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PAMELA HARTIGAN: Social entrepreneurs are not about redistributing wealth.
They are about actually providing a solution to completely change the root cause of the problem.
A social entrepreneur is what you get when you combine Richard Branson and Mother Theresa:
a practical, market-oriented innovator who sets up organizations
that provide specific target groups with needed goods and services.
You, as philanthropists, are actually doing philanthropy-led investment:
you act as the angel investor, absolutely critical, critical role.
JOSH MAILMAN: Everyone understands microenterprise now. But I think what’s coming
is micro-health, micro-schools, micro-insurance, micro-housing, micro-energy.
All through the Arab world, I felt, as is true in the rest of the world,
there are wonderful people on the ground wanting to do stuff in their societies,
but because there hasn’t been an organized system of philanthropy,
even though there’s been charity, there was no place that they could go to get support.
HARTIGAN: We have to stop thinking about scaling an organization,
which comes from the corporate side of things, and start thinking about
scaling a movement for social change.
KAMAL MOUZAWAK: Let’s get out of these boxes. It’s not like
if I want to be socially responsible, I have to starve.
The stronger you believe in this vision, the stronger you can attract people all around.
HARTIGAN: You are about taking the risk that no one will take, and you are about saying,
“I believe in this idea, I believe in the people behind it,
and I believe in the fact that this is going to create huge value.”
You’re not saying, “I know this is gonna make me money,”
you’re seeing the value that’s going to be generated for the much wider society.
I think that it is the role of you people, as philanthropists and as heads of foundations,
to be the risk capital in the social sector because everything’s gonna depend on that.
MOUZAWAK: If you are philanthropists, if you are financial workers, if you are social workers,
so how to merge these two worlds together, and bring the best of each,
and not to be either a wolf or a saint, and that’s it. It’s just merge and bring together.
MAILMAN: I see it as really a means to advance philanthropy in the Middle East
in a very significant way, and I think we’ll see in ten years much more extensive programs
as a result of the kind of entrepreneurs that are found through this process.
We felt there was a chance to build a movement;
that there was something that business could do besides do philanthropy,
and you know, that itself is really inspiring. And that’s how we’re gonna make a better world.