Appealing to the Crowd

Donation-based crowdfunding is an increasingly common and visible practice where campaigners ask friends, family, and even complete strangers for help. It isn't unusual to see these campaigns in the news and on social media following a tragedy or disaster and they have helped millions of people. However, crowdfunding also creates serious ethical and political problems, including undermining privacy, worsening social inequities and injustices, and encouraging fraud and misinformation. This book presents these concerns in the context of more traditional giving practices. It ends with values to guide crowdfunding and suggestions for how to engage in crowdfunding in less problematic ways.

Jeremy Snyder is a Professor in the Faculty of Health Sciences at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia, where he has been a faculty member since 2007. He is the author of Exploiting Hope (Oxford University Press, 2020).

Introduction
Chapter One: Giving and the Rise of Crowdfunding
Chapter Two: Crowding Out Privacy
Chapter Three: Proving Your Worth
Chapter Four: Who Gets Funded?
Chapter Five: Missing and Masking Injustice
Chapter Six: Crowdfrauding
Chapter Seven : Misinformation and Hate
Chapter Eight: Crowdfunding during a Pandemic
Chapter Nine: Crowdfunding as a Mediated Practice
Conclusion: Making Crowdfunding More Appealing
Bibliography
Index