BuzzFlash Reviews

BUZZFLASH REVIEWS

"Wonderfully hopeful and enlightening.... The stories of these social entrepreneurs will inspire and encourage many people who seek to build a better world." -- Nelson Mandela

Uh, contrary to Bush's bizarre recent news conference in which he asserted that Nelson Mandela is dead, the champion of justice is very much alive -- and praising the updated version of "How to Change the World: Social Entrepeneurs and the Power of New Ideas."

Can we, as individuals, change the world through adopting models of what are being called entrepeneurial social change organizations?

Daniel Bornstein, the author of "How to Change the World," believes that the answer is a resounding "Yes."

Daniel Bornstein: "The people I write about in my book are people who want to transform society, and this is indeed the rare person. They are people who will not stop pushing until they have redefined their field. There are not many people in the world who are that obsessive, that single-minded and that clear about what they want to do. Most people have many other goals in life, and they balance their goals. The social entrepreneurs do not lead well-balanced lives. Everything gets filtered through the prism of their ideas: where to live, who to marry, when to marry, what to read. Everything....

"Every one of those individuals is a social entrepreneur. Although they are working at a different levels, their changes are no less valuable or worthy. You have many different levels at which people can participate in this emerging sector. This is what is so wonderful — because this sector now need the talents of people from all different walks of life with many different temperaments and skills....

"My research shows that people are great social entrepreneurs when they are very clear and very driven to bring about the positive social change that they want to bring. Most of the things they need to know, they learn along the way. Or they bring in people who can do things that they're not good at."

Book Description:

"David Bornstein's How to Change the World is the first book to study a remarkable and growing group of individuals around the world--what Bornstein calls social entrepreneurs. These men and women are bringing innovative, and successful, grass-roots approaches to a wide variety of social and economic problems, from rural poverty in India to discrimination against gypsies in Central Europe; from industrial pollution in the United States to child prostitution in Thailand. Like business entrepreneurs, social entrepreneurs are creative, driven, and adventurous. The embrace change, exploit new opportunities, and think big.

"In How to Change the World, Bornstein provides vivid profiles of many such individuals, looking at the personalities, strategies, and techniques they have in common. The book is an In Search of Excellence for social initiatives, intertwining personal stories, anecdotes, and analysis. Readers will see how social entrepreneurs bring about structural changes in their societies--in other words, how one human being can make a difference.

"The case studies in the book include Jody Williams, who won the Nobel Peace Prize for the international campaign against landmines she ran by e-mail from her Vermont home; Roberto Baggio, a 31-year old Brazilian who has established eighty computer schools in the slums of Brazil; and Diana Propper, who has used investment banking techniques to make American corporations responsive to environmental dangers. The paperback edition will offer a new foreword by the author that shows how the concept of social entrepreneurship has expanded and unfolded over the last few years, including the Gates-Buffetts charitable partnership, the rise of Google, and the increased mainstream coverage of the subject. The book will also update the stories of individual social entrepreneurs that appeared in the cloth edition."

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