My response regarded Ianâs proposal that GiveDirectly solve the problem by using Zakat funds to solely benefit Muslims and then using unrestricted funds to benefit non-Muslims (and operating expenses). The problem from the Zakat-funderâs perspective is whether or not GiveDirectly would use those earmarked funds to âfungâ with its unrestricted funds to benefit non-Muslims.
Letâs assume GiveDirectly has a goal of maximizing welfare with its money transfers. So, without a separate fund earmarked for Muslims, letâs say that there would be funding for a million ideal recipients (determined strictly by need, feasibility of conveying funds, and other strictly utilitarian factors), two hundred thousand of those happening to be Muslims and eight hundred thousand of those happening to be non-Muslims.
Letâs modify the hypothetical to say that some of this funding for one hundred thousand of those million ideal recipients is earmarked for Muslims. GiveDirectly could dutifully deploy this funding for these hundred thousand Muslims. With its unrestricted funds for the remaining nine hundred thousand, GiveDirectly can achieve the same disbursement result by transferring to the 100,000 remaining Muslims in its ideal set and transferring to the 800,000 remaining non-Muslims. From this hypothetical, if I donate an earmarked amount to benefit one thousand Muslims, GiveDirectly can shift its unrestricted fund to benefit 1,000 less Muslims and then it can benefit the next 1,000 people that would most benefit, regardless of religion.
Because money is fungible, GiveDirectly can use the earmarked funds to benefit those Muslims it would have helped with unrestricted funds (because some of the ideal recipients on utilitarian grounds will happen to be Muslims) and this will free up other funds to do whatever GiveDirectly finds to be most marginally beneficial (including benefiting non-Muslims). Thus, even giving to a fund earmarked for Muslims operated by GiveDirectly could have the practical effect of benefiting (even primarily benefiting) non-Muslims. This may or may not be acceptable to the Zakat-funder, depending on whether a technical or functional interpretation of requirements is made.
On the other hand, if GiveDirectly did not update based on the pool earmarked for Muslims, it would be failing to act to maximize welfare with non-Zakat funds, thus potentially upsetting its other donors who want cash deployed where it can do the most good.
If there were an organization totally separate from GiveDirectly that distributed funds, this would address some concerns of âfungingâ, although one cannot wholly prevent other actors from adjusting their behaviors based on such an organization. But with a separate organization whose books is not totally open to GiveDirectly, it would be more likely that the functional effect of donating would have the functional effect of mostly directly benefiting Muslims.
If a religious donor needs influence over the allocation of other donorsâ monies in order to make their donation consistent with their religious obligations, that donor really needs to find a religion-specific charity.[1] (From Kaleemâs comment in response to this one, it doesnât sound like most zakat donors would be in that camp.)
Iâd personally characterize a charity that didnât update based on the existence of zakat-restricted funds as using my (non-zakat) donations in a discriminatory manner, contrary to my own religious and ethical beliefs. So for instance, if 10% of the funds are restricted, and the charity would have distributed to 200,000 Muslims and 800,000 non-Muslims absent the existence of restricted funds, the 200K/â800K split needs to be maintained for me to continue giving to that charity.[2] If the balance shifted to maintain the counterfactual impact of the zakat donors, this means that the identity of some recipients funded with non-zakat funds has changed (and we already established in the hypo that giving to the 800,000th non-Muslim would do more good than giving to the 200,001th Muslim on the list). Thus, I donât think it would be possible for the same organization to satisfy both donors who wanted the counterfactual benefit from their restricted donations to accrue to their religious group and donors like me. I also suspect that my beliefs are fairly common among would-be donors, but canât cite anything for my hunch.
Accommodating religious beliefs can be a tricky subject to be sure.
If 30% of the funds were restricted, a 300K/â700K split would be acceptable. In that universe, it is clear that all the non-restricted funds would be going to the beneficiaries for whom it would do the most good without respect to religion.
I agree with your perspective expressed in the second perspective and further agree that a non-updating charity would be discriminatory and contrary to my values as well.
Not sure I agree with your characterization in the first paragraph. If the spirit of the rule regarding Zakat is that Muslims predominantly benefit, it seems reasonable to question whether an action whose value does not predominantly benefit Muslims (due to the reactions of other actors) is in line with that spirit. If the counterfactual of the world in which you have donated is one in which there are 80% less funds to non-Muslims and 20% less funds to Muslims, I can see why one might say your donation might not be Zakat.
I didnât intend for the first paragraph to state a personal opinion on zakat or Islamic law (which I am totally unqualified to offer). Itâs meant to be more of an up-front conclusion for the rest of the post.
Because thereâs no way to satisfy people who want the counterfactual benefit to flow predominately to their co-religionists and to satisfy people like me, people in the former camp should give to organizations that are openly designed and advertised to meet their religious needs. If someone like me gives money to the (hypothetical) Society for Effective, Zakat-Compliant Direct Cash Transfers to Muslims in Poverty, I canât much complain of surprise that my money was used in a way inconsistent with my non-discrimination values.
Yep, I see that youâre saying itâs unreasonable for Zakat donors to expect their donations not to influence other funders such that their donations counterfactually predominantly benefit Muslims.
I suppose I am just a bit surprised (and, if Kaleem is correct, gladdened) that such donations that may not have the the counterfactual effect of predominantly benefiting Muslims would still qualify as Zakat.
thanks for thisâI think I get it now. I think the points relating to the effects on zakat-donors and non-zakat donors are good ones, especially since I hadnât considered the effect on non-zakat donors a huge amount up until now.
With regards to Zakat donors: I donât think the majority of muslim donors would find this argument a reason not to donate. The thing they care most about is whether or not the entire amount of zakat they donate is reaching the hands of zakat-eligible recipients. There is a large amount of scholarship around the philosophy of zakat, and group/âsocietal upliftment is the primary non-spiritual goal. So I donât think the idea that there are spillover effects which benefit non-muslims would be an issue for most donors, since there is a general expectation that people who are not eligible recipients (e.g. Muslims who arenât poor) will experience positive effects too.
With regards to maximization-oriented non-zakat donors: Iâm not sure about this. I think in the scenario where GD somehow ignore the (hopefully massive) new restricted pool of funds, then yeah maybe this means that donating to GD stops being an extremely cost-effective thing to do. But I think the group of people who care very much about this either 1) donât donate to GD already, since we seem to have many much more cost-effective options available and 2) would be fine with that because itâd be a result of an influx of donations which are contingent on the new program and are counterfactually significant when thinking about âall the money given to effective causesâ.
But ⌠It seems unlikely that GD would react that way to this type of influx in restricted funding? Given that the realistic way which this would happen would be that GD set up a new muslim country-specific program (e.g in Bangladesh or Afghanistan), Iâd expect unrestricted funds to be used in the same way theyâre currently being used with respects to the various programs they already run? Maybe Iâm still missing something youâre pointing out here.
I think your point about new org vs GD benefits are right, but maybe also overlook many of the reasons why GD would be an appealing option to muslim donors (low admin cost and transaction costs, high transparency and accountability, track record) whereas setting up a new org means that these things arenât there immediately and might never be there to the same degree
I think that Givedirectly, where it has free hands, will try to direct cash to where it can do the most good. If many of the worldâs poorest are being served by the Zakat program, this will probably affect choices to some extent at a macro or micro level.
For instance, perhaps counterfactually to the Zakat-funded Bangladeshi program, such a program would have been funded with unrestricted funds (such unrestricted funds then being able to go elsewhere).
But I have no special insight into Givedirectly, just the general observation that if you earmark funds for anything that would otherwise be covered by unrestricted funds, that simply frees up those funds for the orgâs marginal priorities.
Re Zakat-donors: if they have no issue with their donations functionally benefiting non-Muslims too, thatâs great. I too would rather it all go under Givedirectly given its strengths.
Hi Kaleem,
Sorry, I wrote my previous response quickly.
My response regarded Ianâs proposal that GiveDirectly solve the problem by using Zakat funds to solely benefit Muslims and then using unrestricted funds to benefit non-Muslims (and operating expenses). The problem from the Zakat-funderâs perspective is whether or not GiveDirectly would use those earmarked funds to âfungâ with its unrestricted funds to benefit non-Muslims.
Letâs assume GiveDirectly has a goal of maximizing welfare with its money transfers. So, without a separate fund earmarked for Muslims, letâs say that there would be funding for a million ideal recipients (determined strictly by need, feasibility of conveying funds, and other strictly utilitarian factors), two hundred thousand of those happening to be Muslims and eight hundred thousand of those happening to be non-Muslims.
Letâs modify the hypothetical to say that some of this funding for one hundred thousand of those million ideal recipients is earmarked for Muslims. GiveDirectly could dutifully deploy this funding for these hundred thousand Muslims. With its unrestricted funds for the remaining nine hundred thousand, GiveDirectly can achieve the same disbursement result by transferring to the 100,000 remaining Muslims in its ideal set and transferring to the 800,000 remaining non-Muslims. From this hypothetical, if I donate an earmarked amount to benefit one thousand Muslims, GiveDirectly can shift its unrestricted fund to benefit 1,000 less Muslims and then it can benefit the next 1,000 people that would most benefit, regardless of religion.
Because money is fungible, GiveDirectly can use the earmarked funds to benefit those Muslims it would have helped with unrestricted funds (because some of the ideal recipients on utilitarian grounds will happen to be Muslims) and this will free up other funds to do whatever GiveDirectly finds to be most marginally beneficial (including benefiting non-Muslims). Thus, even giving to a fund earmarked for Muslims operated by GiveDirectly could have the practical effect of benefiting (even primarily benefiting) non-Muslims. This may or may not be acceptable to the Zakat-funder, depending on whether a technical or functional interpretation of requirements is made.
On the other hand, if GiveDirectly did not update based on the pool earmarked for Muslims, it would be failing to act to maximize welfare with non-Zakat funds, thus potentially upsetting its other donors who want cash deployed where it can do the most good.
If there were an organization totally separate from GiveDirectly that distributed funds, this would address some concerns of âfungingâ, although one cannot wholly prevent other actors from adjusting their behaviors based on such an organization. But with a separate organization whose books is not totally open to GiveDirectly, it would be more likely that the functional effect of donating would have the functional effect of mostly directly benefiting Muslims.
If a religious donor needs influence over the allocation of other donorsâ monies in order to make their donation consistent with their religious obligations, that donor really needs to find a religion-specific charity.[1] (From Kaleemâs comment in response to this one, it doesnât sound like most zakat donors would be in that camp.)
Iâd personally characterize a charity that didnât update based on the existence of zakat-restricted funds as using my (non-zakat) donations in a discriminatory manner, contrary to my own religious and ethical beliefs. So for instance, if 10% of the funds are restricted, and the charity would have distributed to 200,000 Muslims and 800,000 non-Muslims absent the existence of restricted funds, the 200K/â800K split needs to be maintained for me to continue giving to that charity.[2] If the balance shifted to maintain the counterfactual impact of the zakat donors, this means that the identity of some recipients funded with non-zakat funds has changed (and we already established in the hypo that giving to the 800,000th non-Muslim would do more good than giving to the 200,001th Muslim on the list). Thus, I donât think it would be possible for the same organization to satisfy both donors who wanted the counterfactual benefit from their restricted donations to accrue to their religious group and donors like me. I also suspect that my beliefs are fairly common among would-be donors, but canât cite anything for my hunch.
Accommodating religious beliefs can be a tricky subject to be sure.
Thereâs an exception in at least some cases: if the other donors specifically and knowingly consent to that influence.
If 30% of the funds were restricted, a 300K/â700K split would be acceptable. In that universe, it is clear that all the non-restricted funds would be going to the beneficiaries for whom it would do the most good without respect to religion.
I agree with your perspective expressed in the second perspective and further agree that a non-updating charity would be discriminatory and contrary to my values as well.
Not sure I agree with your characterization in the first paragraph. If the spirit of the rule regarding Zakat is that Muslims predominantly benefit, it seems reasonable to question whether an action whose value does not predominantly benefit Muslims (due to the reactions of other actors) is in line with that spirit. If the counterfactual of the world in which you have donated is one in which there are 80% less funds to non-Muslims and 20% less funds to Muslims, I can see why one might say your donation might not be Zakat.
*Note I know very little about Islamic law, etc.
I didnât intend for the first paragraph to state a personal opinion on zakat or Islamic law (which I am totally unqualified to offer). Itâs meant to be more of an up-front conclusion for the rest of the post.
Because thereâs no way to satisfy people who want the counterfactual benefit to flow predominately to their co-religionists and to satisfy people like me, people in the former camp should give to organizations that are openly designed and advertised to meet their religious needs. If someone like me gives money to the (hypothetical) Society for Effective, Zakat-Compliant Direct Cash Transfers to Muslims in Poverty, I canât much complain of surprise that my money was used in a way inconsistent with my non-discrimination values.
Yep, I see that youâre saying itâs unreasonable for Zakat donors to expect their donations not to influence other funders such that their donations counterfactually predominantly benefit Muslims.
I suppose I am just a bit surprised (and, if Kaleem is correct, gladdened) that such donations that may not have the the counterfactual effect of predominantly benefiting Muslims would still qualify as Zakat.
thanks for thisâI think I get it now. I think the points relating to the effects on zakat-donors and non-zakat donors are good ones, especially since I hadnât considered the effect on non-zakat donors a huge amount up until now.
With regards to Zakat donors: I donât think the majority of muslim donors would find this argument a reason not to donate. The thing they care most about is whether or not the entire amount of zakat they donate is reaching the hands of zakat-eligible recipients. There is a large amount of scholarship around the philosophy of zakat, and group/âsocietal upliftment is the primary non-spiritual goal. So I donât think the idea that there are spillover effects which benefit non-muslims would be an issue for most donors, since there is a general expectation that people who are not eligible recipients (e.g. Muslims who arenât poor) will experience positive effects too.
With regards to maximization-oriented non-zakat donors: Iâm not sure about this. I think in the scenario where GD somehow ignore the (hopefully massive) new restricted pool of funds, then yeah maybe this means that donating to GD stops being an extremely cost-effective thing to do. But I think the group of people who care very much about this either 1) donât donate to GD already, since we seem to have many much more cost-effective options available and 2) would be fine with that because itâd be a result of an influx of donations which are contingent on the new program and are counterfactually significant when thinking about âall the money given to effective causesâ.
But ⌠It seems unlikely that GD would react that way to this type of influx in restricted funding? Given that the realistic way which this would happen would be that GD set up a new muslim country-specific program (e.g in Bangladesh or Afghanistan), Iâd expect unrestricted funds to be used in the same way theyâre currently being used with respects to the various programs they already run? Maybe Iâm still missing something youâre pointing out here.
I think your point about new org vs GD benefits are right, but maybe also overlook many of the reasons why GD would be an appealing option to muslim donors (low admin cost and transaction costs, high transparency and accountability, track record) whereas setting up a new org means that these things arenât there immediately and might never be there to the same degree
I think that Givedirectly, where it has free hands, will try to direct cash to where it can do the most good. If many of the worldâs poorest are being served by the Zakat program, this will probably affect choices to some extent at a macro or micro level.
For instance, perhaps counterfactually to the Zakat-funded Bangladeshi program, such a program would have been funded with unrestricted funds (such unrestricted funds then being able to go elsewhere).
But I have no special insight into Givedirectly, just the general observation that if you earmark funds for anything that would otherwise be covered by unrestricted funds, that simply frees up those funds for the orgâs marginal priorities.
Re Zakat-donors: if they have no issue with their donations functionally benefiting non-Muslims too, thatâs great. I too would rather it all go under Givedirectly given its strengths.