Donations Hall of Shame

“You don’t get a get-home-free card just for having good intentions. You have to do things that make sense,” says aid critic William Easterly, in describing bad donation practices.

Whether it’s old shoes, used soap, or broken computers, the efforts that made it into our Donation Hall of Shame all have one thing in common: they’re well-intentioned ideas that ultimately made their recipients’ lives worse, not better.

Much of the information in this piece was drawn from Saundra Schimmelpfennig’s excellent aid blog, Good Intentions Are Not Enough; you can also follow Saundra on Twitter here.

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Are there misguided donations you would nominate for the Hall of Shame? Do some not deserve to be there? Let us know in the comments, below.

Now that you know how not to donate, read about our Donation Best Practices in the next section.