‘There is no such thing as a free lunch’, so the saying goes; it has long been understood that gifts, donations, or charity, are part of complex social systems, which do not always have positive outcomes for the beneficiaries of these exchanges. The charitable act of giving has come under renewed scrutiny in recent years, with a number of public figures and high-profile philanthropists proclaiming that effective giving can ‘change the world’. These ideas have coalesced into the phenomenon of ‘philanthrocapitalism’, as a perceived new stage in philanthropic giving which commits huge resources and applies the methods of the business world to solve social problems. The succession of massive gifts by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, or the global interventions of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, are just two overt examples of this wider trend.

Yet, as historians of religious missions, transnational advocacy networks, humanitarian interventions and colonial discourse will be well aware, the longer history of philanthropic giving and the charitable act is deeply entwined with imperialism and empire, and continues to be associated with neo-imperialism in the contemporary era. This workshop seeks to interrogate and investigate this nexus, to expand our understanding of the relationship between systems of charity and imperialism broadly defined within a trans-temporal and global framework. In doing so, the workshop will also begin to historicise and critically appraise ‘philanthrocapitalism’ as both an idea and practice. We invite the submission of abstracts which speak to any of these broad themes.

The keynote address will be given by Professor Regina Grafe of the EUI, a specialist in the political economy of early modern Spain and the Spanish Empire. The workshop will be held on Friday 3 March 2017 at the University of Warwick.

This workshop is part of the Poverty Research Network at the University of Warwick. To participate please submit an abstract (maximum 250 words) to the workshop organisers Julia McClure (J.McClure@warwick.ac.uk) and Andrew Jones (A.Jones.12@warwick.ac.uk) by Sunday 11 December 2016. Please include both Julia and Andrew as e-mail recipients.