The Future of 'Doing Good'

Charity is no longer alone at the table; ROI has pulled up a chair 

At the beginning of 2026, the world felt unsteady. Crisis followed crisis, we all felt the weight of it personally, trying to be humans – parents, friends, Christians, and development practitioners while absorbing a constant sense of global anxiety.

If we zoom out slightly, we see these shocks sit on deeper tremors: inflation and cost-of-living pressures, trade uncertainty, governments squeezed by debt and unredictable markets, and international aid falling sharply. Whether this moment is best described as a transition or a rupture,[1] what seems clear is that the global development landscape is being reconfigured at an alarming speed. As I have sat contemplating and lamenting in this space, I’ve wondered how as a Christian, and as a development worker, I can make a difference. How can large faith-based NGOs like World Vision shift and meet the changing needs in this changing system?

The Global Reconfiguration 

A defining feature of the present moment is a perceived shift away from development norms in which “doing good” primarily meant governments or NGOs mobilising aid, toward approaches more focused on investment and growth. This shift is visible not only in changing frameworks but also in changing actors, as business leaders and deal‑makers join, or replace, diplomats and development practitioners. In some contexts, the tone of international engagement appears to be shifting with them. Shared norms and international law are increasingly rivalled by transactional relationships, spheres of influence, and power plays. Charity is no longer alone at the table; ROI has pulled up a chair.[2]

At the same time, the concentration of global wealth is unprecedented. A quick search will show you that the 3 richest people in the world have more wealth ($1.33 trillion) than 111 of the world’s smallest economies combined ($1.32 trillion). 3 people have more than over 600 million people.

In theory, the world’s wealthiest individuals could fill much of the gap left by governments turning inward. This has led some to suggest that the future of development may yet be secured by enlightened elites, impact investing, and “business for good.” Perhaps things are not so bleak.

While private investment might address some failures of aid like supporting local enterprise, creating jobs, and strengthening markets, Dutch historian Rutger Bregman remains unconvinced that a moral shift has taken place. He argues[3]:

“There has been no moral awakening in the corporate world. Business for good, conscious capitalism, social impact. It was all mostly a sham. Beneath the talk, the cultural tide has been running in the other way for decades.”

So, the question remains open. As the dust settles, we may indeed see new forms of local growth and economic freedom. Or we may simply discover that power has migrated, from the wielding of logframes to the wielding of business plans, while extraction, inequality, and exclusion persist under a different logic. How can we ensure that we do better?

The Role of Christian Networks

In moments of global reordering, people of faith have often helped societies articulate why compassion, justice, and human dignity matter. As the modern aid system took shape, Christians helped shape the moral imagination that undergirded it. As the landscape shifts again, that responsibility has not disappeared but has intensified.

History offers a long lineage of Christians whose convictions gave rise to transformative networks and movements: William Wilberforce and the Clapham Sect in the abolition of the slave trade; William and Catherine Booth in pioneering street-level compassion that became the Salvation Army; Charles Malik embedding human dignity in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; Mother Teresa reasserting the worth of overlooked lives; Martin Luther King Jr. shaping the civil rights movement; and, within World Vision’s own story, figures such as Bob Pierce and Rev. Kung Chik Han who birthed an “international partnership of Christians whose mission is to follow our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in working with the poor and oppressed to promote human transformation, seek justice and bear witness to the good news of the Kingdom of God.”

Their shared legacy is not individual heroism but collective discernment. Change did not emerge from competing kingdoms with loosely aligned missions, but from communities learning to recognise and join God’s work together. Christian conviction found its force through collaboration, shared purpose, and moral clarity.

Today, Christian networks such as Micah Global, INFEMIT, the World Council of Churches, the World Evangelical Alliance, Integral Alliance, the Global Christian Forum, the Lausanne Movement, and others carry this same mandate. The question before us is whether we can work together to help shape the moral imagination of “doing good” in this new era. If aid is receding and investment is advancing, the question becomes not merely who will do good, but how we will imagine the good in the first place.

A Christian vision for humanity

To put the “humanity back into humanitarianism” is to ask a fundamental question: what does it mean to be human? For Christians, a key starting point is Imago Dei: the belief that every person is made in the image of God. Human dignity is not earned through productivity, purchasing power, or ‘investability’; it is given. Justice and compassion are owed to all simply because they are human.

While this idea remains true, Old Testament scholar Myrto Theocharous sharpens an additional perspective. Where poverty, crisis or violence does not degrade the sacred worth in any person, one should perhaps rather ask, “Can a Christian who refuses justice to another… be called the ‘Image of God’?”[5] The threat to the divine image, it would seem, lies not in a failure to receive justice as God is always on the side of the oppressed, but in a failure to do justice, which is the calling of those who claim to bear God’s likeness. Theocharous presses this further: “It is actually arrogant to serve the disadvantaged only in order to solve their problem. It is arrogant to serve them so that they can be ‘human’ just like me. I am the one who is not human without them.”[6]

This reframes the entire debate. Whether through aid or investment, Christian communities are not called to benevolence that secures power, status, or return for the giver. Imagining “the good” means discovering our full humanity in one another and resisting any model of development that diminishes the dignity of those it claims to serve.

Here, Christian networks become indispensable. In a world increasingly shaped by fragmentation, inequality, and inward-looking accumulation, these networks have a unique vocation: to foster connection, build moral critical mass, and articulate visions of shared flourishing. Progress becomes not the endless accumulation of assets, but the pursuit of justice, relationship, and enough.

For those with wealth, this requires courage—something braver than acquiring more. We need moral imaginations that make hoarding untenable and solidarity compelling. And for those without, the Gospel proclaims restoration of what was always theirs: safety, dignity, voice, and hope. This mutual restoration is why the good news of Jesus is, fundamentally, good news for the poor.

Christian networks are uniquely placed to help articulate a different way of being human together. We need a shared effort to move beyond both a charity that reinforces hierarchy and an investment logic that prizes ROI over relationship. Through collaboration and imagination, we can offer a vision for this new era—one where dignity is restored, power is shared, and fullness of life is realised for all. 

Phil Hilditch is an Advisor for Global Church Partnerships & Theological Engagement at World Vision International, working at the intersection of faith, global engagement, and organisational strategy. With a background in theology and conflict transformation, he supports church partnerships, organisational learning, and collaboration across diverse cultural and religious contexts, drawing on experience from the Middle East, Eastern Europe, and global networks.