Social entrepreneurship in the New York Times "Giving" section

by Nathaniel Whittemore · 2008-11-15 11:31:00 UTC
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Earlier this week, the NYTimes published its annual "Giving" section, a 20+ romp through the world of charities, nonprofits, and change-making. As you might expect, much of the coverage was focused on the economic crisis, with articles not only cataloging the impact already felt, but anticipating donation shortages to come and helping advise nonprofits about what to do.

Reflecting an increasingly fertile discussion about new forms of change making, a number of articles focused on social entrepreneurship and social innovation.

"Entrepreneurs Profit by Helping Nonprofits" explores a number of organizations who are using the internet to provide more cost-effective and efficient services (particularly fundraising) to nonprofits. Two of the organizations, Charity Folks and cMarket's Bidding for Good, help nonprofit organizations get more out of product or service donations from companies and celebrities by creating wider audiences for auctioning off those goods. Another, GoodSearch, harnesses advertising revenue to allow people to support their favorite nonprofits as the search the internet.

In "About Leverage - A Tarnished Capitalism Still Serves Philanthropy," Philanthrocapitalism author Matthew Bishop argues that while we will feel the impact of the downturn on giving from businesses and wealthy donors, this actually reinforces the need for a more leveraged, strategic philanthrocapitalism. Bishop is an important voice in the social enterprise conversation, but I'm always frustrated when he focused entirely on celebrity donors. Not only is the ecosystem bigger than that, the trends that the Gates' and the Clinton's are supporting and tapping into are being driven by innovation from the bottom which is rejecting dogma about social change.

Nathaniel Whittemore is the founder of Assetmap. Previously he was the founding director of the Northwestern University Center for Global Engagement.
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