Stanford Social Innovation Review

DEAD AID: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa by Dambisa Moyo

MARKET REBELS: How Activists Make or Break Radical Innovations by Havagreeva Rao

We must break the stereotype that low-income communities are unable to help themselves.

RAMP nurtures local inventors in India, Peru, and Indonesia

How foundations can best support social innovators. 

Nonprofit lender Root Capital connects rural farmers and artisans with the corporations that crave their products.

Research shows that men may be more effective than woman at utilizing microfinance investments. 

Market solutions to poverty, which include services and products targeting consumers at the “bottom of the pyramid,” portray poor people as creative entrepreneurs and discerning consumers. Yet this rosy view of poverty-stricken people is not only wrong, but also harmful. 

Serving more than 110 million people per year, BRAC is the largest nonprofit in the world. Yet it doesn’t receive the most charitable donations. Instead, BRAC’s social enterprises generate 80 percent of the organization’s annual budget. These revenues have allowed the organization to develop, test, and replicate some of the world’s most innovative antipoverty programs.

Two new players in the world’s social investing scene seek financial returns along with social impact. 

Mathematical tool helps countries weigh the pros and cons of using biofuel. 

The world’s neediest people are using mobile phones in ways that were never intended, and with great success. With wireless technologies, Indian farmers are finding out the latest crop prices, Nigerian youth are learning how to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS, and Peruvian citizens are reporting criminal activity in their neighborhoods. Yet dialing into these powerful tools is not always straightforward. The author explains how to make the wireless revolution ring in economic growth and prosperity for people living at the bottom of the pyramid.

THE SOUL OF A NEW MACHINE by Tracy Kidder

THE POST-AMERICAN WORLD by Fareed Zakaria

Commercial microfinance institutions (MFIs) must calculate two bottom lines: alleviating poverty for clients and also generating profits for investors. To achieve the latter goal, some MFIs charge their impoverished clients exorbitant interest rates. The recent Banco Compartamos IPO in Mexico raises a red flag, demonstrating how easily well-intentioned MFIs and their investors can shift from microlending to microloan-sharking.