Since going organic is the latest talk of the town, Smart Money went to work to find out if an organic Thanksgiving is really worth it, taking into account cost savings, health benefits, and environmental sustainability.

The upfront cost:
Going organic will increase the cost of a typical Thanksgiving meal by 75%. Ouch.

According to Smart Money: "Overall, the organic version of our turkey-day menu for eight people -- including dinner rolls, a salad and three bottles of organic wine -- totaled $295.36. That puts the organic premium for the meal at $126.35 compared with the same shopping list filled with nonorganic options."

The cost behind the cost:
While the consumer sees a higher price for organic foods, the Organic Trade Association explains that these prices support healthier agricultural systems, meaning potential long term environmental benefits for the quality of agricultural land.

Health benefits:
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) argues that the organic label should not be the deciding factor; it may be healthier to buy locally or privately produced items from farmers markets instead of buying organic items that were shipped from across the country.

NRDC notes: "Of course, health concerns - such as the use of pesticides on produce - also factor into the decision for some shoppers. Among conventionally raised fruits and vegetables, some naturally rely less on pesticides and could be good bets at Thanksgiving. Broccoli, for example, is one such "clean" vegetable. We would have saved $2 by swapping out our organic stalks."

The New York Times offers a few ways to strategically go organic on key items in order to minimize costs.

To sum up this Thanksgiving Evaluation: By going organic, consumers will spend more money, contribute to long term environmental sustainability, and potentially cut back on pesticides. Or they might just be paying for peace of mind.

Which brings us back to evaluation basics: contributing toward a goal, even if imperfectly, is important. Attributing one's efforts is much harder. Contribution is okay.

Posted by Lisa Molinaro at 10:06 AM | Permalink

You would think you'd need a fighter to lead the Department of Defense. But nowadays effective leaders are collaborative -- even at the Pentagon.

"Smart power" originator Joseph Nye published an interesting new angle on the changing dynamics of power in US News and World Report. His article, "America Needs a New Style of Leadership," argues that "It's time to retire the 'big man,' heroic warrior model of leadership." Leaders who function as larger-than-life fighters don't cope very well with managing complex systems, writes Nye:

The enormous potential of human leadership ranges from Attila the Hun to Mother Teresa. Most everyday leaders remain unheralded. The role of heroic leadership in war has led us to overemphasize command and control and hard military power--and downplay other styles of leadership. For example, in the recent presidential race, some people derided Sen. Barack Obama for being a former community organizer rather than a war hero.

...The "Big Man" type of leadership works in societies based on networks of tribal cultures which rely on personal and family honor and loyalty, but such social structures are not well adapted for coping with today's complex information-based world. In the modern United States, institutional constraints such as constitutions and impartial legal system circumscribe such heroic figures. Societies that rely on heroic leaders are slow to develop the civil society and broad social capital that are necessary for leading in a modern networked world. Modern leadership turns out to be less about who you are or how you were born than about what you have learned and what you do as part of a group. We need to go beyond the Big Man approach to leadership.

...Adept leadership depends not on stereotypes of style but on how individuals combine hard and soft power skills to produce smart strategies. That is what our new president will need to demonstrate if he wishes to be successful and regain public confidence.

So who, exactly, has honed these skills and applied them to difficult leadership tasks? Our current Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates (pictured above), for one. Read all about it.

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 3:50 PM | Permalink

An article in the Washington Post, "Report: U.S. Uses Aid to Promote Non-Humanitarian Goals," brought me back to my first international relations class in college -- the one where you learn terms like "hegemon" and "public good." Why? Because while there are legitimate reasons to argue against using foreign aid for political and military ends, most foreign policy experts these days will tell you that foreign assistance is a key tool in our national security toolkit -- and that it ought to be used more and more in lieu of military force.

Traditional thinking about statecraft holds that stable international order emerges when there is either a clear balance of power between states (because everyone knows where they stand) or a hegemon that exerts its power and influence to shape the international order. The latter, this thinking goes, is better because there is less ambiguity than in a constantly-shifting balance of power situation. While the hegemon more or less has its way, it also finances (relative) peace and creates the space for prosperous international relations. (Read an intriguing critique of the "hegemon is better than balance of power" argument by Bruce W. Jentleson and Steven Weber in Foreign Policy here [subscription required]. They argue that powerful new actors, who are not states, change this equation.)

Small wonder, as the U.S. grapples with its increasingly unwieldy hegemonic duties, that we are relying quite a bit on foreign aid in our efforts to respond to threats and stabilize dangerous regions. Indeed, in the face of research showing that no purely military strategy has ever successfully completed an attempt at nation-building (see Rand's recent report, "After the War: Nation-Building from FDR to George W. Bush"), what other strategy can the United States pursue?

Time for a reality check on expectations. The emerging dictates of "smart power" require that the U.S. use foreign aid to solve security problems (though it's no magic bullet; see Egypt and Pakistan).

Yet the report quoted in the Post raises legitimate concerns about how politically-driven aid taints truly humanitarian giving by association. The story quotes George Rupp, president of the International Rescue Committee, on the difficulty that humanitarian efforts such as those of IRC -- which attempts to stay above local politics both for the safety of its workers and the legitimacy of its mission -- encounter.

Rupp said his organization has refused to participate in the PRT program in Afghanistan because it "decreases the security of our humanitarian workers on the ground." Rupp said his organization delivered assistance in the Afghan town of Gardez for more than 15 years without incident. But he said locals began to "call into question our impartiality" when they saw NATO military vehicles and soldiers distributing aid and rebuilding schools in the area.

This will be an enduring challenge for humanitarians in the coming years: how to craft programs and brands that stay distinct from the smart power-driven push for more strategic aid.

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 10:38 AM | Permalink

Let's do a quick cultural comparison. On the front of a European cigarette box, written in bold caps lock letters, are the words: SMOKING KILLS. It is quite difficult for any smoker with the slightest bit of intelligence to misunderstand this two-word message.

On the other hand...Somewhere hidden in between nice pictures of camels or beautiful women is the more aesthetic yet slightly confusing Surgeon General's Warning: Smoking Causes Lung Cancer, Heart Disease, Emphysema, And May Complicate Pregnancy.

Not that most of us didn't receive the smoking-kills-you lesson in middle school, (we probably did) but it still seems that the two-word phrase which is both bolded and in large print gives the message a bit more clarity than the American message (which has no mention of death nor does it declare with certainty that smoking actually complicates pregnancy).

Europeans seem to have the message down: yes, smoking does kill (hard to miss since it takes up half of the side of the box) so what smokers choose to do with that information is up to them.

However, Americans are struggling to grasp mixed and muddled messages. For instance: cigarettes and Barack Obama. The Washington Post put Obama's smoking habit in the spotlight to jab at the true convoluted nature of the smoking debate. Should we judge him? Can we tell our children the truth about our President's habit? Will he die during his presidency from smoking related diseases? Can he lead our country if he can't even quit smoking?

We may want to take the hint from Europe's messaging style in this case and keep it simple. Smoking kills. Barack Obama is the president-elect and the world is looking to him for change. Why not keep these two images and their baggage separate and let him make up his own mind on this one.

Posted by Lisa Molinaro at 3:49 PM | Permalink

My wife, a longtime supporter of John McCain, nonetheless grew teary-eyed with pride during Barack Obama's acceptance speech on the night of November 4. She grew up in Africa and the Middle East, and Obama displayed to her a new picture of American leadership: a vindication of both the potential of African Americans and of those who have experienced the world beyond U.S. borders in a prolonged, outlook-changing way.

But how did we get here? How did Obama overcome the barriers other black candidates have faced to inspire the widespread confidence necessary among the electorate to win a presidential election?

I am convinced that a large piece of the answer is this: no president before Obama brought such varied personal experience to the office. We may think first of the way Obama brings racial diversity to the White House, but without the social capital Obama accrued during his time abroad --his diversity of geographic experience -- he likely would never have achieved what he did.

The global landscape is changing, and Americans -- many of them deeply reticent about their place in a multipolar world -- recognize nonetheless that the United States needs a leader who is well-prepared to navigate, communicate and negotiate this new international landscape.

So why aren't there more young minorities in the United States with an Obama-like international resume? Here's one reason: only 1 in 100 U.S. college students study abroad; of those who do study abroad, only 3% are African American, Hispanic or Native American. No doubt aspects of it were difficult, but Obama's unusual family background amounted to an enormous windfall, catapulting him over and above his peers -- African American and otherwise. Most minority students in the U.S. don't have access to that sort of social capital.

But there are a few bright spots -- organizations that are actively trying to give minority students the tools to understand and impact the world. The video linked above was produced by Bardoli Global, a nonprofit that brokers opportunities for African American, Hispanic and Native American students to do intensive study abroad in emerging economies, followed by almost a year of close mentoring and a professional internship. (Full disclosure: I am a member of Bardoli's board of directors and cannot resist the urge to point out that the organization is currently amidst a very exciting capital campaign. If you're interested in supporting their work, please visit this fundraising page.)

Another bright spot is Global Citizen Year, designed to engage thousands of diverse young Americans in a transformative year of global service between high school and college and create a pipeline of new American leaders uniquely suited to combat the global challenges of the 21st century.

Sound familiar? Efforts like these are the keys to access more widely the experience that Barack Obama brings to the U.S. Presidency. If they succeed, we will see more of him.

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 2:55 PM | Permalink

Even if wind, solar and other types of renewable energy cost more, publics in 21 nations, rich and poor, say they would support mandatory measures to switch from carbon-based fuels.

A new WorldPublicOpinion.org poll of 21 nations finds very strong support for the government requiring utilities to use more alternative energy, such as wind and solar, and requiring businesses to use energy more efficiently, even if these steps increase the costs of energy and other products. Fewer than half of the nations polled favor putting more emphasis on nuclear energy or on coal or oil.

In all nations most people reject the view that shifting to alternative energy sources would hurt the economy, believing instead that it would save money in the long run.

This poll is significant because it includes such a wide swath of countries, including most of the largest nations -- China, India, the United States, Indonesia, Nigeria, and Russia.

But keep in mind: people aren't presented with as clear a choice as this poll gives them when they make decisions out in the marketplace that affect energy use. Lawmakers, advocates and businesses need to help these publics recognize where and when these choices are made; otherwise, opinion will remain that, to little lasting effect.

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 1:57 PM | Permalink

Ever since the yellowcake uranium incident a few years back, the CIA has been trying to redeem its image: less bumbling lapdog of the President, more efficient, hands-on spy service. In the spirit of inspiring the agency toward its ideal of James Bondish competence, Foreign Policy brainstormed five critical missions that the CIA should undertake to re-establish its bona fides.

In true Bond movie style, the proposed missions range across the globe and include a commendably shady cast of characters: gauge the spread of the H-bomb (India? N. Korea? Pakistan?); scope out the extent of Chinese naval power; figure out the dynamics at play within Russia's state-owned energy conglomerate, Gazprom (turns out all those conspiracy theories about oil and politics were almost right; this mission's about natural gas); figure out which Afghan tribes have Taliban connections, then how to bribe them; and finally, who's in line to succeed Kim Jong Il?

Who needs fictional criminal cartels like Quantum (see new Bond flick, "Quantum of Solace")? These missions would be plenty interesting.

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 2:39 PM | Permalink

What might happen if the non-profit world was free from funding constraints? Though a distant dream for most, many non-profits are in fact examining minimal-cost outreach tactics in preparation for when funds run dry.

As women's organizations across the country are pushing for equal gender representation in the new administration, their struggle to find adequate funding has pushed them to think creatively. Allison Stevens, Washington Bureau Chief for Women's eNews, introduces a few options for mobilizing that are cost-free given the struggle for financing that many non-profits are facing in the current economic crisis.

"Money is not going to get in our way," said Ellie Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority Foundation, a women's rights lobby in Arlington, Va.

Smeal said women's rights groups are more organized than ever and have new communications tools at their disposal. One possibility would be an online site that would collect recommendations from grassroots women's activists around the country.

Smeal's website is jam-packed with grassroots initiatives to engage women across the country. Their "take action" webpage provides viewers with 6 step-by-step options on how they can engage. Additionally, their student activism page provides students with means to meet other engaged students, start their own campus movements, become informed on campus-related issues, etc.

By mobilizing community members and volunteers, non-profits successfully tap into one of their greatest (and free) resources. Instead of cutting back in the midst of a financial crisis, non-profits can look towards making progress at the grassroots level. President Elect Barak Obama is not the only grassroots community organizer around; going back to the basics; mobilizing the people, is an advocacy tool that we will most likely see in increasing popularity.

Posted by Lisa Molinaro at 11:50 AM | Permalink

Effective advocacy is deeply entwined with effective communication. Once you have established an advocacy goal, most often the next step is to figure out who your organization needs to reach -- the most specific audience you can identify -- in order to achieve that goal. Then you're faced with the question of how -- how to communicate meaningfully with an audience who will not, in most cases, instinctively grasp why your issue or proposal is of special import.

In many cases, the media can act as an amplifier, helping you raise the visibilty of your issue with a key audience. The Communicaitons Consortium Media Center has a long track record helping nonprofits figure out how to communicate their ideas effectively in a media context. CCMC recently packaged much of this knowledge in its second edition of Strategic Communications for Nonprofits: A Step-by-Step Guide to Working with the Media "New and updated features include: new case studies; new trends in media and branding; ethnic media issues; and trends in technology."

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 1:17 PM | Permalink

Speaking of the power that clever advocates -- specifically, efforts like the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization -- can exert by leveraging their spending to incentivize others to deliver services, The Economist reports that the big pharmaceutical companies are shifting their focus to serve the needs of developing countries. GAVI and similar commitments to buy useful drugs that have yet to be developed for markets in the global South are not the only reason for this shift in sales strategy, but they helped to point Pharma toward shifts in the marketplace. Increasingly, drugs to treat diseases that afflict primarily those in the developing world are becoming the R&D priority (instead of another heartburn med, for example):

For its part Pfizer, the world's biggest pharmaceuticals firm, recently announced a restructuring that makes emerging markets a priority. Jean-Michel Halfon, who is in charge of that effort, says serving customers in developing countries is now "a business, not a charity."

This is nothing less than a huge success story for global health advocates.

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 11:07 AM | Permalink

"Leverage" has a bad name these days. The word evokes investment banks' habit of borrowing $30, $50, $100 for every dollar invested. That sort of leverage did not create efficiencies. Instead, it created illusions of capital where there was none, and it hurt public confidence.

It's a shame that capital markets are so prone to boom and bust. Among other downsides to this cycle: concepts -- like leverage -- that underlie market behavior are very useful, yet their abuse makes them appear fundamentally flawed. Despite all that economists and policymakers have learned since the stock market went bust in 1929, leading the country into a decade of Depression, we still have a hard time steering an even course between irrational exuberance and fear.

Matthew Bishop, the New York bureau chief of The Economist and co-author of Philanthrocapitalism: How the Rich Can Save the World, reminds those focused on social and environmental impact that leverage, used in a healthy way, is indeed a powerful, legitimate asset. And leverage needn't involve borrowing money at all. Leverage, for nonprofits and civil society organizations, should be fundamental to their theory of change.

This kind of leverage -- using a relatively small donation to enlist others in a cause -- is very different from the Wall Street kind, which by multiplying the size of traders' bets sometimes has blown extra air into financial bubbles. Expect philanthropic leverage to become more important in tough economic times as social demands increase and government budgets get tighter -- the need to get the maximum bang for the increasingly sought-after philanthropic buck should become even more critical.

Bishop includes advocacy as a prime example of effective leverage. An idea may travel back and forth between the private and public sectors several times as it moves from concept to implementation to impact, and it may need to leverage public and private resources at different points along the way:

As Mayor Bloomberg says, his charitable foundation is giving millions of dollars away to try to eradicate smoking worldwide, but that money will struggle to match the impact of the ban on smoking in public he legislated in New York. Mayor Bloomberg also uses philanthropy to finance pilot projects that he thinks are too risky to ask taxpayers to pay for initially. If they are proven successful, however, this philanthropic investment can be leveraged with little controversy or risk to taxpayers by making the expansion of the project part of the city budget. A similar model is now being used by Cory Booker, the mayor of Newark, who has a philanthropy coordinator in City Hall.

And there are other kinds of leverage to consider during tough financial times. Consolidation for efficiency isn't something many nonprofits get excited about, but here, too, leverage might play an important role.

One obvious opportunity for leverage during the economic downturn will be for philanthrocapitalists to bring about mergers and acquisitions in the nonprofit sector, which currently has far too many organizations doing essentially the same thing. When raising money was easy, those nonprofits could resist demands to get together. Now philanthrocapitalists who want to finance bigger, more efficient organizations may find a new willingness to accept their terms.

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 4:54 PM | Permalink

Within a few short hours of Obama's victory, this slide show flew through cyberspace (much faster, I might add, than any in-depth analysis or political commentary).

Over the past few years, we've begun to see the new online phenomena of news stories being told through slide shows in addition to conventional articles with one or two photos thrown in here and there. BBC's "day in photos" was one of the first to venture into this realm. It quickly became attractive for readers who didn't have the time to read a few articles yet still wanted a lively highlight of the day's most interesting events.

The paradox of the internet is that news sources have unlimited space- no more word limits, yet viewers seem to yearn for the quickest and most catchy means to digest a story. Soon enough, other news sources adopted the exciting idea of condensing stories of an entire day, month, year, event, person's life...etc into a photo slide show. Most online news sources now have an entire section of their website dedicated to Photos and Videos alone.

Many advocates struggle to maintain the integrity of a complex issue; a slide show would seemingly oversimplify it. However, it would be foolish to neglect the fact that the slide show is popular due to its simple nature: it is an easily digestible series of short yet poignant bullet points that remain imprinted in a viewer's memory. If these bullet points happen to be photographs, is it so bad?

Posted by Lisa Molinaro at 3:44 PM | Permalink

As the economy worsens, the relationship between grant makers and grant seekers is liable to get even more testy than it already tends to be (though the well will not necessarily run dry, say the experts). I found this piece, by Eugene R. Wilson, who has a long history on both sides of the equation, to be a helpful "empathy primer," so to speak, for grant seekers trying to understand what's so hard about giving money away. One excerpt:

The critic Dwight Macdonald once explained why many grant makers avoid seeing grant seekers in person. A foundation is "just a big pile of money, surrounded by people who want it," he said.

All of whom believe they deserve it, he might have added. At the ARCO Foundation, we received a new request every 16 minutes of the workday. We learned that you turn down 20 requests for each one you approve.

Barry D. Karl, the University of Chicago historian, told a gathering of grant makers that I attended in 1979 that when you awarded a grant, you created an ingrate and a lot of enemies.

More importantly, if we chose badly, the grant money was wasted. But with new requests quickly piling up, there was no time to spend wondering which of those organizations we rejected might have done more with a grant.

In such a deluge, grant seekers are often treated badly. Grant makers must change that.

The quote helps explain why both sides get frustrated with the grant seeking process -- and why evaluation and lessons learned often fall through the cracks. But, notes Wilson, both grant makers and grant seekers participate in creating the social impact sought (if indeed it was created, which brings us back to evaluation). Grant makers' don't deserve to be proud of their power of the purse unless the purse is opened wisely and deployed in a flexible, transparent way. Meanwhile, grant seekers might have a lot to say about causing social change, but they should realize that others' do too: ergo, keep it short and tie the work into the grant maker's larger vision for change.

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 4:53 PM | Permalink

I posted a few weeks ago on Nicholas Kristof's column exploring the way Barack Obama's (at that time still undecided) presidency would change the face of the United States -- not because of what Obama does but because of his name, background and heritage. That can be a foreign idea to people who work hard day-in and day-out for substantive policy change.

But symbols are incredibly powerful, though Americans may not realize why or how, exactly, symbolic shifts in the U.S. presidency will challenge or change perceptions of their country. Jim Sleeper, a professor at the Yale School of Divinity, writing for TPM Cafe, offers his perspective in a post titled "I, Barack Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear..."

...During the campaign, neo-conservatives such as Daniel Pipes and others of Obama's detractors thought it smart to highlight his paternal Muslim roots and associations. But now that he's won, you'd have to be as naive as a neo-con to miss the nobility and world-historical gains this country would achieve if, having overthrown a bad Hussein, it installed a good one -- not in Baghdad, but in Washington...

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 4:26 PM | Permalink

Charitable giving is too strange a bird for anyone -- economists, nonprofit experts and corporate managers included -- to predict very accurately. One might expect philanthropy to be among the first casualties of economic difficulty, since it is, in economic terms at least, clearly non-essential. But as yesterday's New York Times story "Bracing for Lean Times Ahead" shows with the Depression-era study to the right, giving is counter-intuitive; it can increase in the midst of great financial difficulty.

According to the Times, nonprofits will probably face lower giving levels soon, but "few fund-raising experts or nonprofit leaders are predicting an implosion in giving, a long fall from the more than $300 billion that was donated last year in the United States." Historical data show "that swings in giving are not nearly as severe as broader economic ups and downs, and that during some of the worst times philanthropy remained strong," as was the case during the Depression.

Patrick M. Rooney, interim executive director of the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University, said the most reliable indicator of individual giving was Standard & Poor's 500 stock index, with a 100-point jump translating into an additional $1.5 billion of philanthropy from people who report donations on tax forms. "It works just the same way on the downside," he said.

Using that rule of thumb and the price of the index on Nov. 6, such individual giving would drop this year by about $8.7 billion from an estimated $187 billion, according to Mr. Rooney. That's far less than financial markets have fallen.

Helpfully, the Times also ran some advice for nonprofit managers in the midst of funding trouble. "The Nonprofit's Guide to Surviving a Downturn" discusses Reynold Levy (who directs New York's Lincoln Center) and other nonprofit leaders' accumulated wisdom about fundraising and management in difficult times.

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 2:20 PM | Permalink

Those without the resources or influence to access the mainstream media often talk about the web's power to fashion grassroots coalitions that upend the establishment. I'm not sure the establishment, once it's established, has ever devoted much thought to cultivating the grassroots. But the Washington Post reports that Barack Obama is planning to leverage his campaign's enormous online operation to translate grassroots campaigning to direct governance.

Armed with millions of e-mail addresses and a political operation that harnessed the Internet like no campaign before it, Barack Obama will enter the White House with the opportunity to create the first truly "wired" presidency.

Obama aides and allies are preparing a major expansion of the White House communications operation, enabling them to reach out directly to the supporters they have collected over 21 months without having to go through the mainstream media.

Just as John F. Kennedy mastered television as a medium for taking his message to the public, Obama is poised to transform the art of political communication once again, said Joe Trippi, a Democratic strategist who first helped integrate the Internet into campaigning four years ago.

It's unclear how Obama will maintain his special connection to these ten or so million Americans while governing on behalf of the rest; in his acceptance speech, Obama explicity promised to be the President of those who did not vote for him, too. But it's a fascinating prospect, particularly as advocates think about how to manage the transition following their own campaigns targeted at candidates during election season.

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 5:02 PM | Permalink

The GII Exchange is back up and running after a brief hiatus due to technical difficulties. We apologize for last week's radio silence.

Many groups argued for a more sensible approch to U.S. foreign policy during the 2008 presidential campaign. It's impossible to determine the net effect each of these efforts produced in the race. But I appreciate how one of them -- Impact 08, an attempt to help candidates strike the right balance among defense, diplomacy and development assistance proposals -- recapped its contributions and offered ideas about how the efforts of those involved before the election carry forward.

Impact 08's focus on overall outcomes (rather than their own outputs) and next steps for the new administration is helpful to all advocates on these issues; everyone working on these issues needs to figure out how to stay relevant after the election as the business of governing gets underway.

Posted by Josh Weissburg at 4:36 PM | Permalink