Beacon of Hope

No one would ever call him naïve. Growing up poor and Black in the 1960s in East Texas would cure him of that. Add countless moments of discrimination and biased encounters—including being mistaken for a waiter at elegant events—and Darren Walker ’86 is as clear-eyed and sober a realist as there is. And yet, there is something compellingly hopeful in the man. His life and his life’s work tell a quintessentially American story. Rags to riches, underestimated to wildly successful, on the margins of society to seated among the world’s powerful.

As he steps down this October after 12 years as president of the Ford Foundation—one of the world’s largest and most influential philanthropic entities—Walker captures that hopefulness in his new book, The Idea of America: Reflections on Inequality, Democracy, and the Values We Share. As his writings unfold, it’s clear Walker doesn’t think his own story is unique. His success out of poverty could be—he argues must be—the rule, not the exception.

“It’s easy for privileged people like me to believe in America, because the economic system has worked for us,” he says. “Inequality is really the opposite of hope. It makes people feel like systems are rigged against them, and therefore they become less optimistic about their future and their children’s future.” When people feel hopeless, Walker adds, “[t]hey will trade off their rights and liberties because they become convinced that rational responses are no longer sufficient to deal with the situation as they see it.”

To bring the point home, Walker argues that “hope is the oxygen of democracy.”

The idea of America has always been contested. That is why we need voices that offer up the very best idea of America.

The economic system worked for him because his own journey was, as he says, “defined by the idea of public investment in human potential.” Born to a single mother in rural Louisiana, Walker moved to and grew up in Liberty County near Beaumont, Texas. His mother enrolled him in the first class of the federal poverty-reduction program Head Start in 1965. Later, a federal Pell Grant sent him to UT. “I was able to get on the upward mobility escalator because I lived in a country that believed in the dreams of little boys and girls living in shotgun houses,” he says, contrasting his experience with other family members in the Deep South who ended up impoverished or incarcerated, “[n]ot because they were less talented, but because the system failed them.”

Arriving at the Forty Acres in the late 1970s, Walker felt like he’d succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. “It was like going to Paris in April. It was the most magical place,” he says. He threw himself into leadership positions in clubs and academics, becoming the first Black student admitted to the prestigious Friar Society. At a reception for the Friars at the Bauer House, Walker extended his hand to one of the hosts. “She said, ‘I’ll have a gin and tonic,’” he recalls. Walker didn’t blink, explaining that he was not a waiter but an honored guest. “She was mortified, and we ended up having a lovely conversation,” he adds graciously. 

“It allowed me to develop an armor—and part of that armor was a sense of kindness and grace that helped me not get thrown off my game.” After all, for every time he was looked down upon, Walker notes, he was also met with “enormous generosity and support from people on my journey who were championing me.”

After earning his undergraduate degree in 1982 in government and speech communication, Walker enrolled in The University of Texas School of Law, later describing it as “the best, hardest experience of my life” in a 2016 commencement address. “I came to understand the power of the law and how much of the way we construct our systems, our economy, and our social dynamics is defined by lawyers.”

Never wanting to be poor again, Walker practiced law with a white-shoe firm in New York City before joining the capital markets division of UBS, putting two sisters through college along the way. He began volunteering at a school in Harlem called the Children’s Storefront, where he was shocked—and compelled—by the contrast between the blight of that neighborhood and his own. So, he moved to Harlem. “I went from a doorman building to crack vials on the stoop, with no supermarket, no services,” he says. “The things I took for granted didn’t exist in Harlem.”

In 1995, he left UBS to work with the Abyssinian Development Corporation (ADC), where he used his legal and finance skills to help bring the first supermarket and more than 1,000 units of affordable housing to Harlem. “I understood project finance. It’s just that now the clients were not rich institutions, the clients were poor people.”

I believe that most Americans want a positive, hopeful nation that continues to be a beacon in the world.

Darren Walker ’86

Walker moved seamlessly through Big Law, Wall Street, Harlem, ADC, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Ford Foundation, matching his own success with helping others. “He is absolutely fearless,” says Del Williams ’85, a close friend, former classmate, and general counsel at Hillwood, a Perot Company, in Dallas. His gentle demeanor, Williams continues, belies a quick ability to size up a situation and act with conviction. “He is not wringing his hands or paralyzed by the moment,” Williams says. “Darren makes it look easy.”

Honoring Walker—and reflecting Walker’s sense that opportunity belongs to everyone—Williams, Diana Howard ’85, Dan Routman ’85, and others funded an undergraduate scholarship program at UT Austin. “Though he is extraordinary, he will be the first to tell you he didn’t get where he is by himself—he got there because of other people,” says Howard. The Darren Walker Scholars program fills a critical gap for low-income students, covering living expenses not included in Pell Grant awards. Started in 2022, there are now 15 Walker Scholars, with the first cohort graduating next year. “The idea is to help create other Darren Walkers,” Howard says.

Turning to his own future, Walker will preside over the board of the National Art Gallery and join the board of the Obama Foundation. It’s not lost on Walker that this year has seen dramatic changes in the country—including cuts in public investment that are at odds with his life’s work. Though sobered by the current moment of history, Walker is emphatic in his patriotism.

“I will always be bullish on America, and my belief in this country and its potential is unwavering,” says Walker. “That does not mean that on any given day I’m not appalled at some of the things I see.” He adds, “[t]he idea of America has always been contested. That is why we need voices that offer up the very best idea of America. I believe the vast majority of Americans believe in goodness and kindness. I believe that most Americans want a positive, hopeful nation that continues to be a beacon in the world.

“For that to happen,” Walker concludes, “we can’t give up on America.”