Editor’s Note: Patrick McAllister, an anthropology professor at New Zealand’s University of Canterbury, and Patricia Allan, his pastor compatriot, share their views on public contributions in their home country. The two offer their opinions in reponse to a Tuoitrenews report on a Mekong Delta tycoon publicising his family’s names, pictures, and statues everywhere in the pagodas he heldped renovate.

In New Zealand and Australia people tend to be very humble about giving donations to charity. Many in fact give anonymously and have no interest in making it known to others that they have made a donation. Donations are seldom if ever solicited on the basis of the fact that the giver’s name will be publicised. Partly this is because people in Australia and New Zealand generally do not like to display their wealth publicly. People in Australia and New Zealand are self-effacing. Being modest is seen as a virtue, and they tend to avoid conspicuous display of wealth and look down on those who try to publicise themselves or boast about their wealth or their talents.

For example it is known that one of the richest men in Australia, billionaire Kerr Nielsen, co-founder and managing director of Platinum Asset Management, lives in a modest home and walks to his office every day across the Sydney Harbour bridge. Yet such people also use their wealth for the public good. For example, in 2009 Neilson and his wife opened the White Rabbit Gallery in Sydney to share with the public their extensive collection of contemporary Chinese art.

Another example is the New Zealand billionaire Owen Glen, who has put a lot of money into the cause of ending family violence and violence against children, and who a few years ago gave NZ$7.5 million towards the establishment of a new business school building at the University of Auckland, but in this case the building was named after him. Philanthropists like Nielsen and Glenn also sometimes establish scholarships to enable gifted students to study towards a higher degree, or they create foundations which provide funds for NGOs, researchers, community organisations, etc. The same can be said of people who founded large organisations in many countries, such as the Ford family and the Ford motor car company which established the Ford Foundation to provide assistance to developing countries, or the Wellcome Foundation in the UK, which seeks to support the improvement of human and animal health.

When it comes to churches, people often give donations in the memory of an ancestor, perhaps having the name of the ancestor or family member placed on the item bought with the funds donated, such as a chair, a stained glass window, etc. In this way they honour the memory of their family member. But many donations to churches are anonymous. In some cases churches or church related organisations publish lists of people who donated over the previous year, sometimes indicating the approximate size of the donation by putting the names into groups, e.g. those who donated less than $100, those who donated between $100 and $500, and so on. People who donate generously and frequently to a church may be asked to take part in special church related events or to sit on decision making bodies such as the church Board. But in such cases the amounts that such people give are seldom known, and  giving wealthy donors a prominent status because of their donations is controversial and can cause divisions in the church community.

Certainly, members of church and charitable organisations are often encouraged to leave some of their wealth to the organisation in their last will and testament. If this is a substantial amount a trust fund may be set up in the name of the deceased benefactor, added to from time to time, and used for general or specific purposes. Finally, charitable donations in Australia and New Zealand are encouraged by giving income tax reductions to donors.