A while ago I suggested to [one of the leaders of the Center for Effective Altruism] the creation of a charity to promote promise-keeping. I didn't claim such a charity would be an optimal way of promoting happiness, and to them, this was sufficient to show 1) that it was not EA - and hence 2) inferior to EA things.

Keeping promises is a good thing.

I've heard the claim that societies and subcultures where people expect promises to be kept, will prosper over those where people don't. (I've also heard the claim that members of the latter groups tend to regard members of the former to be hopelessly gullible ... and also the claim that the former two claims are used to justify social prejudices and thus to weaken people by discouraging them from cooperating.)

However ...

I'm not sure how effectively a charity can go about promoting promise-keeping in general. A traditional way to promote virtues is by preaching, in one form or another. The Mormons used to run ads during Saturday morning cartoons, promoting virtues such as honesty. That one was very memorable (at least to me) ... but I'm not sure how we would check whether it actually made people tell fewer lies.