But in spite of having started a charity, The Big Issue fits uneasily into the charitable category. Largely because The Big Issue was started as a business to develop a business-like attitude towards homelessness. We have promoted, throughout our time, the concept of self-help. We have banged on about self-help whenever we have been given the opportunity. In some ways self-help is in total opposition to the concept of charity.
Charity is about giving.
Self-help is about doing it for yourself, bereft of dependency. But this is where the difference between self-help and charity unravels. Charity, given as part of a programme for self-improvement, is no longer the debilitating affair it can often become. Charity as a means of stabilising someone's life, in order to help themselves, creates opportunity. Charity becomes dynamic when it's related to social change.