What Works in Social Change?

What is it? Too often success = success at fundraising. Doesn't tell us much.

That's an excellent question - and a crucial one. In my research, I had three different measures of success. The first measure was whether the individual/group achieved their stated goals. The second one was whether there were unintended benefits and side effects from their actions. (Often people don't accomplish their stated goals, and would seem to be a "failure," but their actions lead to other positive outcomes.) And finally, I had a measurement of empowerment - i.e., whether their attempts to make a change led people to believe that they could make a difference. This attitude led people to embark on other efforts to take initiative and leadership to make changes in their community. This is significant. Ashoka founder Bill Drayton likes to say that everyone can be a change maker, but surveys show that a large percentage of people believe themselves to be powerless. If people fail to achieve their stated goals, and don't achieve any other unintended benefits, but they go on to increased civic engagement, then that is a measure of success as well. I'd be interested in hearing other people's views on how to measure success. Thanks!

Scott,

Your principles above could well describe our recent experience. Back in 2006 we'd stumbled on the story of neglect in homes for disabled children in Ukraine and spoke out about it.

Further than just speaking out alone, my colleague Terry living in Ukraine explored possible solutions in full public view by blogging. Rather than render children to institutions where costs were higher, it was argued, why not enhance the benefits for potential adopters and those that would take the initiative in creating family type homes. There was an immediate need for more than 400 rehab centres across the country.

http://eng.maidanua.org/node/581

For us at the time, 'wealth and power' was represented by two major elements - The re-privatisation of a steel mill yielding $4.8 billion and the path toward MCC Compact assistance from the US. These, it was suggested could support the estimated program cost of $1.5 billion.

The social aikido, as such would have been the tsunami of condemnation which came from a smear blog hosted on Google, the Titan of information. Though this was a culture coopted into silence, It became impossible to ignore the issue.

Our 'constructive program' was the development of a microeconomic strategy plan. It proposed first and foremost - intervention for institutionalised disabled children. The objective was to enhance local economic conditions through application of microfinance and aaffordable broadband and create a social investment fund mechanism to support social enterprise on a national scale. Again, social media was deployed to ensure widest possible exposure and protect against theft.

http://en.for-ua.com/analytics/2007/08/06/121201.html

http://en.for-ua.com/analytics/2007/08/09/110003.html

These components were intended to work in concert, such that the more profitable underwrote the more social to deliver a nil overall cost outcome. It was to target "hunger, poverty desperation and chaos" and was thus described as a microeconomic 'Marshall Plan'.

It didn't work out exactly as we planned. Rather than a social investment fund, a new USAID foundation was planted. Their government did however adopt recommended childcare policy changes and a bank stepped in to take on the broadband component. Tragically, the disabled children in institutions were de-emphasised, it seems.

Social enterprise in general, doesn't tackle the root causes of corruption and misgovernment. Like microfinance, it's a tool, not a panacea in its own right.

All this had begun 10 years ago in Russia, with a development initiative which had been sourced through application of an alternate economic paradigm which proposed that capitalism could be modified to a form which could better serve humanity. This above all, I believe, will be the most effective strategy for social change, the transformation of economic thinking.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inclusive_capitalism

Thanks for the powerful example, Jeff. The vision of a microeconomic Marshall Plan is fascinating. And I think that your assessment at the end is quite astute. You make an excellent point that social enterprise is not a panacea, and that it doesn't tackle the root causes of corruption and misgovernment. This is why, in the research that I conducted, it seemed that there needed to be more than social entrepreneurship. The first principle of exposing injustice - which you and your colleague Terry did in writing about the neglect of disabled children's homes - is crucial. Justice Louis Brandeis famously said that sunlight is the best disinfectant - i.e., only when we shine light on problems can we begin to heal them. When corruption and misgovernment happen behind closed doors, with little transparency or accountability or exposure, it is going to be hard to promote social enterprise. That's why exposing injustice seemed to be the first step that many of the successful groups pursued, before moving on to propose better alternatives.

Totally Agree

overty is a result of different factors(politics, economy and social)

Many of the countries just like Indonesia are poor because of political decision and foreign interfere that exploit country resources for the interest of big cooperation...

Other countries suffer poverty simply because they lack resources...other becuase they were involved in wars.

Steps to eradicate poverty is by working and really establishing source of income..

During the past years they were enormous fund to the third world country however poverty statistics says that poverty had increased, this is really tell us there is something wrong...

May be changing political decision is hard but we can start by working with the less preveliged people , understand their need and most importantly make them aware that they can and able to be like anyone else in the society , they can be creative, productive and intellectual and our role is to provide them with the tool..

If each one in the planet direct small amount of his effort to a cause (poverty, environment, rape, injustice) the world will be a better place for all

As incoming president of Aiki-Extensions - a nonprofit network of aikido practitioners who take aiki principles off the mat and into the world in areas like youth violence prevention, K-12 peacemaking curricula, business consulting, psychotherapy and Israeli/Palestinian peace programs - I was particularly interested in the phrase "social aikido", which is of course reminiscent of Gene Sharp's coining of "political jiujitsu" 30 years ago. I've written on how Obama performs political aikido (http://www.dailykos.com/[…]/-Obamas-Soft-Powera-primer-on-Aikido), and taught an Aikido and Ethical Policy class at Williams College this January.

I'd argue that your third best practice is the real aikido (or that the 2nd practice and the 3rd are basically the same thing) - the blending with a situation and leading it to a more positive conclusion. The creation of the win-win scenario is where the creative core of aikido is fully engaged and at its most useful. In any case, I'd like you to expound a bit on HOW to channel the wealth and power of the opposed-to-social-change institutions to everyone's betterment. In my case, I run a scholarship fund that brings Palestinian and Jewish youth leaders to a sports camp in the US each summer, and would love to realign several institutions to be more supportive, starting with the US State Department, but haven't figured out how to get traction at that level . . .

I'm glad to hear about your organization, "taking aiki principles off the mat and into the world in areas like youth violence prevention, K-12 peacemaking curricula, business consulting, psychotherapy, and Israeli/Palestinian peace programs." I'd love to get more information. I'll definitely check out your website.

And yes, you are absolutely correct that Gene Sharp should get credit for his ideas on "political jiujitsu." Sharp's work is very powerful, and it has helped people all over the world attain revolutionary social change, as we see here in Prague (the place I currently live), where the Czechs are about to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution. Many dissidents throughout Central and Eastern Europe were greatly influenced by Sharp's ideas on nonviolence and power.

As the incoming president of Aiki-Extensions, you would probably be a much greater authority on how to channel institutional energy into win-win solutions than I could ever be! From reviewing some of the case studies of success, I can simply say this: They were excellent at building relationships. You cite Obama as an example of someone who performs political aikido. It's significant that Obama was trained as a community organizer, where he learned the art of the one-on-one conversation - understanding the other person's needs, passions, interests, and values (rather than trying to impose or force your own agenda onto other people.) The most successful individuals and groups grasped this. They formed relationships with the people in power, rather than condemning them as the enemy. They then were able to offer a vision that met the needs of all parties. I'm sure you already know this, as it seems to be central to the aikido principles. So I apologize if this didn't adequately answer your question. I'd be happy to continue the conversation. Please feel free to email me at any time. Thanks!

Hi Scott,

It's good to meet you. In your research have you found many who are documenting actions of themselves, and of the people they influence or draw together around a common vision, so that the impact of the group could be better understood over time?

I found a few studies recently showing how groups were documenting actions and the links can be found on my blog at http://tutormentor.blogspot[…]stic-about-funding-non.html

I've been piloting this concept myself, with a documentation system we launched in 2000. While those in the studies I refer to have million dollar budgets, I've been doing this with mostly volunteers. You can review our system at http://www.tutormentorexchange.net/ohats

What have you found in this area that you've been able to use in your own research?

Hi Daniel,

The system that you have developed is so valuable! In my own research, I didn't really find many people who were documenting their actions in detail. Certainly there were some individual groups that had put together materials, brochures, newsletters, and websites discussing some of their successes. But for the most part my data collection was painstaking - many years of interviewing people, doing site visits, and collecting many boxes full of primary and secondary source materials (e.g., newspaper and magazine articles, books, etc.) I then went through and coded all of the materials to investigate the factors that might lead to success or failure. I wish I had known about your system in the past; it sounds like it would have been very helpful. Thanks for your contributions!

Hi Scott, the transformational change society's looking for is coming out of Capitalism 3.0, blended-value organizations, profit for social purpose, social capital, impact investing and such. Like Gandhi's idea of nonviolence, it's 'a force more powerful than the atomic bomb', in transforming organizations and healing humanity of, as you say, its 'adversarial antagonistic models.'

When value creation includes social and environmental factors, the steps to the solution of the larger equation, have already been taken. By the way, I've been a (voluntary) community organizer, so I know there's a variety of ways of measuring success, in bringing different groups of people together and in providing the process for them. I'm not surprised you investigated nearly 120 factors that might be linked to failure and success, measuring is always a process. Your question, of whether SE is sufficient, in breaking silos, with a paradigm of entrepreneurial models, for a new way of thinking - in changing the landscape - it only takes one domino to start an effect on the rest.

Now, there's a unique opportunity to change markets too as well as evolve organizations, with the only real resistance being driven by a mindset that is becoming obsolete, it's only a matter of time for the change we seek. Hey, I like your website.

Hi Jo, I really appreciate your comments. I agree with your assessment of this unique opportunity to change markets, and the power of "Capitalism 3.0, blended-value organizations, profit for social purpose, social capital, impact investing," etc. I think that social entrepreneurs are helping to drive that transformation.

And I like how you use the analogy of the domino effect. Here in Europe, we just celebrated the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall this week. And the celebrations in Berlin had a series of dominoes right along the path of the wall; as the dominoes came falling down, it represented the massive changes that happened so quickly in 1989 - the change in Poland leading to changes in Hungary, which helped lead to changes in East Germany, which helped lead to the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia, and eventually the complete collapse of the Iron Curtain.

So, yes, I agree: "it only takes one domino to start an effect on the rest." This is a principle that gives me great hope.

12 Nov. 2009

Dear Scott,

I would not even dare to ask the question. Rather the question I would ask myself is: How true am I to my commitment in being a social entepreneur?

This is the question I ask myself every day and especially every night before I go to sleep.

To be a social entrepreneur in the corporate world is a constant struggle. You have to contend with the interests of the members of your board,your customers, your suppliers and the horde of people you deal with in the course of the day. You have to make them see things "your way", i.e. as a social entrepreneur. This is the social aikido you are talking about. And I realize that I have to be very strong and passionate in my commitment to being a social entrepreneur in order to survive and not be swallowed up by the system.

In actual practise though I see that the social aikido and the transformative action you are talking about are one and the same action. I preach social entrepreneurship every day to my business colleagues. I go through their door, i.e. their way of seeing things and then show them that the social entrepreneurial way is actually complementary to their interests. I gain converts this way but not in the horde of thousands but one or two per year.

I would be very interested to read your doctoral thesis. Send me a copy. My email address:francis_osorio2000@yahoo.com

Best regards
FOsorio

Dear Francis,

Thanks for your comments. I'd be happy to send you a copy of my doctoral dissertation; it's very long and academic, but if you're willing to wade through many hundreds of pages, I can send it this weekend. (I'm running off to a conference this morning.)

It does sound like you are doing an excellent job of practicing social aikido - helping show people that "the social entrepreneurial way is actually complementary to their interests." Even if you are only winning over a few converts per year, there may be a valuable ripple effect from it that can lead to great things. (Please see the previous post about the domino effect.) Congratulations on all your good work!

1. We need to help women move from a focus on the mundane (beauty) to social justice. They are the missing link, denigrated every time they try to enter politics.
2. We need to reinforce the idea that women are given the gift of leadership despite what they are hearing from the pulpit. Religion has been used to keep women from participating.
3. We need to become more inclusive in our language. Words do matter.
4. We need to put more women in the seat of Congress. We have too many hawks and not enough doves.
5. We need to recognize the role religion has made in keeping women from leading
6. We need to become better educated about US policies and the problems WE have created in other nations.
6. We need to expose social injustice in all of its forms AND their root cause(s).
7. We need to get rid of the "US exceptionalism" mindset that will not listen or learn.
8. We need to correctly follow a business plan that unites our passion with doing good and teach others that the "personal success" focus leads to gross materialism
9. We need to read The Status of Women in the States and address the inequities in every state. We are great at creating research about the problem, but slow to force change.
10. We need to come to grips with the fact that our capitalizt system has turned decidedly predatory and if we do nothing in 2010, will have contributed to pain and suffering.

 Sincerely, Rosanne Ferreri-Feske, CEO, The New US Woman, www.thenewuswoman.com

Hi Rosanne,

Please accept my many apologies for taking so long to respond. I have been traveling for work. Suffice to say, I applaud your comments. You have so much of great importance to say. And I looked at your website, which is excellent, too. Thank you so much.

Dear Rosanne, I appreciated your numbered guidance on what to be aware of in how to truly engage with transformative change.

Particularly for me, Point 3 about communications is so very important, especially cross cultural. It is so amazing to me that when we communicate, the words really 'come in third place.'

What's first and second? First is the tone. If we are abrasive, affrontive, sarcastic then it doesn't open up the conversation and action for change. Calm, proactive, inclusive, even -- "slow" -- conversations help provide dynamic change. It sounds as if it is an oxymoron. But allowing the participants to breathe in the interaction helps bring about the best and most inclusive solutions for all parties.

Second then is body language and what we communicate; third come the words.

Your point #4 was also important, about representation in Congress. Rwanda is the first country that had a majority of women in their parliament. They're followed by Sweden at 47% representation, and Cuba at 43%. In America: only 18%.

What's especially impressive about Rwanda: It's law. 30% of seats must go to women. And to increase impressiveness even more, they've passed it willingly: 56% are women. When something is a law and people surpass the requirement, it shows it is becoming something natural in their daily life. We can all learn from that: Doing the right thing because we want to and it is natural.

Putting a legal and intentional stake in the ground on women representation will eventually, hopefully, lead it to be more natural.

I'd add my final point: We need to learn more about other countries and their advancements, embrace those examples, and hopefully institute them in our culture.

Thank you for a riveting discussion!

Sincerely,
Pamela

Pamela Hawley
Founder and CEO
UniversalGiving™
http://www.universalgiving.org

Living and Giving Blog
http://pamelahawley.wordpress.com

Scott,
Your thesis topic is so relevant. I would be very interested to read further details of your findings.
Further to the "constructive program" idea - I would add that best practices and successful examples of social change work in CONTEXT of the culture, country, economy they are practicing in. Sounds basic, I know, but I find it is often a point easily missed by so many organizations that try to import foreign ideas into a foreign country without really putting it in context of the local. The better vision of the future should take into consideration the people that future entails.

Thanks Jyotsana,

Again let me begin by apologizing for taking so long to respond. As I mentioned in the previous post, I've been traveling constantly for work.

I completely agree with your statements. I have seen the same problem that you point out: that foreign NGOs try to impose a cookie-cutter model of their ideal solution on a culture where it is not best suited. In the research that I did, most of the solutions were grassroots initiatives; the local communities and people created their own vision of the future first, and invited NGOs, businesses, and governments to join them! It turns on its head the model that we have seen so often in the past.

Hi Scott,

I'm so jazzed I found this posting--and I want to congratulate you on your research. I too would love to view the research myself. My email is socialbutterfly4change@gmail.com if you don't mind sharing. I'd even be open to do a Q and A blog post based on your research and insights gained for my blog fly4change.com.

That all said--during your research, did you come across the study of social marketing? And, I'm not talking about the social media circus, but social marketing--the field that looks at influencing and changing behaviors for good. For my master's thesis, I did some research into the the various marketing strategies that exist to "do good" and landed upon social marketing as one that offered a proven framework, multiple case studies, and an ability to scale towards multiple social change issues. A part of social marketing is identifying the barriers to the desired behavior--so your third finding in your research does not surprise me.

I would greatly enjoy a further conversation about thank everyone for their contributions here.

Best,

Alex

Hi Alex,

Thanks for your wonderful post. I have indeed encountered the study of social marketing, and find it fascinating. I have to admit that I'm far from an expert in that field, and I would love to learn more. I look forward to a conversation. I will contact you via email this weekend to send you my findings in more detail; I'd be happy to do a Q and A on your blog, too. And I look forward to learning from you more about social marketing. This is such a valuable field.

UPSTREAM measures.

What are UPSTREAM measures?

UPSTREAM measures are those that address causal links that lie far upstream in the chain of causality that bring about the more obvious human, life and ecological problems that are addressed by most attempts at social change.

UPSTREAM measures are those that seek to eliminate or at least reduce the invisible and elusive root causes of those human behaviors that damage or destroy humans, other life forms, or the larger ecological eco-system that sustains life.

Social change, as it appears to be understood in most of the threads here, including this one, focuses primarily on DOWNSTREAM measures.

Social entrepreneurship, as it appears to be understood focuses primarily on remedying conditions generated by human behaviors, which behaviors themselves lie far UPSTREAM of the measures being pursued, whether effectively or ineffectively.

This means that we are largely missing the real opportunity inherent in social entrepreneurship, i.e., to bring to an end, or reduce the identities, beliefs and other mindsets that generate the dysfunctional human behaviors that generate our need for the remedial instrument of social entrepreneurship in the first place.

“What works in social change” is therefore not only about merely increasing the success rate of the projects being undertaken. It is should be at least as much about redirecting extending the focus of social entrepreneurship from DOWNSTREAM problems and solutions toward identifying and addressing UPSTREAM causes of the human behaviors that generate the problems that have been remedied from the beginnings of social entrepreneurship.

Of course, this is not easy. But we cannot really expect truly transformative social change without including UPSTREAM measure within the range of measures undertaken by social entrepreneurship.
Finding and addressing UPSTREAM issues are not easy because the root causes of human behavioral dysfunctionalities and destructivenesses are located in our conceptual interpretive subsystem. And conceptual content, hidden away in our minds, don’t lend themselves easily to scrutiny, let alone improvement, least of all by ‘others’.

As long as social entrepreneurship continues to focus primarily DOWNSTREAM of our dysfunctional behaviors, we are continuing to allow the factors that keep generating these problems and challenges to thrive. And this cannot be something that merit’s terms such as “transformative action”, when real transformation can only be addressed far UPSTREAM.

Let us reserve the term ‘TRANSFORMATIVE’ exclusively for those ‘actions’ that are truly transformative, because these actions aim to put an end to the systemic causes of the problems we face, and not merely to addressing the problems themselves. The term ‘change’ is good enough for successfully addressing DOWNSTREAM measures.

As a Sustainable Designer I am always trying to reduce environmental impact & consumption by designing projects for current & future sustainability. My goal was to create lasting SOCIAL CHANGE by supporting the idea of Sustainable Lifestyles. Less consumption, smaller footprints, clean power generation & most importantly, creating an overwhelming sense of personal pride & satisfaction due to your lifestyle that you want to share it with others (ripple affect).

Our 'LifeStyle PROJECTS' take smaller homes (1000 sq ft or less) & renovate them into sustainable dwellings. Using solar panels, grow boxes, insulation, efficient appliances, & many other techniques & tech. Our projects use the concept of creating social spaces to entice & encourage social gathering, conversation & community closeness. They produce 100% or more of their energy needs, reduce water consumption by 80% or more & allow the occupants the opportunity to grow 30% or more of their needed food, connecting them directly to their food source.

We have found that these projects become incubators for community sustainability. Neighbors around the projects begin investing in solar power as a result of a party they attended where they were discussing the current tax incentives & financing available for solar not to mention the long-term energy production savings. Community garden plots have been created for organic gardening. The list goes on.

Social change is happening all around us. We just need to spur the scale of this change by providing examples of the benefits within our communities. Social change takes input from all entities to achieve the scale necessary for global social empowerment. Government grants, NGO labor & education, small business ingenuity & dogged relentlessness all play parts in bringing about positive results.