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times">If
big UK charities can seem defensive, resistant to criticism and careful to stay
on message with glossy pamphlets, billboards, and armies of press and PR
officers, Hilary is quick to argue that, at least within organisations and NGO
meetings, people do speak very openly about these issues. "Within a lot of
these bigger agencies, these debates are raging. That's what gives me
hope."</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style> </p>
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