Not Everything (Worth Addressing) Is a Crisis

There is a tremendous moral hazard inherent in using crisis language to describe problems that are more chronic in nature.

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When an earthquake of 9.3 magnitude rocked the floor of the Indian Ocean in December 2004, it triggered a 100-foot wave that killed nearly a quarter of a million people in more than a dozen countries. In just a few minutes, the Boxing Day Tsunami destroyed the tourism and fishing industries in countless local communities. Millions were plunged into poverty, and in the weeks and months that followed, billions of dollars in supplies and other aid arrived on the shores to help them.

Despite all our efforts to tame nature—both physical and human—the world remains an unpredictable and dangerous place. Hurricanes, civil wars, and Ebola outbreaks are always lurking in the shadows, and human institutions respond to these emergencies to mitigate their after-effects. This is perfectly natural and appropriate.

But what happens when we approach persistent social problems as “crises” or “epidemics”? What are the results of applying an “emergency” framework to stubborn phenomena like multi-generational poverty in a developed country?

Acute Versus Chronic 

When my gymnast daughter needed medical care for a repetitive-use injury to her lower back, I took her to a sports-medicine osteopath. He remarked that Western medicine is the best in the world for trauma care, but often relies on the same tools suitable for acute injury to treat chronic conditions. Identical, or virtually identical, symptoms caused by a car accident in one person and bad posture in another might not respond equally to identical treatment. Surgery might be perfectly appropriate for the former, but could worsen conditions for the latter.

The same is true of social problems. In the wake of the Boxing Day Tsunami, it made sense to focus on immediate physical needs and temporarily bombard the area with resources: food, tents, clothing, medicine, and so on. And when poverty is caused by a specific event—a natural disaster or war on a larger scale, or the death or illness of a breadwinner on a more-individual scale—a focused, short-term intervention may also be appropriate. But when, for example, the schools in a particular area are chronically underperforming, handing out backpacks and school supplies—while possibly welcome and worth doing—is not likely to have a measurable impact on academic achievement.

For chronic social issues—like multigenerational poverty—physical resources are often necessary, but never sufficient for enduring transformation. Of course, some philanthropists believe they have discerned the root causes of poverty, and set out to end it by reordering society or fundamentally altering human nature. But outsider-designed programs—whether shorter-term material interventions or more-ambitious projects aimed at root causes—often do more harm than good.

Crisis Fundraising 

Just as it is natural and good that people respond to acute crises with sacrificial generosity, there is a tremendous moral hazard inherent in using crisis language to describe problems that are more chronic in nature. Not only are organizations tempted to exaggerate the severity and scope of the problems they are trying to solve, but they also create an expectation that the issues can actually be effectively addressed with material resources and/or targeted interventions alone. This can be particularly harmful when addressing chronic poverty, which often has extremely complex and multivariate causes that are frequently worsened by incorrectly applied resources.

Framing chronic problems as crises with easily identifiable, acute causes also makes it morally permissible to experiment with reckless, poorly-thought-through solutions. If a house is uninhabitable because it is on fire, by all means, douse it with water. If it is uninhabitable because of years of deferred maintenance or a poorly laid foundation, dousing it with water will only accelerate the decline. Resourcing broken or corrupt systems can reduce the incentives for change or even break those systems further.

The proliferation of small-dollar mass fundraising has further intensified this issue in the world of charity. Everything from various “phobias” and thought-crimes on the left to DEI and Critical Race Theory on the right are now crises or epidemics, demanding immediate, radical actions and lots of cash. And of course, the perpetual worst offenders are the “most important election of our lifetime” fundraisers at the local, state, or national level. Almost everyone, somewhat understandably, is trying to raise tsunami-level money for their pet cause.

Lasting Transformation

Thankfully, while chronic social problems are indeed difficult to tackle, lasting transformation is possible. Unfortunately, it is often slow, frustrating work that is difficult to convey to donors who do not already understand its value.

At the Woodson Center, our most-effective affiliated groups are run by residents of the communities they serve. They address factors in their neighborhoods, like crime and violence, to create an environment more conducive to longer-term planning and upward mobility. They work to restore families, encouraging and modeling the skills and behaviors associated with marriage and parenting, and serving as surrogate parents where needed. And against the backdrop of reducing crime and strengthening families, they empower motivated residents to increase their incomes by forming small businesses, increasing their skills, and so on. Indigenous success becomes contagious, motivating more neighbors to join in. The wealth they create has a higher purpose, beyond material consumption to providing for their loved ones and investing back in their communities.

Too many outsider-designed interventions interfere with instead of support this process of community renewal that must be driven from within. Material resources, improperly deployed, are lost to crime or drive wedges between parents or older relatives and their children, encouraging reliance on a program instead of the family and the community that will be there long after the program has shut its doors. They may even inflame consumerist envy instead of encouraging virtue, cultivating the opposite habits needed to make things better. Most important, interventions designed primarily to deliver goods and services from outsiders are typically insulated from the kind of feedback that would even make them aware of the unintended consequences of their charity.None of this should be taken to imply that resources should not be deployed to address chronic social problems. Many are indeed serious and should be faced head on. But they didn’t appear overnight, and they will not be resolved with short-term efforts, no matter how well-intended.

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This article first appeared in the Giving Review on April 14, 2025.

Source: https://capitalresearch.org/article/not-everything-worth-addressing-is-a-crisis/