How Americans Give: The Financialization of American Jewish Philanthropy

Abstract

In the second half of the twentieth century, the philanthropic sector in the United States grew in power and scope. Its expansion cannot be understood apart from close analysis of the process of financialization that bound, even obligated, American democracy to capitalism. The American state’s deregulation of finance and its partnership with private industry and actors in matters related to public policy nurtured the growth of philanthropy, and also empowered philanthropic organizations to interpret and craft state policy. American Jewish philanthropic institutions, which already commanded trendsetting power by the middle decades of the twentieth century, played a crucial role in reshaping American philanthropy. These institutions and their leaders became literate in American tax policy and took active roles in reforming it by lobbying for and, sometimes, crafting tax code changes. Their efforts contributed to the reordering and decline of the American welfare state in favor of the growth of private capital. American Jewish philanthropy—sometimes called tzedakah—drew from the central texts, beliefs, and rituals of Jewish life, yet its modern form served as a tool of political economy that allowed Jews to construct their interests and those of the democratic state as coincident projects of survival through capital practices.

capitalism, charitable endowments, nonprofit sector, taxation, welfare states