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They really are good guys: the contradictions of philanthro-capitalism.

Article Excerpt
It sounded like a headline from the Chaser or the Onion: 'World's second-richest man donates fortune to world's richest man'. Yet in late June, Warren Buffet did just that, publicly announcing that he would outsource his newly found philanthropic impulse and donate 37 billion dollars to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, primarily to fund innovative medical research. Gates has already pledged large amounts of his own fortune to charity, announcing the same month that he would step back from running Microsoft in order to concentrate his efforts on the Foundation. Both decisions were met with widespread praise. This is perhaps understandable. In an era where major political parties can only distinguish themselves through the size of a future tax cut, the news that both Gates and Buffet were prepared to give most of their money away seemed better than nothing to those who lament the plight of the world's poor.

Some commentators went further, speculating that we could be entering a new age of mega-giving, that Gates and Buffet, along with George Soros, might reignite a passion for philanthropy. This new philanthropy would seem apt for our media-saturated culture, creating a celebrity version of corporate responsibility whereby the entrepreneur can make enormous sums of money then appear benign by giving it away at a later date. More significantly, the venture-style philanthropy that groups...

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