Aaron Horvath’s piece in the fall issue of The Hedgehog Review is excellent. And it comes full circle from start and finish.

I remember sitting in the library and reading Ken Stern’s With Charity for All for a class discussion on genocide and humanitarian aid. It’s the appearance, the charade of excellence, not genuine need that generates big gifts, as Jack Shakely reminds us in a review of Stern’s book. Horvath reminds us that the trouble that plagues charities goes much deeper than the obvious scams. The charade of excellence is a feature, not a bug.

It’s a thin line… between a reality described by their abstractions and a reality constituted by their abstractions. And the more they, and we, fall under the spell of the latter, the more difficult it becomes to imagine how else we might contribute to meaningful social change.

A few other quotes here, one of which made me laugh out loud.