I worry that Sarah Constantin’s article will make an existing problem worse. The effective altruism community is made up of people who understand that politics isn’t their comparative advantage. But sour grapes transforms this into ‘and also, politics is The Dark Arts and if you do it you’re Voldemort.’
GiveWell needs to make charity recommendations based on what’s true, not based on what it can sell. But effective altruism as a whole is a political project. If it’s to become more than a hobby, it needs to use political power to change the way existing institutions (charities, aid organizations, governments, large companies) allocate their resources. And doing that means politics.
Keeping the political/persuasive branch of effective altruism from influencing or corrupting the truth-seeking branch is important. And expunging transparent lying (which is bad politics and bad persuasion) from the persuasive branch is important. But it’s also important that we be willing and able to manipulate the political institutions that hold all the existing power.
Anonymous #29: