Many thanks to TSW reader Woody who contributed this link to an Intercept article on the broader topic of management/staff meltdowns in “progressive” NGOs (doesn’t this make you wonder to what extent this is happening in other organizations?).
Again, a rather inflammatory headline and tagline:
ELEPHANT IN THE ZOOM
Meltdowns Have Brought Progressive Advocacy Groups to a Standstill at a Critical Moment in World History
(A critical moment in World History?)
Here are some excerpts:
In fact, it’s hard to find a Washington-based progressive organization that hasn’t been in tumult, or isn’t currently in tumult. It even reached the National Audubon Society, as Politico reported in August 2021:
Following a botched diversity meeting, a highly critical employee survey and the resignations of two top diversity and inclusion officials, the 600,000-member National Audubon Society is confronting allegations that it maintains a culture of retaliation, fear and antagonism toward women and people of color, according to interviews with 13 current and former staff members.
Twitter, as the saying goes, may not be real life, but in a world of remote work, Slack very much is. And Twitter, Slack, Zoom, and the office space, according to interviews with more than a dozen current and former executive directors of advocacy organizations, are now mixing in a way that is no longer able to be ignored by a progressive movement that wants organizations to be able to function. The executive directors largely spoke on the condition of anonymity, for fear of angering staff or donors.
“To be honest with you, this is the biggest problem on the left over the last six years,” one concluded. “This is so big. And it’s like abuse in the family — it’s the elephant in the room that no one wants to talk about. And you have to be super sensitive about who the messengers are.”
The human resources department and board of directors, in consultation with outside counsel, were brought in to investigate complaints that flowed from the meeting, including accusations that certain staff members had been tokenized, promoted, and then demoted on the basis of race. The resulting report was unsatisfying to many of the staff.
“What we have learned is that there is a group of people with strong opinions about a particular supervisor, the new leadership, and a change in strategic priorities,” said a Guttmacher statement summarizing the findings. “Those staff have a point of view. Complaints were duly investigated and nothing raised to the level of abuse or discrimination. Rather, what we saw was distrust, disagreement, and discontent with management decisions they simply did not like.”
A Prism reporter reached a widely respected Guttmacher board member, Pamela Merritt, a Black woman and a leading reproductive justice activist, while the Supreme Court oral arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization were going on last December, a year and a half after the Floyd meeting. She offered the most delicate rebuttal of the staff complaints possible. The human resources department and board of directors, in consultation with outside counsel, were brought in to investigate complaints that flowed from the meeting, including accusations that certain staff members had been tokenized, promoted, and then demoted on the basis of race. The resulting report was unsatisfying to many of the staff.
And having noted the previously noted the prominence of some foundations in grant-making with regard to our issues, I thought this was interesting.
The reliance of so many organizations on foundation funding rather than member donations is central to the upheavals the groups have seen in recent years, one group leader said, because the groups aren’t accountable to the public for failing to accomplish anything, as long as the foundation flows continue. “Unlike labor unions, church groups, membership organizations, or even business lobbies, large foundations and grant-funded nonprofits aren’t accountable to the people whose interests they claim to represent and have no concrete incentive to win elections or secure policy gains,” they said. “The fundamental disconnect of organizations to the communities they purport to serve has led to endless ‘strategic refreshes’ and ‘organizational resets’ that have even further disconnected movements from the actual goals.”
Beyond not producing incentives to function, foundations generally exacerbate the internal turmoil by reflexively siding with staff uprisings and encouraging endless concessions, said multiple executive directors who rely on foundation support. “It happens every time,” said one. “They’re afraid of their own staffs.”
How to work together again is, I’m sure, something these groups will ultimately figure out. I’ve done my time both mediating workplace disputes, and being involved in them. And certainly I’ve disagreed with management decisions, and had mine disagreed with. At our Kennedy School training, I remember one of our teachers saying something along the lines of “most team disagreements are caused by roles being unclear”; I don’t know if that’s the case here or perhaps people disagree with the roles. As a veteran of much smaller scale kinds of workplace conflicts, I have compassion, and wish the best, for everyone involved.
Here’s the money quote:
“The reliance of so many organizations on foundation funding rather than member donations is central to the upheavals the groups have seen in recent years, one group leader said, because the groups aren’t accountable to the public for failing to accomplish anything, as long as the foundation flows continue.”
As I mentioned in the earlier post on this subject, when you focus on hiring the elite due to their access to lobbying other elite to secure favors and funding you bring the culture of disdain for those who don’t belong to their “League.”
Here’s a paper that does a good job outlining the tensions. But, written from a business school perspective, predictably falls along the “oh jeez, those ‘dark greens’ aren’t to be taken seriously … it takes a village” approach. https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/136211/1362_Hoffman.pd?sequence=1
I tend to disagree. As the old saying goes … money is the root of all evil. When the chips are down, the PMC will always stoop to lick the boot of their paymasters. Sure, there are ‘exceptions’ to the rule. But the fact that they’re exceptions tend to prove the rule.
Thanks for this paper, Eric! At least corporations are somewhat responsible to their shareholders and customers. I’d like to see the same map for foundations.. who equally have money and equally would then require bootlicking, but to what end? And there’s so much foundational “dark ish” money, I don’t have the energy or talent to follow it.
PS I can’t find it but was reading something on Twitter on climate that said something like “there are two groups, one that thinks we need to get rid of capitalism to solve climate, and one who thinks the climate problem is so urgent we can’t wait to overthrow capitalism.”
Something like this Sharon?
https://twitter.com/jeremycorbyn/status/1545038685917237248?s=20&t=Yn0T6N6qEUkP8piUtyLgkg
Or, this?
https://twitter.com/TheRealWebstir/status/1164291146299764736?s=20&t=Ctjoca9nNbF01TI784p1iA
Here’s an essay from the California Chaparral Institute Executive Director Richard W. Halsey on why he’s ending his Sierra Club membership.
https://californiachaparralblog.wordpress.com/2022/07/06/deserting-nature-for-identity-politics-why-im-resigning-from-the-sierra-club-after-52-years/
“The Sierra Club’s lead mission, one that has inspired so many to fight for Nature, “To explore, enjoy, and protect the wild places of the earth,” is no longer reflected by the Club’s values, goals, or actions. Instead, the Club is equating polarizing political positions with the protection of old-growth forests, saving endangered species, and helping inspire people to love Nature, creating an exclusive group that shames those who do not align with its opinions on divisive cultural issues.”
…
* The Club’s new Core Values lead with a commitment “to shifting power away from white supremacy, repairing harm, and ending structural racism.”
* Nearly every statement in the Club’s 2030 Strategic Plan is written through the lens of systematic racism.
* The list of the Club’s historical accomplishments are now being qualified with references to race.
* Four out of six of the Club’s action campaigns and two of its three “Happening Now” alerts on its website at the end of June, 2022, highlighted racial/personal liberty issues, not environmental protection.
* The Club’s recent article on abortion by its managing director, Eva Hernandez-Simmons, proclaims that, “the Club is committed to rising with our allies to counter the hateful ideology of ecofascism,” and connects the recent misguided Supreme Court decision on abortion with encouraging more white infants, “so white racial dominance can continue.”
The left’s theory is that by dividing people into smaller constituent groups it diminishes their power and distracts from class arguments. The liberal elite love their money/power and fear more than anything else a true left populist revolt. Thus, attacking people like Sanders with far more vehemence than they ever seem to marshall against the right. Remember “Bernie Bros?”
Does anyone really think a jewish civil rights leader from back in the day is really a racist? Jeremy Corbin, a racist? No, on both accounts. But just take a look at the MSM articles that came out when they both began to gather steam trying to paint them as racist and anti-woman.
Pure establishment propaganda. It seems to be working quite well. We’ll see how things work out in England now that BoJo has departed No. 10. Something tells me the working class is beginning to catch on to the scam. And, possibly some Sierra Club supporters as well.
Anything to keep those money hoses pointed straight to the top.
It is amazing how racist much of the “woke” culture has become. This focus on guilt and victimhood according to skin color is concerning. I thought the Civil Rights Act was supposed to have resolved this problem and am bothered with recent emphasis on real and imagined racial differences.