Beware the Bait-and-Switch

The Canadian government recently estimated that Canadians are volunteering a lot these days – some $14 billion worth of free service to help numerous causes across the country and around the world. South of the border the numbers are also impressive. Recent statistics reveal that 26% of Americans volunteer - worth some $170 billion.

Who can argue with such citizen dedication and the desire to give back to community? Well, it depends on the effectiveness of such efforts. Both in the United States and Canada, the federal governments have been challenging their citizens to get increasingly involved and dedicate their time and money. Sounds noble, until we realize that governments north and south of the border are slowly abandoning government commitments to the marginalized, the environment, and numerous other sectors that are pivotal to our overall national quality of life. The backdrop to all of this is that governments are now preparing to do less than the previous era, so naturally they will be asking civil society, with all of its millions of volunteers, to pick up the slack.The obvious difficulty with this logic is that there is simply no way average citizens can make up for the systemic support provided by governments over the past six decades. Part of the reason America is struggling under increasing strain is that, historically, such efforts were left more to the private sector than government investments. Charitable organizations in the US have been historically vibrant and well-supported. Citizens south of the border are now discovering that the broad net of charities, private donations, and citizen volunteering activities are nowhere near enough to stop the decline. With the Canadian government now putting an end to post-World War Two commitments that brought stability, diversity and remarkable growth to this country, we are about to discover that there will never be enough volunteers or donations to make up for the resources once invested though proper government accountability and responsibility.Once governments bail, you increasingly hear of how it’s time to find real solutions to some age-old problems. It what seems to be a recycled pattern, governments get to downloading significant problems on local communities at the same time as they demand better performance from charities and local levels of government alike. It’s a diabolical bargain and, as we witnessed in the 1980s, results in undue strain on the very groups and volunteers left to pick up the pieces left over from government abandonment.In my community of London, Ontario we have undertaken conferences on discovering new ways to get people out of poverty through social innovation, cooperation, and the expanded inclusion of the private sector. There are some remarkable new programs out there that are destined to provide hope and a sense of financial security for people normally entrapped in poverty, the mental health cycle, homelessness and unemployment. These should be supported and encouraged wherever they are implemented or discussed.Yet there is one outstanding issue in all this that needs to be addressed. As national governments continue their incremental isolation from the lives of their citizens, who will call them to account for their declining responsibility to the marginalized? Since it’s well known that private efforts can never make up for the full-scale of support once offered by governments, who will make up for the gap, or those abandoned without proper support? Let’s suppose that 20% - a generous sum - of those trapped in poverty discover new channels to employment or social and financial security. Behind all the trumpeting of success and laurels for the innovators lies the critical mass of people who never did get the proper attention to deal with their entrapment in poverty. And if governments don’t challenge the present financial order where the few make the money while the rest scramble for the scraps, it will be inevitable the unemployment will remain stubbornly high and that those falling into financial insecurity will quickly fill the ranks of those who have just escaped poverty through the new innovations. It will only lead to a vicious cycle of decline and disillusionment.It's the old “bait and switch” and governments and corporations have been using it for a long time. The term is described as, “a sales tactic in which a bargain-priced item is used to attract customers who are then encouraged to purchase a more expensive similar item.”We have been reminded repeatedly that entrenched poverty costs us billions each year, or that the lack of environmental action has the ability to bankrupt wealthy nations, yet we’re told to give or volunteer more as a means for making up for government and corporate failure. We’re being offered a bargain by the powers that be: government programs are too expensive, and so replace them with citizen activism and charitable corporate donations. That’s where the innovation lies, and likely success, we are told.It’s a fool’s errand. For every person that gets out of the swamp another will succumb to its pull. The more the financial capacity of citizens declines, the less they will have to give to charitable ventures. Should the anti-poverty conferences move ahead with innovation but refuse to effectively advocate governments for the critical mass of the marginalized then they will ultimately fail in their efforts. Researched and effective advocacy must remain a staple of any such venture. To do less is to fall for the bait and switch. We’ve been down that road before and we’re still trying to recover from the last round of mistakes.