Thanks for laying this out. May help many to figure out what to do.
My view about a red line at the moment is that a charity should stop acceptingdonations once it’s know that a source is fraudulent. To avoid fraudsters deriving benefit from being associated with the charity. However, when the donations are in the past, there is only a very weak, if any, PR benefit for the fraudsters at hand. In that situation an important (and in EA context maybe the main) harm is that keeping the money by charity will encourage future naive consequentialists. So this indirect effect on one side, and the immediate harm to the causes on the other. It’s a tough call, glad I don’t have to make it.
It would be great if the current discussion leads to a clear precedent and it being clearly stated in EA charity policies what will be done in case of funder’s fraud. This would give the clear signals to the naive consequentialists and (in case of fraud) make decisions for charities easier. Actually I bet there are well described precedents and some guidelines available, is anyone aware of such?
Thanks for laying this out. May help many to figure out what to do.
My view about a red line at the moment is that a charity should stop accepting donations once it’s know that a source is fraudulent. To avoid fraudsters deriving benefit from being associated with the charity. However, when the donations are in the past, there is only a very weak, if any, PR benefit for the fraudsters at hand. In that situation an important (and in EA context maybe the main) harm is that keeping the money by charity will encourage future naive consequentialists. So this indirect effect on one side, and the immediate harm to the causes on the other. It’s a tough call, glad I don’t have to make it.
It would be great if the current discussion leads to a clear precedent and it being clearly stated in EA charity policies what will be done in case of funder’s fraud. This would give the clear signals to the naive consequentialists and (in case of fraud) make decisions for charities easier. Actually I bet there are well described precedents and some guidelines available, is anyone aware of such?