If you agree with these sentences :
… then you’re probably in favour of efficient generosity!
Effective generosity can be defined as a philanthropic value that prioritises improving or saving as many lives as possible for the same amount of money raised. In practical terms, “effective” charities must meet certain key criteria:
–High cost-effectiveness, i.e. a significant impact for every euro spent
–Data that shows effectiveness, since effective organisations rigorously evaluate the impact of their actions
–Transparency about what they do, how they manage their budgets and how they evaluate their effectiveness.
As well as instilling a degree of trust, this transparency is also of great benefit to the organisations themselves. It allows them to receive criticism and potential ideas for improvement, particularly from independent assessors.
Effective generosity has its roots in the effective altruism movement, which began to emerge in the 1970s thanks to the work of the philosopher Peter Singer. According to Singer, we have a moral obligation to help others when we can do so at little cost to ourselves. This idea was then developed in his book The Life You Can Save (2009), which encourages strategic donations to save lives.
Singer also puts forward the notion of the marginal utility of money, pointing out that, for a wealthy person, each additional euro brings a relatively small benefit to their well-being compared to its potential to transform or save lives elsewhere. By redirecting a small proportion of our financial resources to causes where they have the greatest impact, we can achieve immense good without significantly compromising our own quality of life.
That same year, two Oxford students founded Giving What We Can (GWWC), a movement that encourages individuals to commit to donating a significant proportion of their income (from 10% upwards) to charities with a high impact. Since its inception, GWWC has inspired thousands of people (now almost 10,000) to join the pledge.
Two years earlier, in 2007, GiveWell was launched in the United States. It is a not-for-profit organisation made up of a team of researchers who evaluate and identify the charities with the greatest impact per dollar spent. Today, GiveWell is recognised worldwide for its in-depth research, and its recommendations influence donations amounting to several hundred million dollars each year.
Finally, local initiatives have emerged to promote effective generosity on a national scale, based in particular on GiveWell’s recommendations. In 2019, in Germany, Effektiv Spenden was the first organisation of its kind in Europe and inspired similar initiatives in other countries, including Mieux Donner, active in France since 2024.
Effective generosity answers the question “How can I make a positive impact with my donation?
At this stage, you may find this question ridiculous, because after all, a donation is bound to help, isn’t it? In reality, this is far from the case! You can actually have 100 times more impact by giving to a charity recommended by the independent evaluators mentioned earlier. In practice, this means that you could have the same impact, if not more, by giving €100 to a very effective charity as by giving €10,000 to other charities. Sometimes your donation can even have a negative impact, even when the charity is full of good intentions and the idea seems promising at first sight, such as installing turnstiles to pump water.
To avoid implementing this type of ineffective initiative, it is essential to carry out numerous hypothesis tests and studies, and above all to assess its real final impact by following a very precise methodology. One of the important criteria when calculating the final impact is to use counterfactual reasoning, i.e. to compare the situation when the initiative is implemented with the situation when it is not. Sometimes, all or part of the results obtained do not actually depend on the action implemented, but on external factors or other parallel initiatives.
Indeed, if several associations are working for the same thing in the same place when the scale of the problem does not require it, their individual impact is logically divided. Furthermore, the cause that an association is fighting is also an important criterion in assessing its effectiveness: the problem must be large-scale, neglected, and have the potential for improvement, i.e. interventions can really have a significant impact.
This methodology is used by independent evaluators such as GiveWell, and helps people who want to donate to know where to direct their money to have the greatest impact. However, a small number of charities also use this transparent and rigorous evaluation approach to improve their impact.
One example is theAgainst Malaria Foundation (AMF ), which distributes insecticide-treated mosquito nets to protect against malaria in high-risk countries. By donating just €50 to AMF, you can purchase 10 mosquito nets to protect 20 people for two years. This association rigorously monitors its actions. You can track the impact of your donation in real time via their website [1].
Every year in France, around 9.2 billion euros are donated to charitable organisations. The vast majority of these donations are not made to effective organisations, with many people giving primarily to a cause that affects them personally. Often, these people do not carry out any prior research into the effectiveness of the organisation. But if your aim is to save as many lives as possible, then impact donations should be of interest to you, even if your means are limited.
Indeed, effective generosity deconstructs the received idea that only the very rich can make a difference: even a small donation can have a big impact when it is directed towards highly effective charities. Now that you know how to recognise an effective charity, you can do your own research before making a donation.
However, this research is very time-consuming given the diversity of organisations that exist and the complexity of a rigorous evaluation. Fortunately, there are independent evaluators such as GiveWell to carry out this work, and associations such as Mieux Donner to advise you on how you can make a difference with your donation.
Effective generosity invites us to rethink the way we give and use our resources. By emphasising rigorous evaluation, transparency and cost-effectiveness, it proposes an innovative and responsible approach to philanthropy. In a world where the needs are immense but our means remain limited, this approach enables us to multiply our impact and save lives in a tangible way. It’s not just about giving, but about giving better, by ensuring that every euro spent really does make a difference.
Whether you already give regularly or are thinking of making your first donation, effective giving and Better Giving offer you the tools and resources to make a difference. You can already make a donation to one of the most effective associations, make an appointment with a member of our team for free personalised advice, or subscribe to the Better Giving newsletter to keep up to date with news in the field of effective giving.
Émilie Combres
Émilie est étudiante en ingénierie et en sciences politiques. En stage chez Mieux Donner, elle est essentiellement en charge des réseaux sociaux et des relations extérieures.
https://www.againstmalaria.com/Distributions.aspx
In reality, this type of initiative is more the exception than the rule in the charity world, since most charities do not take into account the evaluation criteria mentioned above, or do not set up any evaluation at all. So, democratising effective generosity encourages charities to carry out this work of evaluation and improving the final impact of their actions, to save even more lives.
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