New Research! Poverty Porn, White Saviorism and Rethinking Fundraising

In collaboration with some brilliant research partners, I am working on some exciting new research for 2020. We are looking at the images that we are using in global social impact / international development — particularly the images that we are using to fundraise for our programming and to tell our stories.

Why images? Because of the old adage that a picture is worth a thousand words. As we continue to delve deeper and talk about the importance of diversity and inclusion and equity in our work, looking at our websites and our annual reports is a great proxy indicator to see if we are putting our money where our mouth is.

So, what are we looking at? We are looking to see if — despite the professed changes and a push to be more locally focused and participatory — if we’re still perpetuating the myth of an external savior sweeping in to save the day through the images that we’re using.

We are doing this by through using a critical analysis of images to look for things like if we’re still positioning aid workers as heroes; if there is a race or gender difference in how we portray aid givers vs. aid recipients; if we are continuing to sell images of people in dire circumstances who are simply waiting to be saved; and if we are using principles of dignity and respect in the images we are capturing.

This project was inspired greatly by the Radi-Aid Awards— if you haven’t seen them, please check them out: https://www.radiaid.com/.

And stay tuned for more info, or read more at: https://www.fnmadvising.com/research.