
Credit: Illumine Training
I’ve gathered together materials which describe some important principles for determining fair and impartial – in this case – refugee claims.
But these same principles can be adapted to making funding decisions in a large humanitarian/philanthropic foundation. They can be used to guide the work of funding decision-makers.
Many of our hearing rooms have been corrupted, unfortunately. The principles described here have been scrutinized by decades of jurors and ensure the applicant the fairest and most impartial decision of any adjudicative process I’m aware of.
Unfortunately the material as laid out here is rather like a raw resource. If I have time, I’ll take it the next stage and give it more form.
The principles discussed here are encountered again and again in society. They answer questions like: Is this person telling the truth? Under what circumstances do I grant the benefit of the doubt? What guidelines might I follow in reaching my decision?
Rather than go into more detail here, let me post the introduction. The book itself can be found at the bottom of the article and in the “Downloads Page.”
Introduction
The Reval has occurred. You’ve vacationed and hired staff for your foundation or fund.
Now you’re determining how you’ll decide which requests for funding are ones you’ll go with and which you won’t.
I’m not referring to the fact that you’ve decided to fund health projects and someone is requesting money for building a bridge. What follows is not about decisions around specialties or interests.
It’s actually about how to make impartial and equitable decisions, generally. It has the potential to give birth to a template, a manual for rendering a fair decision.
It looks at some of the rules of human-rights adjudication like standard of proof (on a balance of probability, more likely than not), presumption of innocence, and benefit of the doubt.
It tells the decision-maker how to separate out the genuine from the fraudulent, by testing for credibility – watching for contradictions, inconsistencies, improbabilities, implausibilities, and impossibilities.
These are things well known in the hearing room, but not as well known to foundation grant-givers. Nor would I expect them to be.
I used the materials that follow (and other materials like them) at the Immigration and Refugee Board between 1998 and 2006, to guide me in making decisions on refugee claims.
Your decisions won’t be as complicated, but it’s the process described here that I’m really trying to draw attention to.
These principles are the distillate of decades of jurisprudential interpretation of human-rights decision-making, where “you had to get it right.”
In my work there from 1998 to 2006, I found the IRB’s documentation, trainers, legal staff, and Canadian refugee law in general to be among the clearest and most helpful professional guidance I’d ever been exposed to, in private or government practice.
If some among us – not all – were willing to study the principles enunciated here (and elsewhere) and apply them to financial decision-making or refugee decision-making, or just plain decision-making in general, we’d have an excellent template, a manual.
Are fairness and equitableness not lacking in our world? Is it not a rare commodity in some parts of the globe to find an uncorrupted hearing room? In real life, I mean. Not on TV.
Are we not needing some good suggestions on “how to get it right” for a change? Not whose palm we’ll grease or who owes who for what service.
***
It isn’t for everyone to do the work of making the decision of who to fund and who not to. It’s detailed. It’s disciplined. It’s organized. Who likes to say “no”?
For eight years, I loved the work of a decision-maker.
Even though the pace of work was difficult, I feel forever blessed to have been allowed the discipline of listening to probably 2,000 human-rights cases and writing around 1,500 decisions. I’ve been so benefitted by that experience that words cannot express it.
My organization is going to be big enough so that I’ll need to hire a team of financial decision-makers and then train them in how to make a decision.
When I do, I plan to hire two retired IRB legal services trainers and ask them to train my staff. And these materials are part of what they’ll use. (Yes, I realize they’re from 2004 but they’re still so darned good.)
If these matters don’t interest you, please read no further. I won’t be offended. It’s a specialized matter, for sure.
Otherwise, struggle through the distinctions made here and try to “get” (realize) a picture of the degree of fairness that’s being mandated here – and the degree of protection of the rights of the claimant vis-a-vis the state.
***
Now we’re here in 2018 and ready for the green flag. And the next minute we’ve gone on our vacation and hired our staff.
If we’re a foundation of size, we’re wondering now how to get through all the grant applications being sent to us. How do we make our decisions? And then we remember this book.
The human-rights principles laid out here give us the greatest chance at expressing our love for humanity through our enterprises and decisions.
I invite all financial wayshowers after the Reval to consider living up to them. In my view, your organization will be incredibly benefitted and buoyed up if you do.
Steve Beckow
Vancouver, Canada
https://goldenageofgaia.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Decision-Making-at-the-IRB-22-R2.pages.pdf
Decision-Making at the IRB 2:2 R2.pagesHere is the abridged and rearranged version:
https://goldenageofgaia.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Decision-Making-at-the-IRB-12-R2.pages.pdf
Decision-Making at the IRB 1:2 R2.pages