What it is
The Charitology Prize would honor, once a year, published work that changed where generosity goes or how well it is aimed: a study, a dataset, a method, a tool or a report. It would recognize pieces of work, not rate organizations. One category would be reserved for the best published failure, an honest account of something that didn’t work, written so others can learn from it.
Awards for failure already exist. In the Netherlands, the Institute of Brilliant Failures gives Brilliant Failures awards in fields such as health care and the use of AI in the public sector.
How it works
An independent jury would choose winners from public nominations against published criteria, and each choice would be announced with its reasons. The failure category would be judged on honesty, on how useful its lessons are to others and on whether the people a program served were protected in the telling. Before the first award, the criteria would go through public red-team review, in keeping with Charitology’s rule that no named organization is ranked until its method has passed that review.
Why it matters for the system
The Prestige Economy gives status to the size and visibility of a gift rather than to what it achieved. A prize is a status signal, and this one would point that signal at results.
The failure category would treat the Silence About Failure directly. Today a published failure can cost the next grant. A prize would turn the same act into an honor and give funders a public reason to treat honesty as a strength.
Risks and limits
Any prize can be gamed or turn into one more gala. This one would sell no naming rights, publish its jury’s reasoning and keep its own costs small next to the work it honors. Whether recognition changes behavior at all is a hypothesis, and testing it is Open Problem 15, the Status Flip.
What success looks like
Within five years of the first award, organizations cite the prize when they publish their failures, and the failure category draws more entries every year.