Heather Gerken is Flipping the Script at the Ford Foundation
What Ford’s new president is trying to do—and why it matters beyond Ford (870 words / 3.5-minute read)
I had the opportunity to speak with Heather Gerken, the new president of the Ford Foundation, for the latest episode of The Art of Association podcast. Just a few months into her role, she is already flipping the script that the right and left alike have long relied upon to characterize Ford’s work. Given its status as a flagship funder, her approach has implications well beyond the institution she leads.
You can listen on Apple, Spotify, Amazon, or Pocket Casts.
The familiar script about Ford
For critics on the right, the Ford Foundation embodies everything that is wrong with big philanthropy. The fortune that first endowed it was the fruit of American capitalism. Beginning in the 1960s, however, the institution backed increasingly sharp critiques of this system. In 1976, Henry Ford II, grandson of Henry Ford and then Chairman and CEO of Ford Motor Company, resigned from the Foundation’s board in frustration. To conservatives, this became the paradigmatic override of donor intent.
Critics also resented the Foundation’s growing alignment with the political left. It didn’t help that Ford’s president in this period, McGeorge Bundy, had served as a key advisor to Democratic presidents Kennedy and Johnson. Ford’s ongoing advocacy and funding of racial and social justice, which reached new heights under Darren Walker, Gerken’s predecessor, have kept these critiques simmering.
What those on the right decry, those on the left welcome. Progressives applaud Ford’s efforts to overcome economic inequality, combat systemic racism, and push politics and policy to the left. The perception of what the Ford Foundation does is remarkably similar across ideological camps; the only difference is whether they see it as good or bad.
A more complicated reality
This simplified institutional narrative became somewhat more complicated under Darren Walker. The alleged anti-capitalist ethos was clearly overblown: Walker had spent years as a corporate lawyer and investment banker on Wall Street and professed that “my belief in our capitalist democracy is unwavering.” He served on the boards of Block, Inc., PepsiCo, and Ralph Lauren. And Walker welcomed Henry Ford III, a next-generation Ford Motor Company executive, onto the Foundation’s board.
Moreover, Walker drew mounting criticism from activists on the left who felt he was not going far enough to support their causes. For example, when Walker defended a nuanced approach and incremental progress in reforming New York City’s troubled jail system, protestors swarmed the Foundation’s offices with signs declaring “Abolition Now!” and “Fuck Your Nuance!”
Walker further alienated ideologues on the left when he joined a cross-ideological group of peers to defend philanthropic pluralism. This is the once venerated notion that funders should be free to support causes they care about, consistent with the law.
That Walker signed the statement with leaders of right-of-center institutions like Brian Hooks of Stand Together along with the heads of the John Templeton Foundation and the Philanthropy Roundtable infuriated critics across the spectrum. They objected to seeing their philanthropic allies affirming shared principles with the other side.
A return to first principles
This is the context in which Heather Gerken has taken on the leadership of the Ford Foundation. During our wide-ranging conversation, I was struck by how she is both continuing shifts that Walker set in motion and advancing new ones of her own. Throughout, she is reframing Ford’s work as a return to first principles.
It is telling that she has invoked a 1950 Report of the Trustees of the Ford Foundation, then chaired by Henry Ford II, just as the Foundation was being fully endowed and institutionalized. The trustees used the report to set the course for the institution’s future. They declared that the Foundation’s purpose was to be “the advancement of the ideals and principles of democracy.” Those same aims animate the agenda that Gerken has announced.
She is also emphasizing different aspects of the Foundation’s legacy and how it has contributed to these ideas and principles over the years. This includes the creation of The Fund for the Republic to oppose McCarthyism in the 1950s, supporting the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s, and helping to underwrite the creation of key institutions, from Sesame Street to the field of public interest law.
In our conversation, Gerken underscored her commitment to a scrupulously nonpartisan approach in supporting democracy, elections, and the rule of law. She is determined that Ford’s expanded work in these areas will honor not only the letter but also the spirit of the ban on foundations attempting to influence electoral outcomes.
Finally, in what marks another return to the first principles of philanthropic pluralism, Gerken extolled the benefits of philanthropic leaders and institutions engaging across the ideological spectrum and building viewpoint diversity into their work.
To be clear, she is not advocating meet-in-the-middle, bipartisan compromise. The Ford Foundation will remain a staunchly liberal institution under her leadership. But I expect it will continue to become a more pragmatic and pluralistic one—and will enjoy broader coalitions and more democratic legitimacy as a result.
Please give the episode a listen, let me know your impressions, and share it with others. You can find it here on Apple, Spotify, Amazon, or Pocket Casts.