Letters
Objects or subjects?
1 December 2008
Alliance magazine
I was struck by the similar use of the term 'beneficiary' in the letters from Felicitas von Peter and Theresa Lloyd in your September 2008 issue. While promoting different arguments to improve philanthropy, both letters betray a mental model of the world in which funders and 'beneficiaries' – meaning grant recipients – do the thinking. In their mental model, those whose lives are ultimately meant to benefit from the actions of the thinkers are more objects than subjects.
