By Kumi Naidoo and - -
GENEVA, Jan 1 2005 (IPS)

As the World Economic Forum and the World Social Forum convene in Davos and Porto Alegre, respectively, there is the sense that deep forces we can barely discern are reshaping the world and that the national and global institutions we have always counted are inadequate, write Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum, and the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship, and Pamela Hartigan, Managing Director of the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship. Yet we are optimists, the authors write: for the past four years we have worked closely with the world\’s leading social entrepreneurs whose inspired pragmatism banishes pessimism. While we cannot reformulate our institutional systems overnight, we are convinced that we can do it in the long run because we witness the current work of social entrepreneurs who are now creating different types of institutions that combine public and private sector approaches to achieve economic and social transformation. Governments and aid agencies no longer can be the sole actors in addressing injustice and inequity. The private sector can no longer see itself as simply in the business of making business. And the philanthropic sector cannot be expected to fill in the gaps. We need a hybrid organisation that does all of these things. This column is a part of the special series on \”Globalisation & Human Rights\”, a joint effort of Dignity International (http://www.dignityinternational.org) and the IPS Columnist Service.

As the World Economic Forum and the World Social Forum convene in Davos and Porto Alegre, respectively, the mood is one of foreboding, a sense that deep forces we can barely discern are reshaping the world and that the national and global institutions we have always counted are inadequate.

Yet we are optimists. Why? Because for the past four years we have worked closely with the world’s leading social entrepreneurs whose inspired pragmatism banishes pessimism. Their passion, energy, and ability to see opportunities for social innovation and transformation at every turn are contagious.

We need social entrepreneurs as never before, for we are asked to do nothing less than rethink the world’s economic models. Over the last 200 years the primary global economic system has been driven by three interrelated processes: the growth of industrial production and mass consumption; market capitalism within a framework of government regulations and minimum standards; and technological advances. This has benefited some people hugely, others somewhat less. But two billion people have no stake in the present global order. Both the World Economic Forum and the World Social Forum have recognised that the gap between the rich and the poor is the central challenge before us.

While we cannot reformulate our institutional systems overnight, we are convinced that we can do it in the long run because we witness the current work of social entrepreneurs who are now creating different types of institutions that combine public and private sector approaches to achieve economic and social transformation. We are in an interesting phase of new thinking and experimentation, where the key ingredients are imagination, disciplined innovation, and the ability to spot talent and persistence.

Our solutions lie in helping those successful social entrepreneurs achieve scale, for we cannot expect the systems that created the problems we now experience to now come up with solutions to those problems. We need new alliances, new thinking. Governments and aid agencies no longer can be the sole actors in addressing injustice and inequity. The private sector can no longer see itself as simply in the business of making business. And the philanthropic sector cannot be expected to fill in the gaps. We need a hybrid organisation that does all of these things. Here are two examples of what we mean:

Farouk Jiwa founded Honey Care and introduced a new beekeeping technology into Kenya. Honey Care supplies beekeepers with beehives and trains them in the new method. It subsequently acts as honey purchaser from the communities. Honey Care partners with NGOs to provide micro-financing and beekeeping training. In five years Honey Care has captured 27 percent of the domestic honey market — Kenya was a major importer of honey– and established a network of 2,500 bee-keepers located in extremely poor, subsistence-based rural communities in the western of the country. As a result, these farmers are earning between USD 200 and 250 a year, double their previous incomes. Jiwa’s operation is for-profit, but rather than focus on generating wealth for shareholders, Honey Care is using the market for social transformation, and he is achieving it.

Then there is Rodrigo Baggio who had a dream in which he saw the poorest children in the favelas of his home town of Rio de Janeiro using computers. Today, Rodrigo’s Committee for the Democratisation of Information (CDI) has moved beyond Rio to 869 cities throughout Brazil and 10 other countries. Working in close partnership with community centres in Brazil’s poorest and most violent communities, as well as prisons, CDI teaches computer literacy to the digitally excluded, using as content material to stimulate citizens’ rights and responsibilities. CDI has certified over 80,000 students, 87 percent of whom report it has transformed their opportunities for gainful and dignified employment.

These examples, and many others, are all the more amazing because each was achieved without substantial financial backing. We have lost sight of the scale on which one person can create social change, and the minimal quantity of euros or dollars required to achieve it.

The growth trajectory for social entrepreneurs starts out slowly. Unlike many donors who want to see transformational results in 18 months, social entrepreneurs have learned it takes time to change the world. It often takes them 5 to 10 years before their ideas become viable solutions. Even then, their approach must be continuously modified to respond to unforeseen obstacles or dynamics along the way.

Social entrepreneurs face challenges at every step of their evolution because they challenge the accepted way of doing things. They are a different sort of revolutionary. They see opportunities others don’t because most of us are blinded by the established way, whether we are governments, companies, or NGOs.

Thus new, innovative solutions to complex social problems are there, staring us in the face; we’ve just been looking in the wrong places for them! Social entrepreneurs, working in partnership with open-minded and self-critical partners, be they governments, business, philanthropists or NGOs, can change the world much more effectively than working alone, as they have been until now.

While it may seem risky to seize the opportunity opened up by today’s apparent chaos and confusion to invest in innovative solutions, it is more risky to cling to the past and to inflexible, unimaginative bureaucratic structures and practices. The future belongs to entrepreneurial individuals and organisations that relish challenging current ‘wisdom’ and reinventing the future. Let us keep this in mind at Davos and Porto Alegre. (END/COPYRIGHT IPS)

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