Bayo Akomolafe’s “Paraphilanthropy” represents one of the most philosophically profound and poetically challenging critiques of philanthropy from a decolonial, more-than-human perspective. The Nigerian-American philosopher, psychologist, and “itinerant scholar” proposes paraphilanthropy not as reformed charity but as a fugitive practice—escaping the extractive logics embedded in contemporary giving to reconnect with land, ancestors, and non-human kin. Written with Akomolafe’s characteristic depth and lyrical
complexity, the work refuses easy answers, instead inviting readers into generative discomfort about how money, giving, and social change are inextricably entangled with colonial histories and ongoing extraction from land and bodies.
Key Highlights
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“Para” as Fugitive Practice: Akomolafe uses the prefix “para” (beside, beyond, against) to position paraphilanthropy not as improving philanthropy but as fugitive flight from its premises. Like “paranormal” or “parallel,” paraphilanthropy runs alongside conventional giving while fundamentally departing from its assumptions about change, agency, and value.
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Money as Congealated Violence: The essay traces how money carries colonial history—how wealth accumulation required dispossession of indigenous lands, enslavement, and extractive relationships with the more-than-human world. Paraphilanthropy asks what giving might mean when we acknowledge money as “congealated violence” rather than neutral tool.
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Giving as Entanglement Not Transaction: Against transactional charity models, Akomolafe proposes giving as deepening entanglement—acknowledging mutual vulnerability and interconnection rather than maintaining distance between giver and receiver. This challenges philanthropic assumptions about boundaries, expertise, and who has agency to create change.
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Land as Primary Relationship: The work centers land not as property but as alive, agential, and in relationship with human and more-than-human communities. Paraphilanthropy means attending to land’s requests and needs, not merely funding land-based projects according to human frameworks.
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Decolonial Invitation to Lostness: Akomolafe argues that meaningful change requires becoming lost to colonial maps and metrics—embracing not-knowing rather than strategic plans. Paraphilanthropy invites funders into uncertainty, relationship, and transformation rather than maintaining control through measurement frameworks.
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More-Than-Human Justice: The essay extends justice beyond human concerns to include rivers, soil, fungi, and ecosystems as participants in social change. This reframes what philanthropy might support when ecological flourishing becomes central rather than peripheral to justice work.
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Refusing Resolution: Characteristic of Akomolafe’s work, the piece refuses to resolve into actionable frameworks or best practices. Instead it offers conceptual tools, provocations, and invitations for readers to sit with complexity rather than extracting implementable solutions.
Practical Applications
Akomolafe’s work resists direct application but offers transformative provocations:
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Philanthropic organizations and funders can use paraphilanthropy as invitation to examine their own assumptions about control, measurement, and strategic giving—asking what it might mean to release money rather than direct it, to become vulnerable rather than maintain power
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Grant-making institutions can experiment with relationship-based funding that prioritizes long-term accountability to communities and land over short-term outcomes, recognizing that meaningful change happens in timescales beyond funding cycles
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Movements for economic justice can draw on the concept of money as “congealated violence” to articulate why redistribution alone is insufficient—transformation requires addressing the extractive relationships money embodies
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Land-based and indigenous-led initiatives can reference paraphilanthropy when articulating why conventional funding frameworks don’t fit their work—the essay provides language for why relationship with land and more-than-human kin cannot be reduced to measurable outcomes
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Those exploring gift economies and alternative exchange can use Akomolafe’s analysis of giving as entanglement to develop practices that refuse transactional logics while acknowledging power differentials
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Decolonial practitioners across sectors can engage the work’s invitation to “lostness”—building capacity to operate outside colonial maps rather than merely diversifying representation within existing structures
The essay’s power lies in its capacity to trouble comfortable assumptions rather than providing reassuring answers.
Connection With SuperBenefit
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Akomolafe’s radical critique of philanthropic power dynamics resonates deeply with AIFS’s transformation from transactional funding model to coordi-nation based on voluntary association and mutual support, embodying paraphilanthropy’s invitation to release money rather than direct it toward predetermined outcomes measured by colonial metrics.
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The emphasis on relationship and entanglement as transformation itself—not means to an end—validates SuperBenefit’s understanding that trust-building and attending to group dynamics constitute foundational infrastructure rather than soft prerequisites, explaining why AIFS needed to prioritize relationship before coordination could become sustainable.
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Challenges SuperBenefit to hold the tension between providing reusable patterns for decentralized coordination while honoring Akomolafe’s invitation to “lostness” and emergence, recognizing that genuinely decolonial futures cannot be fully mapped in advance but must arise through practices that refuse colonial logics of productivity and measurement.
Related Concepts
- Power - Dynamics in funding and resource distribution
- Community - Organizations and movements being funded
- Coordination - Mechanisms for collective resource allocation
- Impact - Outcomes and effectiveness measures
- Governance - Decision-making in funding contexts