From Generosity to Justice by Darren Walker

Author:Darren Walker
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Disruption Books
Published: 2023-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

6

THE POWER OF PROXIMITY

VALUING BOTH EXPERTISE AND EXPERIENCE

My motto,

As I live and learn,

is:

Dig And Be Dug

In Return.89

—“Motto,” Langston Hughes

On a snowy winter day in 2014, I visited the Eastern Correctional Facility, a prison in rural Ulster County, New York. There I experienced a most astonishing and inspiring phenomenon: incarcerated men studying Latin, debating Greek tragedies, and speaking advanced Mandarin.

They recited the poetry of Langston Hughes and the essays of James Baldwin, and they looked just like me—mostly black and brown, from underserved and disadvantaged backgrounds. But they had determination and hope in their faces—a look of authentic confidence that follows only from hard-earned achievement.

These men were participants in the Bard Prison Initiative, the brainchild of founder Max Kenner and Bard College’s brilliant president, Leon Botstein.90 This pioneering degree-granting program for incarcerated women and men has been the recipient of Ford Foundation support for many years. As I visited with them—as I spoke with them about their wrenching accounts of bad luck, bad choices, and a criminal justice system that seems designed to rob them of their humanity—I felt heartbroken but also inspired.

In their stories, I was reminded of why the support of Ford and many other philanthropies, institutions, and people working on the front lines of social change matters so profoundly: Yes, inequality and injustice persist. But they are no match for the human spirit.

And I was reminded of something else too: There’s no substitute for meeting people where they are, in the conditions they live in.

I knew all the facts and figures about incarceration in America. I knew a bit about incarceration on a more personal level, too, because I have seven cousins who’ve spent time in prisons in Texas and Louisiana. And I knew that systemic racism is one of the root causes of our mass incarceration problem. But I had to look these prisoners in the eye to understand the importance of bringing dignity into their lives. I had to hear them talk about Aristotle to see why the material conditions of prison life don’t always have to do with material things. Those lessons are why I later encouraged Agnes Gund to visit the San Quentin State Prison in California.

Listening to the people closest to the problems themselves—the people affected by the issues you’re trying to address, the helpers already there who are trying to improve the situation—might seem like an obvious action to take. And yet philanthropists and activists of all stripes skip this critical step all the time. Why? What prevents us from seeking out the advice of those people who are close to the problem we hope to solve?

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