I can’t recall the last time I read a book in one sitting, but that’s what happened with Moral Ambition by bestselling author Rutger Bregman. I read the German edition, though it’s also available in Dutch (see James Herbert's Quick Take). An English release is slated for May.
The book opens with the statement: “The greatest waste of our times is the waste of talent.” From there, Bregman builds a compelling case for privileged individuals to leave their “bullshit jobs” and tackle the world’s most pressing challenges. He weaves together narratives spanning historical movements like abolitionism, suffrage, and civil rights through to contemporary initiatives such as Against Malaria Foundation, Charity Entrepreneurship, LEEP, and the Shrimp Welfare Project.
If you’ve been engaged with EA ideas, much of this will sound familiar, but I initially didn’t expect to enjoy the book as much as I did. However, Bregman’s skill as a storyteller and his knack for balancing theory and narrative make Moral Ambition a fascinating read. He reframes EA concepts in a more accessible way, such as replacing “counterfactuals” with the sports acronym “VORP” (Value Over Replacement Player). His use of stories and examples, paired with over 500 footnotes for details, makes the book approachable without sacrificing depth.
I had some initial reservations. The book draws heavily on examples from the EA community but rarely engages directly with the movement, mentioning EA mainly in the context of FTX. The final chapter also promotes Bregman’s own initiative, The School for Moral Ambition. However, the school’s values closely align with core EA principles. The ITN framework and pitches for major EA cause areas are in the book, albeit with varying levels of depth.
Having finished the book, I can appreciate its approach. Moral Ambition feels like a more pragmatic, less theory-heavy version of EA. The School for Moral Ambition has attracted better-known figures in Germany, such as the political economist Maja Göpel and social entrepreneur Waldemar Zeiler, who haven’t previously been associated with EA. I’ve started recommending the book to people I’d like to introduce to career-impact ideas, especially those who might prefer a story-driven, lighter entry point over something like 80,000 Hours.
It will be interesting to see how the book fares in the U.S., where Bregman recently relocated and has already received some press. Perhaps Moral Ambition can help preserve and propagate EA ideals in a post-FTX era or complement existing brands like Charity Entrepreneurship, Giving What We Can, and 80,000 Hours.
That said, there’s a notable difference in approach. While Moral Ambition incorporates many EA principles, it steers readers toward its own School of Moral Ambition rather than EA organizations. For instance, 80,000 Hours—a natural fit for this topic—gets just a single footnote. This contrasts with EA’s collaborative spirit, where mutual recommendation and shared resources are the norm.
The School of Moral Ambition adds value by broadening the reach of EA-inspired ideas. However, if the EA movement were to shift toward a model with more independent entities and less collaboration, it could risk losing some of its unique strengths.
This makes sense to me, though, based on what Bregman is likely trying to accomplish here. [Caveat: I haven't read the book as I only read English.]
In the world of doing good effectively ("DGE"), we can think of EA as something like a planet. It metaphorically has enough mass to create a round shape due to its gravity, and has cleared its orbit of smaller objects. It's big enough, and too dependent on outside forces for its funding or other critical elements. The cynical rough analogy -- which I do not fully endorse -- would be that Open Phil is the planet, and various other orgs are -- in a gravitational sense -- satellites of Open Phil to a considerable extent. By that I mean that they lack practical independence from their predominant funder and are rather suspectable to changes in its thinking.
Assuming Bregman has important philosophical differences from Open Phil and/or the EA ecosystem, he probably doesn't want to create a satellite of the EA / Open Phil planetary system. That could be for philosophical reasons (e.g., a more neartermist approach vs. believing Open Phil is likely to move increasingly longtermist over time) or for practical reasons (e.g., trying to reach people and tap resources not practically available to EA for optics or cultural reasons). When and if SMA gets larger, it may be in a position to interface with EA on a planet-to-planet basis the way GiveWell can now. I doubt it could do so now.
No community can be all things to all people, and besides redundancy limits the risks of single points of failure. SMA may be intended as a somewhat more populist / accessible, somewhat more "vanilla" flavor of DGE than the EA community, and I don't think it could accomplish those ends very well as an EA satellite. Although there are tradeoffs, I think it's probably good on balance to have a few more planetary systems in the DGE star system.