(This is an adaptation of a post on my blog.)
EA is one of several movements I have seen which have tried to address the problem of a lack of diversity, either demographic diversity (i.e. too many men, too many white people) or ideological diversity (too many programmers, too many technolibertarians). The first category of efforts are often ugly and counterproductive, and in other movements I've witnessed the debate itself scaring members of the targeted demographic away. Without rehashing the debate on the merits of diversity, given that a person has decided they want to increase movement diversity, here are some common failure modes I have witnessed:
- exaggerating the demographics to make your point, in a way that suggests that there are no members of the target demographic currently or at least none whose contributions are meaningful.
useful ways of making this criticism: “we’re 70% male. why is that?” "we want more people from developing countries." "the majority of EAs are just out of college."
ways of making this criticism which have frustrated me: “why aren’t women involved in this movement?” "EAs are from all over the world - well, if the only countries in the world are America, Britain, and Australia" "if EA wants to appeal to anyone who isn't an autistic white nerd...
- suggesting that the movement needs members of the target demographic by appealing to sexist/racist/offensive stereotypes (”we’re not warm and empathetic enough. that’s why we need more women in the movement”. "the reason we don't have enough black people is because we're too intellectual and data-focused.")
- suggesting that the movement recruit by appealing to offensive stereotypes (“if we want more non-white people we need spicier food and fewer long position papers”)
- tokenizing the members of the target demographic who you do have ( “hey, will you be the organization president? you don’t have to do any work but we need a black person on the leadership board” )
- not asking people in the groups you're trying to reach what they think or recommend ( “As a man, I’m concerned that we have too many men, and here’s how I think we should go about fixing it”)
- treating the members of the targeted demographic who you do have like they’re zoo animals ( “A woman interested in Our Movement? Cool! Those are so rare, you know. But we’re getting more of them. Look, over there - that’s a new one.” )
So, Peter Hurford ran a proto-EA club of sorts at his alma mater, I think called the "Venture Philanthropy Club". The goal was for the club to spend the semester assessing different local charities and then make a large donation at the end to whatever charity they assessed as the most effective. That's different than what you're doing, and I wouldn't even necessarily suggest doing the same thing as Peter's Venture Philanthropy Club did. However, Peter does have experience, I'm guessing, in reaching out to local organizations like that, so he may have so advice on what to look for in orgnaizations to calloaborate with, and how to approach them. Peter's name is right there under "Top Contributors" in the sidebar to the right of the screen. Just send him an email and he'll be happy to exchange emails.
Jon Courtney is the Community Director of Giving What We Can. It's his job description to help you do exactly what you're trying to do. You can find his email on the GWWC website.
Tom Ash is my friend who, with Jon, has started the Local Effective Altruism Network. Their goal is to help start as many EA chapters as there are people willing to launch them. Tom himself might be busy, but I think he'd know who among lots of people it's best for you to approach with further questions.