PBC n. 1, "extra credit" reading

The first meeting of the PBC (Philanthropy Book Club) is on February 24/25 (time zone dependent). Members are reading Claire Dunning's Nonprofit Neighborhoods. As you‘re thinking about the role of the federal government, local politicians, community groups, and nonprofits in Boston 70+ years ago, you may want to think about some contemporary discussions of nonprofits, political parties, and politics in general.

The end of 2024 (weeks after the election) brought a slurry of punditry about the role that nonprofits and their agendas played in the Democratic Party's loss. Here's a selection of some of the writing that got a lot of attention:

Matt Yglesias on "How we got here," on his blog. (Yglesias is a pundit).

"Left organizing is in crisis. Philanthropy is a major reason why," Nina Luo in The Nation, in part responding to Yglesias. (Luo is an organizer and has worked with the Working Families Party and Representative Ocasio-Cortez)

Ben Soskis's response to the above. Posted on LinkedIn. (S0skis is an historian and writer for HistPhil. He's on special assignment with Independent Sector in 2025)

I'm sure there's more that's been written on this. Send me links and I'll add them here. Shout out to an inaugural member of the PBC for recommending this.

CAVEAT: There is no extra credit. There is no credit. The PBC is an independent conversation, not associated or affiliated with Stanford University in any way, shape, or form. There's also no teacher and no students. We're all in this together.