Chapter 13 of The World is Flat has a section about the guy who won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize. The path to the prize started thirty years before the award. Thomas Friedman describes him as a social-entrepreneur-activist.
The person he refers to is Muhammad Yunus of Bangladesh. He founded the Grameen Bank in 1976 which gives small loans without collateral to poor people. It’s Bangledeshi bootstrapping.
Over time they expanded the program to giving amounts equivalent to as little as $10.00 to street beggars. The beggars were taught to add sellable products to their begging repertoire and see which worked out best, begging or selling. You guessed it. Many of these folks are replacing more of the former with the latter.
I like that phrase, social-entrepreneur-activist. It’s just as Friedman writes in the book. Here’s a great way for the traditional activists to redirect their energies from protesting governments and global organizations to focusing it directly to the grass roots and solving the problem themselves.
The Grameen Foundation chronicles some of the organization’s other efforts to proactively reduce poverty around the globe.
I think my pal fredric mitchell and his crew at ypbguide.com could appreciate this guy. Check out their link for another example of the microfinance concept. They have a Kiva sponsored link.
Ready to spread your wings and put your politics where your economics are? Look into these organizations or others like them and see if you’re inspired to give a global hand up.
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