Press Release: New Grant Available for Nonprofits
Posted on November 12, 2018Press Release: New Grant Available for Nonprofits
November 9, 2030
About & Background
The Chthulucene Grant aims to provide nonprofits the opportunity to explore an issue without a pressing need to come up with a solution. All too often nonprofits, driven by a need for funding, end up engaging in a constant push and pull between funding opportunities and project creation, and it is not always clear which came first: the funding or the ‘solution’. This new Grant has been created to fill this gap and allow nonprofits the time and space to live in the uncomfortable place of exploration and, hopefully, be an example of a new way of working.
The philosophy of the Chthulucene Grant comes from the notion of wicked problems as first described by Horst W. J. Rittel and Melvin M. Webber, as well as the writing of Donna J. Haraway in their book, Staying with the Trouble. (Donna J. Haraway’s book, Staying with the Trouble)
Wicked problems are problems surrounding society and the social good and approaching them requires a whole new toolkit. (Not ‘solving’ them as Rittel and Webber note, as “Social problems are never solved. At best they are only re-solved – over and over again.” (160)) Rittel and Webber identified wicked problems in the early 1970s within a shift in the professional’s job. Efficiency was no longer the end goal in problem solving, and even further, the ‘problems’ to solve were no longer as easily defined. The Chthulucene Grant pushes its nonprofit grantees to face the wickedness of their problems and some of Rittel and Webbers’ distinguishing properties of wicked problems are used below in the Scope of Work and Evaluation sections.
The Chthulucene Grant aims to respect wicked problems and transform them into a realm for nonprofits to travel within, for learn from, and to come to opportunities through, not against. Harraway defines Chthulucene as “a timeplace for learning to stay with the trouble of living and dying in response-ability on a damaged earth.” (2) The grant takes all parts of this definition to heart.
Scope of Work
Our task is to make trouble, to stir up potent response to devastating events, as well as to settle troubled waters and rebuild quiet places. – Haraway, pg 1
The above task is not an easy one, it is far easier to avoid the trouble, to run from it instead of stay with it. Nonprofits and government are expected to come up with measurable, affordable, solutions quickly. Time taken to go to the root of understand, to understanda, or to ‘stand among,’ is seen as a waste.
Below is a scope of work that the Chthulucene Grant deems critical to carrying out the above task. In your response please detail how you plan to incorporate each element into your work. We also wish that through laying out the below list, non-recipients will still take to heart the spirit intended. As such we’ve noted possible avenues to inject each of the below into a traditional nonprofit organizational setting in the hopes that eventually all working in the world of wicked problems can be free to stay with the trouble.
String Figures
Playing games of string figures is about giving and receiving patters, dropping threads and failing but sometimes finding something that works, something consequential and maybe even beautiful, that wasn’t there before… – Haraway, pg 10
The work that the Chthulucene Grant is looking to support must be a relationship. Any type of nonprofit mission or project should be founded upon a conversation, both sides operating in equity. A game of string figures won’t work if a hierarchy exists; both sides must know the rules of the game and be operating on the same plane. This valuable back and forth should extend beyond ‘research’ and into the creation, testing, execution, and evaluation of any project. Every problem is unique and the only way to understand the particular nuances is to form real relationships with those experiencing that problem. (Rittel & Webber, 164) Proposals should detail how such a relationship has been created and how it will it be sustained.
The practice of string figures can be brought into nonprofit practices through ongoing relations with clients and partners. There should be a constant conversation beyond the typical one-off user testing that many nonprofits utilize. Clients (this very word, while commonly used across different nonprofits is in itself problematic and establishes a hierarchy) should always inform the direction of projects, starting from their inception. On a higher level, how many nonprofits include a ‘client’ on their Board of Directors, or even further, how many members of BODs have ever even met or lived in a situation similar to a client? Changing this dynamic and devoting resource to real relationships is a step all nonprofits could learn from.
Making Oddkin
What must be cut and what must be tied if multispecies flourishing on earth, including human and other-than-human beings in kinship, are to have a chance? – Haraway, pg 2
It is easy to focus on the needs of humans, we’ve got plenty to address; however, not thinking about the whole is extremely dangerous. It’s simply a fact that humans aren’t the only actor or piece of the complex system that makes up the earth. It is thus impossible to truly stay with the trouble without making oddkin with other-than-human beings.
This also relates to the ‘Russian nesting doll’ nature of wicked problems. There is almost always a different problem sitting above or below, and determined to be causing the problem you are focusing on. (Rittel & Webber, pg 165) These relations can be vertical, horizontal, and diagonal, forming a web of connections. The Chthulucene Grant wants to see proposals that situate themselves within a larger multispecies ecosystem.
All nonprofits can afford to take a critical look at their wider system: how their projects are affected, how they affect others, and what unnamed beings exist outside of humans. Organizations can create partnerships with each other to form a dynamic that both supports and holds each other accountable. One nonprofit doesn’t have to do it all, but they should be aware of how their issue intersects with other actors in the space. Additionally, nonprofits can all move towards working in harmony with the earth and other-than-human beings through at least naming what those beings may be in their ecosystem.
Details Matter
There is no immediate and no ultimate test of a solution to a wicked problem.…Every solution to a wicked problem is a “one-shot operation”; because there is no opportunity to learn by trial-and-error, every attempt counts significantly. – Rittel & Webber, pg 163
There are no take-back-sies in the real world, especially in the world of wicked problems. No project is ever going to get it right the first time, but all organizations can take care to pay attention to the details, both before implementation but also after. What negative externalities may have been created? While this particular part of the scope is intertwined within all of the above points, the Chthulucene Grant is interested in how projects plan to take accountability for unseen consequences.
Organizations can start this process by thoroughly exploring how they are measuring the success of their programs and move away from the ‘typical’ measurable metrics. While those may matter to a degree, think outside the box and be ready to track the real impact of your work, even if it’s not what you want to see.
Conclusion
The Chthulucene Grant reimagines the funding process for nonprofits. This grant comes with few boundaries; there are no traditional budgets, deadlines, or mandated reporting. There should be no fear of straying from the grant mission or guideline; start with a thread of an idea and follow it where it may lead, “to find the problem is thus the same thing as finding the solution; the problem can’t be defined until the solution as been found.” (Rittel & Webber,161) But do not let this mean you are eschewed of responsibility for “planners are liable for the consequences of the actions they generate; the effects can matter a great deal to those people that are touched by those actions.” (Rittel & Webber,167) There are no trial runs and demonstrating a continued understanding of the weight of this response-ability is the only requirement if a grant is received.
– Lauren
Sources:
Haraway, Donna J. Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2016.
Rittel, Horst W. J.(1973). Dilemmas in a General Theory of Planning. Policy Sciences, 4, 155-169.