Director’s Lecture Series: Philanthropy and Social Justice

Adam Habib, Darren Walker, Mark Malloch-Brown

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Many of the world’s richest billionaires engage in philanthropic work donating billions. These donations have garnered both praise and criticism over the years and with the actions of billionaires increasingly in the spotlight, it raises questions surrounding philanthropy and social justice; there are more philanthropists than ever before, so why is inequality increasing and how can philanthropy be a force for positive change globally? Do the world’s richest have a moral obligation to share their wealth and if so, how can this be done with social justice in mind?

As part of this series, we invite you to join us on 14 February 2022 for a conversation between Darren Walker, President of the Ford Foundation and Mark Malloch-Brown, President of the Open Society Foundations, moderated by Professor Adam Habib, SOAS Director, as they speak to the issue of: Philanthropy and its role in addressing inequalities and advancing social justice .

This is the second event in the SOAS Director’s Lecture Series, following the Addressing vaccination inequality in an interconnected world event last year, where SOAS Director Adam Habib will lead discussions with high profile leaders and changemakers regarding important topics of our time.

To attend, please sign up for this event via Eventbrite.

About the speakers

Mark Malloch‐Brown is President of the Open Society Foundations, the world’s largest private funder of independent groups working for justice, democratic governance, and human rights.

He has worked to advance human rights, justice, and development for more than four decades in a variety of roles: with the United Nations, the World Bank, and as a British government minister, as well as with a range of civil society groups and business. At the United Nations, Malloch-Brown spearheaded the global promotion of the UN Millennium Development Goals as head of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) from 1999 to 2005, under the then UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan. At the UNDP, and previously as head of external affairs at the World Bank, Malloch-Brown led reform efforts that were widely seen as increasing the impact of both organizations. He later served as Kofi Annan’s chief of staff, and then as UN Deputy Secretary General, before joining the British government of Prime Minister Gordon Brown, as minister responsible for Africa and Asia from 2007 to 2009.

Malloch-Brown rejoined Open Society’s Global Board in 2009, reflecting a close friendship with George Soros that developed in the early 1990s when he was working as a political consultant in Latin America and later over relief efforts in Bosnia. In 1995, Soros backed Malloch-Brown and others’ idea of launching the International Crisis Group, an NGO focused on preventing and averting violent conflict, in response to the horrors seen in Rwanda, Somalia, and the former Yugoslavia.

Malloch-Brown was knighted for his contribution to international affairs and is currently on leave from the British House of Lords. Malloch-Brown is a Distinguished Practitioner at Oxford University’s Blavatnik School of Government, an adjunct fellow at Chatham House’s Queen Elizabeth Program, and has been a visiting distinguished fellow at the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization.

Darren Walker is President of the Ford Foundation, a $16 billion international social justice philanthropy. He is a member of the Reimagining New York Commission and co-chair of NYC Census 2020. He chaired the philanthropy committee that brought a resolution to the city of Detroit’s historic bankruptcy. Under his leadership, the Ford Foundation became the first non-profit in US history to issue a $1 billion designated social bond in US capital markets for proceeds to strengthen and stabilize non-profit organizations in the wake of COVID-19.

Before joining Ford, Darren was vice president at Rockefeller Foundation, overseeing global and domestic programs. In the 1990s, he was COO of the Abyssinian Development Corporation, Harlem’s largest community development organization.

Darren co-chairs New York City’s Mayoral Advisory Commission on City Art, Monuments, and Markers, and has served on the Independent Commission on New York City Criminal Justice and Incarceration Reform and the UN International Labour Organization Global Commission on the Future of Work. He co-founded both the US Impact Investing Alliance and the Presidents’ Council on Disability Inclusion in Philanthropy and is a founding member of the Board Diversity Action Alliance. He serves on many boards, including Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, the National Gallery of Art, Carnegie Hall, the High Line, the Committee to Protect Journalists, and the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History & Culture. In the summer of 2020, he was appointed to the boards of Square and Ralph Lauren. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philosophical Society and is the recipient of 16 honorary degrees and university awards, including Harvard University’s W.E.B. Du Bois Medal.

Professor Adam Habib is an academic, activist, and public intellectual. He is Director of SOAS University of London and previously VC and Principal of University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa. He holds qualifications in Political Science from the University of Natal, Wits and the City University of New York.

Professor Habib is a co-founder of the African Research Universities Alliance, an affiliation of research-intensive universities on the continent.

He has published numerous edited books and journal articles over the last three decades in the thematic areas of democratisation and its consolidation in South Africa, philanthropy, inequality, institutional reform, and South Africa's role in Africa and beyond.

Habib’s academic contributions resulted in his election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, in addition to serving as a fellow of both the African Academy of Science and the Academy of Science of South Africa. He also serves on the Council of the United Nations University.

Habib holds qualifications in Political Science from three universities, including the University of Natal and Wits. He earned his masters and doctoral qualifications from the Graduate School of the City University of New York.

Contact email: events@soas.ac.uk