12/4/2020 Donor Intent at the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative

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Donor Intent at the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative

Dec 04, 2020
Joanne Florino

You may have read in the past few months that the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI) is under re for its
allegedly inadequate response to the call for racial justice. In June a group of the organization’s black
employees sent a letter to Priscilla Chan (who runs the operations of CZI) accusing her and her husband,
Mark Zuckerberg, of failing to uphold their commitment “to making CZI a more diverse, inclusive, and
equitable organization.”

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12/4/2020 Donor Intent at the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative

In mid-August the Washington Post ran a piece on CZI’s “race problem” that detailed complaints about both
internal employment practices and the philosophy driving CZI’s grantmaking. At the end of August,
Ray Holgado, who had joined CZI in September 2018, resigned from his position as program of cer in the
Criminal Justice Reform team. And on November 9, he led a racial discrimination claim against CZI with the
California Department of Fair Employment and Housing.

In a piece Holgado recently authored, “Performative Philanthropy and the Cost of Silence,” he lays out
his case against CZI, mixing allegedly discriminatory practices toward black employees with his concerns
that CZI “did not value [his] professional expertise, identity, or lived experience.” These are two very different
things. It would be inappropriate and unfair to discuss the employment complaints that Holgado has lodged
against CZI here; they will be reviewed and decided elsewhere. His complaints about his inability to
in uence the philosophy behind CZI’s grantmaking, however, involve questions around governance and
power in philanthropy that do warrant our comment.

Holgado is particularly dismayed that CZI’s grantmaking “operates devoid of racial analysis,” pointing
particularly to an admonition he received from a senior member of the Criminal Justice Reform team. “I was
warned,” he writes, “…that I should avoid pushing for grantmaking strategies that centered racial equity,
as Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan did not believe race was relevant to the issue of mass
incarceration.” Twice in 2019, Holgado proposed bringing Edgar Villanueva, philanthropy executive and
author of Decolonizing Wealth, to speak at CZI, and twice his suggestion was declined. That he was frustrated
is understandable. And he certainly has a right to his opinion that it is “irresponsible and dangerous for an
organization of [CZI’s] magnitude and in uence to operate without care or consideration for race while
tackling issues related to voting rights, housing, criminal justice, immigration, and education.”

But CZI’s donors also have rights, as discussed in Preserving Your Legacy: A Wise Giver’s Guide to Honoring and
Protecting Donor Intent. Given that CZI is not a private foundation but a philanthropic LLC, its donors have
maximum exibility and control to exercise their right to determine the organization’s philanthropic
direction based on their understanding of what will, or will not, be effective, and the right to bring on
staff members who will assist them in pursuing that direction.

Yes, they should listen to and consider other voices, including those of the communities they seek to
serve, those of their program (and other) staffers, and those of other philanthropic leaders. They would most
certainly nd a broad variety of opinions about how best to move forward in their areas of focus and about
the wisdom of viewing their grantmaking through a racial lens. But in the end, CZI’s grantmaking will—and
should—represent the nal decisions made by Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg.

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