A New Kind of Charity this Ramadan

Pakistanis are giving people, as Adil Najam concludes in his book Portrait of a Giving Community: Philanthropy by the Pakistani-American Diaspora. Surprisingly, Prof. Najam also concludes that we Pakistanis tend to underestimate our contributions to the causes we choose to support.

Every year during Ramadan, when Muslims attempt to reconnect with God and his people, the standard barrage of nonprofit TV ads appears targeting the kind and the guilty, kicking off the equivalent of the Christmas shopping season. Your Zakat dollars are more important than you may realize. They are the lifeblood of many nonprofits. According to one such organization, the month of Ramadan represents 35-40% of its annual donations. With such high stakes and so little time, once again the games begin. This year, with an overall economic slowdown and unprecedented global inflation, the stakes are even higher.

The formulas are tried and tested. Each charity tries to evoke one emotion or another, hoping to win the ultimate prize: your Zakat dollars. These enterprises understand that the psychology of giving is closely linked to emotions. If an organization evokes in its donors an emotion such as sadness, guilt or remorse, it can raise capital.

Herein lies the risk. Although I am supportive of many such organizations, I feel insulted by the number of badly managed nonprofits in our Pakistani community. Out of guilt or kindness, many of us open our wallets and donate money without asking questions. This practice has led to a plethora of ill-managed and unaccountable organizations.

This practice is not only inefficient, but also dangerous in this post-9/11 era. The less fortunate in our homeland deserve better, especially when there is so much work to be done. Every dollar wasted by unchecked nonprofits is equivalent to 100 pencils in a village school. With millions of uneducated, undernourished and sick children in Pakistan, waste of limited resources is not a simple matter of inefficiency.

Nonprofits serve our communities in areas where government has failed or never bothered to show up, and the communities are underserved and un-empowered. The role of such organizations was legitimized in the aftermath of the disastrous earthquake of October 2005, when nonprofits and charities raced to the affected areas and created the necessary supply and delivery networks, ultimately helping save thousands of lives.

Almost three years later, the work is not finished; there are hundreds of schools, clinics and other basic services missing in rural and even urban Pakistan. The work continues, and so does the support. Once more, this Ramadan, we are asked to contribute and, if Adil Najam is right, the community will do its part and donate generously.

The intent is not to marginalize the causes themselves, but to highlight the need for more transparency and accountability, and hence to create a demand for more evolved organizations.

In today’s connected world, conducting the necessary research is often a matter of a few mouse clicks. Many websites rate charities and nonprofits against industry metrics, and many offline resources exist for evaluating your favorite charity. One of these is Charity Navigator (www.charitynavigator.org). This site provides an overall organizational rating and also discloses such items as program expenses and executive salaries.

Most charities proudly list their IRS tax numbers in their ads as proof positive of their legitimacy. We must delve deeper and look further. For example, asking for copies of the previous year’s tax statements and copies of Form 990 may require a simple two-minute phone call to the nonprofit or charity office. If enough people asked for such information before donating, the behavior of many groups would improve.

We as donors are in control, and being vigilant and demanding transparency is not optional but imperative. We must learn to treat our donations as investments in the future of Pakistan and, as such, must demand better.

This Ramadan, perhaps the best charity we can offer is to learn more about our charities.