To the Editor:

The July 7, 2015 article "A $400 Million Gift and Accompanying Criticism" describes controversy around John Paulson’s record gift to the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. The root of much criticism is a sense that the gift is unjust—one university president called it "obscene"—and that Harvard doesn’t need the gift as it is already wealthy. Some defend the gift by arguing that the SEAS needs the money relative to other schools in the university, or to keep pace with other engineering schools.

I’d like to offer a different way to think about it—that Harvard has no needs, and that’s precisely why the gift is so powerful.

Jim Lord, a development professional who has many good insights on the field, likes to say organizations have no needs. Communities, societies, and individuals, of course, have needs to satisfy and problems to solve. Not so for organizations. They have solutions. They have answers. They have capabilities. But they do not have needs.

So instead of “Does Harvard need this money?” or “Does SEAS need this money?” the question becomes, “What can Harvard and SEAS do with this money?” That may strike the critic as a trivial distinction at first, but it’s actually profound.

Following Jim Lord’s advice, we could make the case for Paulson’s investment (and all philanthropic investment) this way: At Harvard we think differently about attracting philanthropic support. We approach our donors with a simple fact: Harvard has no needs. That is why we are so successful—we work with donors to focus on and solve the great problems that we face.

President Faust’s engagement with students on fossil fuels takes a capabilities approach when she argues that Harvard’s impact comes most effectively through research and innovation.

I think that is part of why the Chan family gift to the School of Public Health was well received was because—as the article mentions—the gift’s purposes were described with some specificity and so the image conveyed was that it would generate social return on investment.

The same is true of course for SEAS. Many of the greatest opportunities to improve human wellbeing and the wellbeing of the environment can and are being pursued by work at the school, and may only come from an institution like SEAS. On the other hand, there are services different schools or non-profit organizations can perform better than Harvard, and in those cases a gift may have a higher return there. In both cases it is a focus on the capabilities of a school or non-profit organization, not its needs, which get us to the transformative potential.

Timothy R. McDonald received his MPP from Harvard Kennedy School in 2014.