THE FORD FOUNDATION

by Dwight Macdonald ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 15, 1956

From its appearance in The New Yorker, this unauthorized dit of the Ford Foundation- ""a large body of money completely surrounded by people who want some"" is a withering account of its administrators, its diffuse pursuits, its benefactions, its ""magnitudinous immensity""- some $2,500,000,000, and its less sizeable accomplishments. Formed, in an era in which the government had appropriated the more tangible great works, the Ford Foundation launched its ""problem-oriented"" program with the Fund for the Advancement of Education, the Fund for Adult Education, the Fund for the Republic, the little literary magazine- Perspectives, and television's Omnibus, and in a limbo of intellectual abstractions and meaningless research indulged its ""weakness for cerebration"". This was particularly true under the liberal hegemony of Hoffman and the maverick Hutchins; with the appointment of the new president, Gaither, the Foundation moved from its California estate (Itching Palms) to Madison Avenue. In the new offices both ""sumptuous and democratic""- the true expression of the Foundation's personality, they settled down to the serious business of unloading, with the recent great give-away to the colleges and hospitals, a classic example of ""scatteration"", a palliative which will not produce anything and for the teachers is at best a 4% increase of a needed 20%- ""a kind of tip"".... A wickedly entertaining appraisal of this behemoth, bogged down in bigness and in the practice of philanthropy without a purpose.

Pub Date: May 15, 1956

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Viking-Reynal

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1956

Categories: NONFICTION