Co-founder of Maternal Health Initiative, a family planning organization incubated through Charity Entrepreneurship. Writer of Beyond Denial. Formerly worked on policy in the California civil service.
Sarah Eustis-Guthrie
Karma: 1,111
More EAs should consider “non-EA” jobs
Family Planning: A Significant Opportunity for Impact
A Few Strategies for Increasing Productivity
I disagree. IMO, many of the issues that EA faces when it comes to sexual harassment/abuse stem from aspects that are particular to the community itself. I did research for a book on this topic, and sexual misconduct and abuse thrive in contexts where power is more concentrated and there is less accountability; basically, the harder it is to speak up about someone, the more likely that their bad behavior will go unchecked and they will continue hurting people.
EA (particularly Bay Area EA?) tends to concentration of power among particular figures. And concentration of many kinds of power, including control over funding and job opportunities as well as things like social status. EA can also be pretty insular. If speaking up about someone means endangering your job and your friends, it’s harder to speak up. That’s not even getting to the fact that you might be endangering your housing situation, or might be worried about how it might affect your impact on the world.
These factors are not totally unique to EA—I spent a long time in the classical music world as well, and concentrations of power let countless bad actors off the hook. But I would say that they’re particularly severe within EA, and understanding the particular factors that worsen things allows for more targeted solutions.
The most common critique of effective altruism that I encounter is the following: it’s not fair to choose. Many people see a fundamental unfairness in prioritizing the needs of some over the needs of others. Such critics ask: who are we to decide whose need is most urgent? I hear this critique from some on the left who prefer mutual aid or a giving-when-asked approach; from some who prefer to give locally; and from some who are simply uneasy about the idea of choosing.
To this, I inevitably reply that we are always choosing. When we give money only to those who ask as we walk down the street, we are choosing to prioritize their needs over the needs of those whose calls for help cannot or will not reach us. The choice not to choose is really a choice to leave the decision to external factors.
Resources are limited. We must choose. The question is how, and this is the role of effective altruism.
This post articulates an essential component of effective altruism in an elegant way. It provides a simple metaphor that is helpful both for adherents of the movement to reflect on what effective altruism involves and to communicate with the public about the ideas that undergird the movement. This simple, powerful metaphor renders this post deserving of lasting attention.
The post itself could be stronger; I think there’s a reasonable argument that the post would be equally strong or stronger without the central example. An abbreviated version of the piece, consisting of the first full paragraph in conjunction with the final four, could serve as a brief overview of this sharp idea. However, that’s something of a quibble: the piece is well-written, and explores a brilliant idea. I’m grateful that I had the chance to read it, and I would highly recommend that others give it a read.
[Job] International Generalist at Maternal Health Initiative
It’s terrible to see how people have suffered due to harassment and abuse in the community. I think this is an important time for us to reflect as a community on what we need to be doing differently.
Some aspects of the problem are more easily tractable (clearer policies on reporting misconduct at orgs; better systems for responding to misconduct), while others stem from aspects of EA that are pretty deeply-rooted (centralization of power; blurry work/life boundaries and a high level of romantic/professional entanglements). Many people seem to be pretty bought into the more entrenched aspects I mentioned, but I feel that their downsides haven’t been sufficiently accounted for. At the very least, I think we need to more robustly account for their risks, and factor them into community norms and behaviors.
If you’re harassed by someone who controls your funding, and they’re also a beloved community member with high status, it’s going to be inherently so much harder to speak up. Yet many EA orgs have harassment policies that are poor or non-existent. Multiple people have told me that they feel such policies aren’t necessary in EA because this is a high-trust community with well-intentioned people. I’d argue that when personal and professional lives are so entangled, strong policies are more, rather than less important.
I’d be eager to hear what other actionable changes people feel would be valuable.
We will be publishing a journal article with our pilot findings that goes into all of the data and has much more advanced statistical analysis—we’ll be sure to share that here as well! We’re also planning to publish a commentary that focuses on our broader concerns on postpartum family planning and digs into that data. I totally agree that what we’ve shared here is just a small sliver of the data.
I’ve been involved with EA since 2015. I think there’s a lot of room for EA to do better when it comes to inclusivity, especially regarding gender (but also race/class/other identity aspects).
The gender skew in EA exacerbates a lot of the issues related to gender. The gender ratio varies a ton across different geographies and cause areas, but in my experience it ranges from roughly 50⁄50 to overwhelmingly male (70⁄30 male/female per 2020 EA survey). When I walk into a meetup and I’m the only woman there, that affects my experience. This was particularly the case when I was first getting involved with EA as a teenager: part of deciding whether you stay involved with a community is your answer to “am I welcome here? Is this community for people like me?,” and repeatedly having experiences where I was one of the only women present gave me the sense that this community wasn’t for people like me. That led me to engage less with EA, though I eventually returned; I suspect it’s more common for women and people from underrepresented groups to “bounce off” of EA like this. It is genuinely surprising in many ways that EA doesn’t have more women, as women tend to be way more involved in the non-profit sector more broadly. It doesn’t have to be this way.
But the gender skew also affects things when there are issues. If someone makes some comment that makes you uncomfortable and the rest of your male conversational partners laugh it off, that’s not super helpful. I think that, as a community, we should work to reduce the gender skew—through making EA spaces more welcoming to women, investing in mentorship programs, etc.—and actively take efforts to mitigate issues created by the gender skew. On a macro level, fewer women in the room when decision-making is occurring means that issues that affect women are less likely to receive their appropriate attention. That necessitates that institutions make a more active effort to pay attention to issues that effect women, collect women’s opinions on issues that affect things, and yes, have more women in the room when decisions are happening. On a micro level, note when you’re at a get-together and it’s overwhelmingly monolithic (in terms of race, gender, etc.). Pay attention to how that affects how you treat people in the non-dominant group.
(splitting into a second comment b/c of length)
This is a shockingly good website for a...hmmm… April 1st initiative. Looking forward to your impact, great work team!
That’s a good point. I don’t have any data on this (not sure if this is something addressed in any of the EA surveys?) but my understanding is that you’re totally right that most EAs are in non-EA jobs.
What I was trying to get at in my post was less the thought that more EAs should take jobs in non-EA spaces, but more the notion that discussions of career choice should take those choices more seriously. My title—More EAs should consider non-EA jobs—could be expanded to be “More EAs should consider non-EA jobs as a valid way of doing the most good.” But there was definitely some ambiguity there.
I think it’s valuable to distinguish between folks who take non-EA jobs out of EA-related considerations (i.e. “I’m taking this job because I think it will allow me to do the most good”) vs. those who take them for unrelated considerations (such as interest, availability, location, etc.). I would guess that both approaches are at play for many people. I don’t think that conversations of career choice talk enough about the former; I think they tend to foreground career paths in EA orgs and don’t talk much about the potential value of bringing EA into non-EA spaces.
I think individuals and institutions in EA need to do a better job of mitigating risks created by unequal power dynamics. In a previous job, I conducted research related to institutional accountability and sexual assault. One common theme is that the way that institutions and communities respond to bad behavior by key figures is shaped by their norms and systems, with certain attributes making accountability more difficult to achieve. In my opinion, there are several aspects of the EA movement as it currently exists—including the blurrier work/life boundaries for many folks, the outsize power of certain community leaders, the frequent reliance on ad-hoc rather than formal systems, and the movement’s small size—that make accountability particularly difficult, and I don’t feel that we have done enough to create systems that respond to these risks.
Let’s think through an example. (To be clear, this is entirely hypothetical.) Imagine that a woman is harassed by a prominent community leader. She works for a small EA org. Her boss is close friends with her harasser, and the org receives significant funding from his organization. She wants to say something, but she doesn’t want to threaten her job or their funding. Not only that, but most of her friends are in EA circles, and she knows speaking up would be divisive.
Some of the things that make this sort of situation more difficult in EA are based on parts of the community that would be difficult or undesirable to change. But some of them are worth changing, and the existence of all of them makes the creation of robust systems even more important.
I think it’s useful for institutions to think through these sorts of exercises. What if a major donor was engaging in bad behavior? An organization’s leader? To what extent would victims feel able to come forward? How likely would it be that the victim would face negative consequences from speaking up, vs. that the perpetrator would face real consequences?
There are always going to be bad actors. It’s up to communities and institutions to set up systems so that when improper behavior occurs (whether harassment, assault, etc.), it is more likely that bad actors will face accountability for their actions. With rare exceptions, the deck is stacked against the victim and towards the perpetrator; good systems can help reduce how strongly the deck is stacked.
What do these good systems look like?
Well-publicized, accessible systems (within orgs, community spaces, and events) that allow people to report incidents of improper behavior
Clear policies for how institutions will respond to reports, including how they will maintain confidentiality
Thoughtful procedures for reducing the likelihood of retaliation
Explicit conflict of interest policies for orgs and grantmakers
Robust governance systems
This is just a start, but hopefully a helpful one! These are conversations worth having.
Thank you for sharing this! Your and Jeff’s EA meetups were my first introduction to the EA community more broadly, and the warm and welcoming tone that you set made a real difference. And in a space that often felt very male and STEM-dominant, it really helped to have another woman to talk to from a direct-work background. You’ve done so much good for the community, work that may not have been possible if you had ignored your instincts way back then.
And I appreciate your candor; I know I tend to assume that people who have been more successful weren’t wracked with doubt in the past. It definitely helps provide some perspective.
Thanks for sharing this. I wasn’t very familiar with Giving Green and you bring up interesting points. I would like to push back against two of your points: 1) that progressive groups are the ones making climate change partisan, and 2) that searching for consensus is the best way to find legislative success in our current political climate. You say that “making climate change a partisan issue might look promising in the short-term given the current Democratic trifecta, though the wafer-thin majority and existence of the filibuster somewhat dampens the case even there, but in even the medium term there is an obvious and potentially very large downside to such an approach.”
Climate change is already a partisan issue. I’d argue that it’s partisan mostly not because of what progressive climate activists are doing, but rather because of right wing climate denialism. In my opinion, progressive groups dialing it down wouldn’t make the Republicans any less obstructionist, but rather further defang the left and create even less of a chance for change. Let’s imagine several scenarios:
Scenario 1: Republicans are obstructionist, most/all Democrats push for compromise with Republicans, orgs like CATF push for bipartisan initiatives, orgs like Sunrise don’t do much. Likely outcomes:
Republicans make minor concessions and mildly more progressive climate legislation passes, OR
Republicans continue to be just as obstructionist as they’ve been for the past 15 years and nothing passes (unless the filibuster is eliminated).
Scenario 2: Republicans are obstructionist, some Democrats push for compromise, while others push for more radical change in conjunction with orgs like Sunrise. Likely outcomes:
The issue becomes even more partisan and divided and nothing changes OR
Republicans and moderate democrats bow to strong grassroots pressure and strong climate legislation is passed.
This framing would suggest that strong progressive climate action would offer both higher risk and higher potential reward, which seems accurate to me.
My opinion is that it’s going to take a lot for progressive climate legislation to be passed, and I think if we keep saying “the Republicans are effectively controlling the narrative re climate change and that will never change, we have to push gently so as to not ruffle feathers,” we’re only going to get tiny amounts of change (or none at all). Climate change seems like an issue where we can’t afford to wait. Furthermore, narratives aren’t static; they can change! Think of cases such as the civil rights movement in the ’60s: changing the narrative around civil rights and achieving legislative success came not from finding consensus with recalcitrant segregationists but by an aggressive progressive movement willing to make noise. Of course, the analogy you choose makes a big difference. Feel free to share an analogy that would point to the opposite conclusion, but I’m having trouble thinking of one.
Thanks for reading, and I’m very eager to hear any rebuttals that folks have.
Thanks for sharing. He’s been one of my heroes for a long time, and I see him as having both strong overlap with certain EA ways of thinking and serious differences.
He was a person who had an unswerving commitment to justice and improving human flourishing. He recognized the utter injustice of health inequalities and was able to articulate that vision so that it could be understood by many folks who don’t typically care about the suffering of far-off people who look different than them. These ways of thinking are central to EA for me: the sense that we have no right to discount the suffering of far-off individuals, no matter who they are or what they look like; the sense that we have serious moral obligations that require serious commitment.
He was also a person who situated medical problems within sociopolitical contexts, and who believed that comprehensive solutions (i.e., investing in health systems across the board) were far superior to targeted interventions (i.e., bed nets). He was critical of approaches focused on cost-effectiveness, arguing that they were morally abhorrent. In this sense, he is obviously taking a very different approach to the traditional EA approach. But I think that some of his arguments are valuable counters to the EA emphasis on targeted interventions,illustrating as they do that targeted interventions are subsidized by existing infrastructure, and that some initiatives–such as the Partners in Health campaign against multi-drug resistant TB in Peru–can be initially non-cost effective but eventually change market pressures and norms such that, in toto, they are incredibly cost-effective. Farmer’s work reminds us that assessments of cost-effectiveness must take into account that inputs are not stable, and that initiatives can be transformative, and that if we zealously focus on short-term effects, we will miss out on opportunities for transformative change.
I don’t agree with everything that Farmer stated or fought for. But I think the EA community would benefit from the insights from his life and work. Paul Farmer is worthy of the utmost respect for his unwavering commitment to improving the lives of marginalized people, and his death is a tragic loss.
Thanks for sharing this. I’ve frankly been consistently surprised by the low proportion of content on the forum that currently relates to animal welfare. For example, most of the EAs I know—even those who aren’t focused on animal advocacy as a cause area for activism/career—are vegetarian or vegan, yet I’ve only rarely encountered content here that’s related to dietary choices. It seems to me that encouraging more engagement related to animal welfare and advocacy would be a great place to invest some time and energy!
However, I’m not sure if a sub-forum would be the best approach to that. I’m not inherently opposed; rather, I’m not sure if it would be the ideal first step. I think it would come down to identifying why it is that there isn’t more engagement: are online EAA discussions happening elsewhere, such as in FB groups? Is it a vicious cycle of the current lack of content furthering further disinterest/lack of engagement, as you suggest? A better sense of that could inform solutions: perhaps a sub-forum, as you suggest, or perhaps weekly posts on EAA topics, or concerted efforts to move discussions to here from existing forums. Just a few thoughts; thank you for raising this topic!
I think this is a really important area, and one I’ve been doing some research / thinking about on my own as well. Two recommendations: CE/AIM has a grantmaker training program that does great work in this space. This also reminds me of a SSIR piece by Ian David Moss about expanding the remit of EA: https://ssir.org/articles/entry/in_defense_of_pet_causes.
Agreed! Honestly, it seems strange to me that there aren’t more EA resources dedicated to getting ultra-wealthy people to contribute to EA causes. Perhaps it’s that it isn’t very tractable, or that it requires a highly specific skillset, or maybe even that it’s bad PR with too much potential for backfiring to be so blunt about it—but this seems like a HUGE opportunity that’s currently neglected. EA has been pretty successful from getting buy-in from a decent number of high earners—where “high-earner” is defined relative to the average American income (think tech folks earning to give). And there are a few ultra wealthy folks on board (e.g. the open phil funders). But getting even one or two more ultra-high net worth folks on board could have a monetary impact equivalent to thousands of people earning to give. Are people familiar with EA initiatives working on this? Or am I missing other downsides?
Thanks for the kind words! This is a great question. There’s a lot of uncertainty here but here’s a few thoughts:
Postpartum insusceptibility is likely a decent chunk of it—i.e. some women have “redundant” protection where they were already 100% protected from pregnancy, so the modern contraception does nothing in the short term, or they were mostly protected and the modern contraception only adds a small marginal benefit
For some of the studies, there was a higher contraceptive uptake at 12 months postpartum in the intervention group than the control but the contraceptive uptake in intervention and control groups was similar at 2 years postpartum—it seems that some PPFP interventions are primarily shifting contraceptive uptake sooner, where postpartum insusceptibility is a particularly strong factor.
Behavior related to family planning is really complex and can be unpredictable/unexpected. For example, the women who start using contraception because of a program are likely not a representative sample of the population; in fact, they may be skewed towards people who are at a lower risk of getting pregnant, because they’re more careful in other ways.
Fellow UChicago alum here, also from a house with hardcore house culture (save Breckinridge!) and I think your comparison to house culture is useful in understanding some of the caveats of GITV moments. Being part of an intense, somewhat insular group with strong traditions and a strong sense of itself can be absolutely exhilarating and foster strong cohesion, as you say, but it also can be alienating to those who are more on the edges. Put differently, I absolutely think we should encourage GITV moments, but that spirit can go too far. Once you start saying “the people who don’t get in the van aren’t real members of [GROUP],” that starts pushing some people away.
With EA as with house culture, I think it’s important to find a balance between cultivating passionate intensity and acknowledging that folks have other things going on and can’t always commit 100%; important to cultivate GITV moments but also acknowledge and build systems and traditions that acknowledge that you can’t always get in the van—and, furthermore, that often folks with more privilege can more easily get in the van. If you have a shift at work or have to care for your kid, you can’t go on spontaneous trips in the same way that a person with fewer obligations might.