[A-List] Do Capitalists Fund Revolutions? (Part 1 of 2)

["james daly" <james.irldaly@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

        ZNet | Activism

        Do Capitalists Fund Revolutions? (Part 1 of 2)

        by Michael Barker; September 04, 2007

    To date capitalists have financially supported two types of revolution: 
they have funded the neoliberal revolution to "take the risk out of 
democracy",[1] and they have supported/hijacked popular revolutions (or in 
some cases manufactured 'revolutions') in countries of geostrategic 
importance (i.e. in counties where regime change is beneficial to 
transnational capitalism).[2] The former neoliberal revolution has, of 
course, been funded by a hoard of right wing philanthropists intent on 
neutralising progressive forces within society, while the latter 'democratic 
revolutions' are funded by an assortment of 'bipartisan' 
quasi-nongovernmental organizations, like the National Endowment for 
Democracy (NED), and private institutions like George Soros' Open Society 
Institute.

    The underlying mechanisms by which capitalists hijack popular 
revolutions has been outlined in William I. Robinson's seminal book, 
Promoting Polyarchy: Globalization, US Intervention, and Hegemony (1996), 
which examines elite interventions in four countries - Chile, Nicaragua, the 
Philippines, and Haiti.[3] Robinson hypothesized that as a result of the 
public backlash (in the 1970s) against the US government's repressive and 
covert foreign policies, foreign policy making elites elected to put a 
greater emphasis on overt means of overthrowing 'problematic' governments 
through the strategic manipulation of civil society. In 1984, this 
'democratic' thinking was institutionalised with the creation of the 
National Endowment for Democracy, an organisation that acts as the 
coordinating body for better funded 'democracy promoting' organisations like 
US Agency for International Development and the Central Intelligence Agency. 
Robinson observes that:

    ".the understanding on the part of US policymakers that power ultimately 
rests in civil society, and that state power is intimately linked to a given 
correlation of forces in civil society, has helped shape the contours of the 
new political intervention. Unlike earlier US interventionism, the new 
intervention focuses much more intensely on civil society itself, in 
contrast to formal government structures, in intervened countries. The 
purpose of 'democracy promotion' is not to suppress but to penetrate and 
conquer civil society in intervened countries, that is, the complex of 
'private' organizations such as political parties, trade unions, the media, 
and so forth, and from therein, integrate subordinate classes and national 
groups into a hegemonic transnational social order. This function of civil 
society as an arena for exercising domination runs counter to conventional 
(particularly pluralist) thinking on the matter, which holds that civil 
society is a buffer between state domination and groups in society, and that 
class and group domination is diluted as civil society develops."[4]

    Thus it is not too surprising that Robinson should conclude that the 
primary goal of 'democracy promoting' groups, like the NED, is the promotion 
of polyarchy or low-intensity democracy over more substantive forms of 
democratic governance.[5] Here it is useful to turn to Barry Gills, Joen 
Rocamora, and Richard Wilson's (1993) work which provides a useful 
description of low-intensity democracy, they observe that:


    "Low Intensity Democracy is designed to promote stability. However, it 
is usually accompanied by neoliberal economic policies to restore economic 
growth. This usually accentuates economic hardship for the less privileged 
and deepens the short-term structural effects of economic crisis as the 
economy opens further to the competitive winds of the world market and 
global capital. The pains of economic adjustment are supposed to be 
temporary, preparing the society to proceed to a higher stage of 
development. The temporary economic suffering of the majority is further 
supposed to be balanced by the benefits of a freer democratic political 
culture. But unfortunately for them, the poor and dispossessed cannot eat 
votes! In such circumstances, Low Intensity Democracy may 'work' in the 
short term, primarily as a strategy to reduce political tension, but is 
fragile in the long term, due to its inability to redress fundamental 
political and economic problems."[6]

    So while capitalists appear happy to fund the neoliberal 'revolution', 
or geostrategic revolutions that promote low-intensity democracy, the one 
revolution that capitalists will not bankroll will be the revolution at 
home, that is, here in our Western (low-intensity) democracies: a point that 
is forcefully argued in INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence's (2007) 
book The Revolution Will Not Be Funded. Of course, liberal-minded 
capitalists do support efforts to 'depose' radical neoconservatives, as 
demonstrated by liberal attempts to oust Bush's regime by the Soros-backed 
Americans Coming Together coalition.[7] But as in NED-backed strategic 
'revolutions,' the results of such campaigns are only ever likely to promote 
low-intensity democracy, thereby ensuring the replacement of one 
(business-led) elite with another one (in the US's case with the Democrats).

    So the question remains: can progressive activists work towards creating 
a more equitable (and participatory) world using funding derived from those 
very groups within society that stand to lose most from such revolutionary 
changes? The obvious answer to this question is no. Yet, if this is the 
case, why are so many progressive (sometimes even radical) groups accepting 
funding from major liberal foundations (which, after all, were created by 
some of Americas most successful capitalists)?

    Several reasons may help explain this contradictory situation. Firstly, 
it is well known that progressive groups are often underfunded, and their 
staff overworked, thus there is every likelihood that many groups and 
activists that receive support from liberal foundations have never even 
considered the problems associated with such funding.[8] If this is the case 
then hopefully their exposure to the arguments presented in this article 
will help more activists begin to rethink their unhealthy relations with 
their funders'.

    On the other hand, it seems likely that many progressive groups 
understand that the broader goals and aspirations of liberal foundations are 
incompatible with their own more radical visions for the future; yet, 
despite recognizing this dissonance between their ambitions, it would seem 
that many progressive organizations believe that they can beat the 
foundations at their own game and trick them into funding projects that will 
promote a truly progressive social change. Here it is interesting to note 
that paradoxically some radical groups do in fact receive funding from 
liberal foundations. And like those progressive groups that attempt to trick 
the foundations, many of these groups argue that will take money from anyone 
willing to give it so long as it comes with no strings attached. These final 
two positions are held by numerous activist organizations, and are also 
highly problematic. This is case because if we can agree that it is unlikely 
that liberal foundations will fund the much needed societal changes that 
will bring about their own demise, why do they continue funding such 
progressive activists?

    Despite the monumental importance of this question to progressive 
activists worldwide, judging by the number of articles dealing with it in 
the alternative media very little importance appears to have been attached 
to discussing this question and investigating means of cultivating funding 
sources that are geared towards the promotion of radical social change. 
Fortunately though, in addition to INCITE!'s aforementioned book, which has 
helped break the unstated taboo surrounding the discussion of activist 
funding, another critical exception was provided in the June 2007 edition of 
the academic journal Critical Sociology. The editors of this path breaking 
issue of Critical Sociology don't beat around that bush and point out that:

    "The critical study of foundations is not a subfield in any academic 
discipline; it is not even an organized interdisciplinary grouping. This, 
along with concerns about personal defunding, limits its output, especially 
as compared to that of the many well-endowed centers for the uncritical 
study of foundations."[9]

    Despite the dearth of critical inquiry into the historical influence of 
liberal foundations on the evolution of democracy, in the past few years a 
handful of books have endeavoured to provide a critical overview of the 
insidious anti-radicalising activities of liberal philanthropists. Thus the 
rest of this article will provide a brief review of some of this important 
work, however, before doing this I will briefly outline what I mean by 
progressive social change (that is, the type of social change that liberal 
foundations are loathe to fund).

    Why Progressive Social Change?

    With the growth of popular progressive social movements during the 1960s 
in the US (and elsewhere), the global populace became increasingly aware of 
the criminal nature of many of their government's activities (both at home 
and abroad) which fuelled increasing popular resistance to US imperialism. 
This in turn led influential scholars, working under the remit of the 
Trilateral Commission (a group founded by liberal philanthropists, see note 
[50]), to controversially conclude (in 1975) that the increasing radicalism 
of the world's citizens stemmed from an "excess of democracy" which could 
only be quelled "by a greater degree of moderation in democracy".[10] This 
elitist diagnosis makes sense when one considers Carole Pateman's (1989) 
observation that the dominant political and economic elites in the US 
posited that true democracy rested "not on the participation of the people, 
but on their nonparticipation."[11] However, contrary to the Trilateral 
Commission's desire to promote low-intensity democracy on a global scale, 
Gills, Rocamora, and Wilson (1993) suggest that:


    "Democracy requires more than mere maintenance of formal 'liberties'. 
[In fact, they argue that t]he only way to advance democracy in the Third 
World, or anywhere else, is to increase the democratic content of formal 
democratic institutions through profound social reform. Without substantial 
social reform and redistribution of economic assets, representative 
institutions - no matter how 'democratic' in form - will simply mirror the 
undemocratic power relations of society. Democracy requires a change in the 
balance of forces in society. Concentration of economic power in the hands 
of a small elite is a structural obstacle to democracy. It must be displaced 
if democracy is to emerge."[12]

    In essence, one of the most important steps activists can take to help 
bring about truly progressive social change is to encourage the development 
of a politically active citizenry - that is, a public that participates in 
democratic processes, but not necessarily those promoted by the government. 
Furthermore, it is also vitally important that groups promoting more 
participatory forms of democracy do so in a manner consistent with the 
participatory principles they believe in. (For a major critique of 
'progressive' activism in the US see Dana Fisher's (2006) Activism, Inc.: 
How the Outsourcing of Grassroots Campaigns Is Strangling Progressive 
Politics in America. Similarly, also see my recent article Hijacking Human 
Rights: A Critical Examination of Human Rights Watch's Americas Branch and 
their Links to the 'Democracy' Establishment.)

    Michael Albert is an influential theorist of progressive politics, and 
he has written at (inspiring) length about transitionary strategies for 
promoting participatory democracy in both his classic book Parecon: Life 
After Capitalism (2003), and more recently in Realizing Hope: Life Beyond 
Capitalism (2006). Simply put, Albert (2006) observes that: "A truly 
democratic community insures that the general public has the opportunity for 
meaningful and constructive participation in the formation of social 
 policy." However, there is no single answer to determining the best way of 
creating a participatory society, and so he rightly notes that Parecon 
(which is short for participatory economics) "doesn't itself answer 
visionary questions bearing on race, gender, polity, and other social 
concerns, [but] it is at least compatible with and even, in some cases, 
perhaps necessary for, doing so."[13]

    Finally, I would argue that in order to move towards a new participatory 
world order it is vitally important that progressive activists engage in 
radical critiques of society. Undertaking such radical actions may be 
problematic for some activists, because unfortunately the word radical is 
often used by the corporate media as a derogatory term for all manner of 
activists (whether they are radical or not). Yet this hijacking of the term 
perhaps makes it an even more crucial take that progressives work to reclaim 
this word as their own, so they can inject it back into their own work and 
analyses. Indeed, Robert Jensen's (2004) excellent book Writing Dissent: 
Taking Radical Ideas from the Margins to the Mainstream reminds us that:

    ".the origins of the word - radical, [comes] from the Latin radicalis, 
meaning 'root.' Radical analysis goes to the root of an issue or problem. 
Typically that means that while challenging the specific manifestations of a 
problem, radicals also analyse the ideological and institutional components 
as well as challenge the unstated assumptions and conventional wisdom that 
obscure the deeper roots. Often it means realizing that what is taken as an 
aberration or deviation from a system is actually the predictable and/or 
intended result of a system."[14]

    The Liberal Foundations of Social Change

    Now that I have briefly outlined why progressive social change is so 
important, it is useful to examine why liberal philanthropy - which has been 
institutionalised within liberal foundations - arose in the first place. 
Here it is useful to quote Nicolas Guilhot (2007) who neatly outlines the 
ideological reasons lying behind liberal philanthropy. He observes that in 
the face of the violent labor wars of the late 19th century that "directly 
threatened the economic interests of the philanthropists", liberal 
philanthropists realized:

    ". that social reform was unavoidable, [and instead] chose to invest in 
the definition and scientific treatment of the 'social questions' of their 
time: urbanization, education, housing, public hygiene, the "Negro problem," 
etc. Far from being resistant to social change, the philanthropists promoted 
reformist solutions that did not threaten the capitalistic nature of the 
social order but constituted a 'private alternative to socialism'"[15]

    Andrea Smith (2007) notes that:

    "From their inception, [liberal] foundations focused on research and 
dissemination of information designed ostensibly to ameliorate social 
issues-in a manner, how­ever, that did not challenge capitalism. For 
instance, in 1913, Colorado miners went on strike against Colorado Fuel and 
Iron, an enterprise of which 40 percent was owned by Rockefeller. 
Eventually, this strike erupted into open warfare, with the Colorado militia 
murdering several strikers during the Ludlow Massacre of April 20, 1914. 
During that same time, Jerome Greene, the Rockefeller Foundation secretary, 
identified research and information to quiet social and political unrest as 
a founda­tion priority. The rationale behind this strategy was that while 
individual workers deserved social relief, organized workers in the form of 
unions were a threat to soci­ety. So the Rockefeller Foundation heavily 
advertised its relief work for individual workers while at the same time 
promoting a pro-Rockefeller spin to the massacre."[16]

    Writing in 1966, Carroll Quigley - who happened to be one of Bill 
Clinton's mentors - [17] elaborates on the motivations driving the 
philanthropic colonisation of progressive social change:

    "More than fifty years ago [circa 1914] the Morgan firm decided to 
infiltrate the Left-wing political movements in the United States. This was 
relatively easy to do, since these groups were starved for funds and eager 
for a voice to reach the people. Wall Street supplied both. The purpose was 
not to destroy, dominate, or take over but was really threefold: (1) to keep 
informed about the thinking of Left-wing or liberal groups; (2) to provide 
them with a mouthpiece so that they could 'blow off steam,' and (3) to have 
a final veto on their publicity and possibly on their actions, if they ever 
went 'radical.' There was nothing really new about this decision, since 
other financiers had talked about it and even attempted it earlier. What 
made it decisively important this time was the combination of its adoption 
by the dominant Wall Street financier, at a time when tax policy was driving 
all financiers to seek tax-exempt refuges for their fortunes, and at a time 
when the ultimate in Left-wing radicalism was about to appear under the 
banner of the Third International."[18]

    One of the most important books exploring the detrimental influence of 
liberal foundations on social change was Robert Arnove's Philanthropy and 
Cultural Imperialism (1980). In the introduction to this edited collection 
Arnove notes that:

    "A central thesis [of this book] is that foundations like Carnegie, 
Rockefeller, and Ford have a corrosive influence on a democratic society; 
they represent relatively unregulated and unaccountable concentrations of 
power and wealth which buy talent, promote causes, and, in effect, establish 
an agenda of what merits society's attention. They serve as 'cooling-out' 
agencies, delaying and preventing more radical, structural change. They help 
maintain an economic and political order, international in scope, which 
benefits the ruling-class interests of philanthropists and philanthropoids - 
a system which, as the various chapters document, has worked against the 
interests of minorities, the working class, and Third World peoples."[19]

    With the aid of Nadine Pinede, Arnove (2007) recently updated this 
critique noting that, while the Carnegie, Rockefeller, and Ford foundations' 
"are considered to be among the most progressive in the sense of being 
forward looking and reform-minded", they are also "among the most 
controversial and influential of all the foundations".[20] Indeed, as Edward 
H. Berman demonstrated in his book The Influence of the Carnegie, Ford, and 
Rockefeller Foundations on American Foreign Policy: The Ideology of 
Philanthropy (1983), the activities of all three of these foundations are 
closely entwined with those of US foreign policy elites. This subject has 
also been covered in some depth in Frances Stonor Saunders (1999) book Who 
Paid the Piper?: CIA and the Cultural Cold War. She notes that:

    "During the height of the Cold War, the US government com­mitted vast 
resources to a secret programme of cultural propaganda in western Europe. A 
central feature of this pro­gramme was to advance the claim that it did not 
exist. It was managed, in great secrecy, by America's espionage arm, the 
Central Intelligence Agency. The centrepiece of this covert cam­paign was 
the Congress for Cultural Freedom [which received massive support from the 
Ford Foundation and was] run by CIA agent Michael Josselson from 1950 till 
1967. Its achieve­ments - not least its duration - were considerable. At its 
peak, the Congress for Cultural Freedom had offices in thirty-five 
countries, employed dozens of personnel, published over twenty prestige 
magazines, held art exhibitions, owned a news and features service, 
organized high-profile international con­ferences, and rewarded musicians 
and artists with prizes and public performances. Its mission was to nudge 
the intelligentsia of western Europe away from its lingering fascination 
with Marxism and Communism towards a view more accommo­dating of 'the 
American way'."[21]

    So given the elitist history of liberal foundations it is not surprising 
that Arnove and Pinede (2007) note that although the Carnegie, Rockefeller, 
and Ford foundations' "claim to attack the root causes of the ills of 
humanity, they essentially engage in ameliorative practices to maintain 
social and economic systems that generate the very inequalities and 
injustices they wish to correct."[22] Indeed they conclude that although the 
past few decades these foundations have adopted a "more progressive, if not 
radical, rhetoric and approaches to community building" that gives a "voice 
to those who have been disadvantaged by the workings of an increasingly 
global capitalist economy, they remain ultimately elitist and technocratic 
institutions."[23]

    Based on the knowledge of these critiques, it is then supremely ironic 
that progressive activists tend to underestimate the influence of liberal 
philanthropists, while simultaneously acknowledging the fundamental role 
played by conservative philanthropists in promoting neoliberal policies. 
Indeed, contrary to popular beliefs amongst progressives, much evidence 
supports the contention that liberal philanthropists and their foundations 
have been very influential in shaping the contours of American (and global) 
civil society, actively influencing social change through a process 
alternatively referred to as either channelling [24] or co-option.[25]

    "Co-optation [being] a process through which the policy orientations of 
leaders are influenced and their organizational activities channeled. It 
blends the leader's interests with those of an external organization. In the 
process, ethnic lead­ers and their organizations become active in the 
state-run interorganizational system; they become participants in the 
decision-making process as advisors or committee members. By becoming 
somewhat of an insider the co-opted leader is likely to identify with the 
organization and its objectives. The leader's point of view is shaped 
through the personal ties formed with authorities and functionaries of the 
external organization."[26]

    The critical issue of the cooption of progressive groups by liberal 
foundations has also been examined in Joan Roelofs seminal book Foundations 
and Public Policy: The Mask of Pluralism (extracts of this book can be found 
online, click here). In summary, Roelofs (2007) argues that:

    ".the pluralist model of civil society obscures the extensive 
collaboration among the resource-providing elites and the dependent state of 
most grassroots organizations. While the latter may negotiate with 
foundations over details, and even win some concessions, capitalist hegemony 
(including its imperial perquisites) cannot be questioned without severe 
organizational penalties. By and large, it is the funders who are calling 
the tune. This would be more obvious if there were sufficient publicized 
investigations of this vast and important domain. That the subject is 
'off-limits' for both academics and journalists is compelling evidence of 
enormous power."[27] (To listen to Roelofs' recent talk 'The Invisible Hand 
of Corporate Capitalism', which summarises the arguments presented in her 
book, click here. )

    To be continued.

    The concluding part of this article will examine how liberal foundations 
coopted the civil rights movement, promoted "iden­tity politics" and 
"multiculturalism", and influenced the development of the World Social 
Forum. Finally it will conclude by offering suggestions for how activists 
might begin to move beyond the Non-Profit Industrial Complex.

    Michael Barker is a doctoral candidate at Griffith University, 
Australia. He can be reached at Michael.J.Barker [at] griffith.edu.au

    References

    [1] Damien C. Cahill, The Radical Neo-liberal Movement as a Hegemonic 
Force in Australia, 1976-1996 (Unpublished PhD Thesis: University of 
Wollongong, 2004); Alex Carey, Taking the Risk out of Democracy: Propaganda 
in the US and Australia (Sydney, N.S.W.: University of New South Wales 
Press, 1995); Sally Covington, Moving a Public Policy Agenda: The Strategic 
Philanthropy of Conservative Foundations (Washington, DC: National Committee 
for Responsive Philanthropy, 1997).

    [2] Michael Barker, 'Taking the Risk Out of Civil Society: Harnessing 
Social Movements and Regulating Revolutions', Refereed paper presented to 
the Australasian Political Studies Association Conference, University of 
Newcastle 25-27 September 2006.

    [3] Here it is important to note that in all four countries that 
Robinson examined, the 'democratic transitions' "were touted by 
policymakers, and praised by journalists, supportive scholars, and public 
commentators, as 'success stories' in which the United States broke sharply 
with earlier support for authoritarianism and dictatorship and contributed 
in a positive way to 'democracy,' and therefore as 'models' for future US 
interventions of this type."  William I. Robinson, Promoting Polyarchy: 
Globalization, US Intervention, and Hegemony (Cambridge: Cambridge 
University Press, 1996),, p.114.

    [4] Robinson, Promoting Polyarchy, pp.28-9. For related online resources 
see, William I. Robinson, A Faustian Bargain: U.S. Intervention in the 
Nicaraguan Elections and American Foreign Policy in the Post-Cold War Era 
(Westview Press, 1992)

    [5] However, he does specify that it is important to note that the US 
"is not acting on behalf of a 'US' elite, but [instead is] playing a 
leadership role on behalf of an emergent transnational elite"; and that the 
"impulse to 'promote democracy'" essentially arises from the need "to secure 
the underlying objective of maintaining essentially undemocratic societies 
inserted into an unjust international system."Robinson, Promoting Polyarchy, 
p.20, 6.

    Robinson also adds that: "A caveat must be stressed. US preference for 
polyarchy is a general guideline of post-Cold War foreign policy and not a 
universal prescription. Policymakers often assess that authoritarian 
arrangements are best left in place in instances where the establishment of 
polyarchic systems is an unrealistic, high-risk, or unnecessary 
 undertaking." Robinson, Promoting Polyarchy, p.112.

    [6] Barry Gills, Joen Rocamora, and Richard Wilson, Low Intensity 
Democracy: Political Power in the New World Order (London: Pluto Press, 
1993), pp.26-7.

    [7] Leslie Wayne, 'And for His Next Feat, a Billionaire Sets Sights on 
Bush', New York Times, May 31, 2004.

    [8] Indeed as INCITE! note in their book The Revolution Will Not Be 
Funded: "We took a stand against state funding since we perceived that 
antiviolence organizations who had state funding had been co-opted. It never 
occurred to us to look at foundation funding in the same way. However, in a 
trip to India (funded, ironically, by the Ford Foundation), we met with many 
non-funded organizations that criticized us for receiving foundation grants. 
When we saw that groups with much less access to resources were able to do 
amazing work without funding, we began to question our reliance on 
founda­tion grants." Andrea Smith, 'Introduction: The Revolution Will Not Be 
Funded', In: INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence (eds.) The Revolution 
Will Not Be Funded: Beyond The Non-Profit Industrial Complex (South End 
Press, 2007), p.1.

    [9] Annon, 'Note on this Special Issue of Critical Sociology', Critical 
Sociology, 33 (2007), p.387.

    [10] Crozier, M., S. P. Huntington and J. Watanuki, The Crisis of 
Democracy: Report on the Governability of Democracies to the Trilateral 
Commission (New York: New York University Press, 1975), p.134.

    [11] Carole Pateman, 'The Civic Culture: A Philosophical Critique', In: 
G. A. Almond and S. Verba (eds.) The Civic Culture: A Philosophical Critique 
(Newbury Park, Calif.: Sage Publications, 1989), p.79.

    [12] Gills, Rocamora, and Wilson, Low Intensity Democracy, p.29.

    [13] Michael Albert, Realizing Hope: Life Beyond Capitalism (London: Zed 
Books, 2006), p.24, 185.

    [14] Robert Jensen, Writing Dissent: Taking Radical Ideas from the 
Margins to the Mainstream (New York: Peter Lang, 2004), p.7.

    [15] Nicolas Guilhot, 'Reforming the World: George Soros, Global 
Capitalism and the Philanthropic Management of the Social Sciences', 
Critical Sociology, Volume 33, Number 3, 2007, pp.451-2.

    [16] Andrea Smith, 'Introduction: The Revolution Will Not Be Funded', 
p.4.

    [17] Daniel Brandt, 'Clinton, Quigley, and Conspiracy: What's going on 
here?' NameBase NewsLine, No. 1, April-June 1993.
    [18] Carroll Quigley, Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our 
Time (New York: Macmillan, 1966), p.938.

    [19] Robert F. Arnove, 'Introduction', In: Robert F. Arnove, (ed.), 
Philanthropy and Cultural Imperialism: The Foundations at Home and Abroad 
(Boston, Mass.: G.K. Hall, 1980), p.1.

    [20] Robert Arnove and Nadine Pinede, 'Revisiting the "Big Three" 
Foundations', Critical Sociology, Volume 33, Number 3, 2007, p.391.

    [21] Frances Stonor Saunders, Who Paid the Piper?: CIA and the Cultural 
Cold War (Granta Books, 1999), p.1.

    For a useful review of Saunders' book see, James Petras, 'The CIA and 
the Cultural Cold War Revisited', Monthly Review, November 1999.
    Also see Hugh Wilford, The CIA, the British Left, and the Cold War: 
Calling the Tune? (London: Frank Cass, 2003); and Paul Wolf, 'OSS and the 
Development of Psychological Warfare'.

    [22] Robert Arnove and Nadine Pinede, 'Revisiting the "Big Three" 
Foundations', p.393.

    [23] Robert Arnove and Nadine Pinede, 'Revisiting the "Big Three" 
Foundations', p.422.

    [24] Craig J. Jenkins, 'Channeling Social Protest: Foundation Patronage 
of Contemporary Social Movements', In: W. W. Powell and E. S. Clemens, 
(eds.), Private Action and the Public Good (New Haven, CT: Yale University 
Press, 1998), pp. 206-216.

    [25] Robert F. Arnove (ed.), Philanthropy and Cultural Imperialism; 
Donald Fisher, 'The Role of Philanthropic Foundations in the Reproduction 
and Production of Hegemony: Rockefeller Foundations and the Social Sciences', 
Sociology, 17, 2, 1983, pp. 206-233; Joan Roelofs, Foundations and Public 
Policy: The Mask of Pluralism (Albany: State University of New York Press, 
2003).; John Wilson, 'Corporatism and the Professionalization of Reform', 
Journal of Political and Military Sociology, 11, 1983, pp. 52-68.



    Few researchers would argue that all foundations actively attempt to 
deliberately co-opt all social movements, although the larger ones like the 
Ford and Rockefeller Foundations have certainly successfully done this in 
the past. Craig Jenkins (1998, p.212) proposes his channeling thesis is more 
appropriate than the cooption model because it: (1) considers "that 
foundation goals are complex, ranging from genuine support of movement goals 
to social control" (a point the co-option thesis also acknowledges), (2) 
identifies the trend towards professionalization (a process also identified 
by the co-option thesis) and (3) this professionalization has led to greater 
mobilizations and successes than would have occurred otherwise. This last 
point is certainly debatable, as the history of social change seems to 
suggest that mass grassroots campaigns have far more progressive influence 
on political institutions than professional advocacy groups.



    Deborah McCarthy (2004, p.254) suggests that the "social relations" 
approach to grantee/funder relations "presents a dialectical model in which 
both grantees and funders influence each other" as opposed to "the 
channeling and co-optation theories [which she argues] present a one-way 
model in which foundations influence grantees but not the other way around." 
In response, I would argue that it is clear that foundation funding is 
dialectical, and it is important not to write off the work of those she 
presents as "one-way models" because clearly each funding relationship will 
vary from another, and the latter models benefit by incorporating the 
unequal power evident between funders' and grantees. McCarthy (2004: 258) 
notes that activist/funders often have to trick their foundations to support 
environmental justice projects by using "terminology with issues that their 
foundation's boards and donors already fund." McCarthy discusses some ways 
in which activists and funders' may begin to work around three major 
problems associated with foundation funding of the environmental justice 
movement which are: "programmatic emphases on project-specific grants, 
outcome-specific evaluation criteria, and short-term grants" (2004, p.263). 
See Deborah McCarthy, 'Environmental Justice Grantmaking: Elites and 
Activists Collaborate to Transform Philanthropy', Sociological Inquiry, Vol. 
74, No. 2, 2004, pp.250-270.

    [26] Raymond Breton, The Governance of Ethnic Communities: Political 
Structures and Processes in Canada (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1990).

    [27] Joan Roelofs, 'Foundations and Collaboration', Critical Sociology, 
Volume 33, Number 3, 2007, p.502.

    [50] Two of the most influential liberal foundations, the Ford 
Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation, created and continue to provide 
substantial financial aid to elite planning groups like the Council on 
Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission. For example, the Ford 
Foundation's 2006 Annual Report (p.62) notes that they gave the Council on 
Foreign Relations a $200,000 grant "For research, seminars and publications 
on the role of women in conflict prevention, post-conflict reconstruction 
and state building." Furthermore, as Roelofs (2003, p.98-9) notes:



    "During the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) debate, the EPI 
[Economic Policy Institute] (funded by Ford and others) made technical 
objections to the models sup­porting the trade agreement. At the same time, 
a much greater effect was pro­duced by Ford funding to the other side, which 
included grants to the Institute for International Economics, a think tank 
that emphasizes the benefits of NAFTA. In addition, 'the Ford Foundation 
also awarded grants to environmental groups and the Southwest Voters 
Research Institute to convene forums on NAFTA. These resulted in an alliance 
of 100 Latino organizations and elected officials, called the Latino 
Consensus on NAFTA, which pro­vided conditional support for the agreement.'"



    Also see Laurence H. Shoup, and William Minter, Imperial Brain Trust: 
The Council on Foreign Relations and United States Foreign Policy (New York: 
Monthly Review Press, 1977); Holly Sklar, Trilateralism: The Trilateral 
Commission and Elite Planning For World Management (Boston: South End Press, 
1980).