The world isn't short of good ideas. The challenge that confronts every nation on earth is how to weed out the good from the bad, and then exploit the full potential of the good ideas and turn them into social innovations that can change the world for the better. For too long we have relied on the bluster of political debate and the logic of the pork barrel to decide on the best way to run our schools, stop killer diseases like malaria, or figure out how to avoid a climate change catastrophe. Given what is at stake, something has to change. Fortunately that is starting to happen.The world is in the middle of a fundamental rethinking of this process of social innovation, with the goal of making it far more efficient and effective than ever before, through a movement that we call "philanthrocapitalism." The best business brains of our age are turning their attention to doing good, using not just their business skills but, in some cases, their businesses. One of the most important tasks they face is figuring out how to finance the growth of a good idea into a worldchanging social innovation.The "capital curve" for commercial businesses as they move from start-up finance to venture capital and, finally in some cases, the public debt and equity markets, is now well understood. Overall, the finance sector does a good job of matching the right kind of capital to the best prospects for profitability. The social sector needs an explosion of innovation and new thinking to follow suit, including developing its own well-functioning capital curve. This process, in which the philanthrocapitalists have a crucial role to play, will require a wide-ranging debate about the respective roles of for-profit, government, non-profit and philanthropic capital, so that these sectors work together more effectively in ways that play to their strengths and minimize their weaknesses.Philanthrocapitalism is behind the growth of mission-related and impact investing that could lever hundreds of billions of dollars of new financing for social environmental projects. It is in the efforts of traditional non-profits, such as
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