Having just finished my first year of teaching law at the University of North Carolina, I’m thinking about what I can do to be a better teacher of topics like the law of nonprofit organizations. One thing is certain: I have to resist my urge to oversimplify complex issues.
In discussing with students the nature of charity in the United States, I suggested that there are two kinds: alms to the poor that make us feel good but do little to relieve suffering, and strategic philanthropic investment that encourages individuals and communities to empower themselves and challenge and reform the structures that cause them to be poor. My point was that the first kind of charity is bad, the second kind is good, and that our country’s legal system tends to promote the bad kind.
That is, of course, a ridiculously pared-down version of a complex issue. I am fully aware that the nature of charity is as much a question of spirituality and emotion as of law; but how can one fit all that into a 50-minute class period?
Looking back, I realize that I could have drawn on a story from my own recent experience that might have helped illustrate how maddeningly and wonderfully complicated the theory and practice of charity is.
The story is recent, but its roots go back to 1986 when I was a Peace Corps volunteer in the West African republic of Niger, one of the world’s poorest countries. I lived in a small village in the bush, but periodically I would ride my government-issue, cherry-red motorcycle into the capital to do errands, stopping at the bank, post office, and street market.
At each of these stops a crowd of beggars, many of them grievously crippled, would limp, wheel, and skitter toward me yelling, “C’est moi le gardien!” They wanted to “guard” my motorcycle while I did my errands, with the understanding that the appointed “gardien” would collect a small payment when my shopping was complete. Like squeegee men in New York City, they were offering an unneeded service for a fee as a dignified alternative to asking for money.
In my early days in Niger, I was appalled by the commotion that the beggars caused. Giving them money, I thought, would do little good beyond furnishing them with their next meal. I could accomplish far more by using my money and energy to build wells, start vegetable gardens, and stock local schools with materials. I should focus on attacking the causes of poverty. Besides, from the perspective of an American, all that street begging was downright unseemly.
I did not yet understand that begging by the needy has an honored place in the religious and cultural traditions of Niger. Nor did I understand that people of means in Niger feel a sense of obligation to give as much as they can to the less fortunate, including those who beg on the street. Perhaps most important, I did not yet understand that it was not they but I who was causing the commotion with my ostentatious motorcycle, my Ray-Ban glasses, and my L.L. Bean backpack brimming with goods that were beyond the means of most Nigeriens.
Long before I understood any of this, I solved my problem with the beggars by establishing a sort of business relationship with one or two at each of my stops. At the sound of my motorcycle, the crowd would look up and prepare to surge, but when they saw who was driving, only those with whom I did regular business would come forward. Over time, I developed an understanding that the beggars and I were playing our appropriate roles. They were needy, and it was right that they should be asking for money. From their perspective, I was ridiculously wealthy. It therefore was my legitimate role to respond to their requests generously. At some point during my stay in Niger I got over my very American discomfort and resentment at being asked for money by people on the street. When I had money, I gave freely.
In 1988, after a bit more than two years in Niger, I returned to the United States, and I then went to law school, married, had children, and bought a house. I did not often think of my gardien friends, though occasionally the sight of a red motorcycle or a man in a wheelchair would bring them to mind.
Then, earlier this year, I received a grant to return to Niger for a month to study African law.
On my last afternoon in the country, I visited one of the capital’s tourist markets to buy gifts for friends and family. I walked slowly down a dirt lane lined with tin-shed “boutiques,” poking my head into each to view the wares. It took an hour or so of shopping and fierce bargaining to fill my bag with trinkets. I was heading for a taxi stand when a man across the road hailed me.
“My friend, you have not yet looked in my shop. Please come and see.” I was about to decline, but when I glanced over I saw that he was in a wheelchair. For some reason -- pity, curiosity, the faint memory that handicapped people in Niger are known for their excellent artisanship -- I trotted across the lane.
In the man’s shed I saw some well-made, brightly colored leather key chains. “How much?” I asked him. I did not look directly at him, partly because I was trying to convey indifference and thereby establish my bargaining position, and partly because he was still out on the lane in his wheelchair. He replied, “How much will you give me for them?” This is a typical opening gambit by West African merchants dealing with tourists. I countered by naming a price that was too low by at least half.
“Okay,” he replied, “and pick out another one as a gift from me.”
Jolted out of my adversarial posturing by this unusual generosity, I looked directly at him for the first time. What I saw was a sweet, bright, and faintly familiar smile.
Fourteen years earlier, he had been my regular gardien at the post office. I would buy my stamps inside, and then he and I would sit outside, sipping sodas and talking about the affairs of the day. Now he was a prosperous merchant dressed in expensive robes and an el hajji scarf worn by Muslims who have made the pilgrimage to Mecca.
After exchanging customary greetings, I asked him somewhat abruptly, “How did you become such a big man?” He spread his arms and craned his neck forward, as if to indicate “Isn’t it obvious?”
“I saved the money people gave me at the post office, and when I had enough, I started my own business. Allah be praised,” he said.
We talked for a few more minutes, exchanged customary blessings, and parted with the promise that we would share each other’s company again.
That is where the story ends, at least for now. And if I am able to work it into my Nonprofit Law class next year, what point will it illustrate? Maybe that labeling any kind of charity as “bad” is silly. Maybe that trying to distinguish between alms and empowerment is impossible: I gave alms to my gardien friends, but at least one of them used the money to empower himself. Or maybe I’ll just tell the story, and leave it to the students to draw their own conclusions.
Thomas A. Kelley is a clinical associate professor in the law school at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.