There are ways to affect the economy on local and national levels—ways to stop what may appear to be inexorable trends towards greater inequality. To help you explore the practical range of options your organizations can consider, NPQ is launching a new series.
Last week, NPQ explored how nonprofits can lead in rebuilding a more equitable and sustainable economy. We believe this timely issue is in need of new approaches, so look for additional work from us, including a webinar series.
As author and professor Janelle Kerlin has noted, “From practitioners to policymakers, activists, and funders of the social good, social enterprise has captured the imagination and hopes of a growing cross-section of society that seeks to find a more sustainable answer to the problems of society.” This article, concluding our four-part series on rebuilding the economy, examines notable differences between the philosophy and practice of social enterprise in the United States and Europe.
A democratic society, contends Detroit-based activist and educator Malik Yakini, requires embedding the economy in “the connection we have to each other and to the planet.” This interview, the third article in a four-part series on rebuilding the economy, situates the search for a more democratic economy in the history of the movements for Black liberation and food justice in Detroit.
If efficiency requires us to send slaves into caves to extract metals and create toxic waste that destroys the planet, notes Douglas Rushkoff, then maybe we should be less efficient. This interview, the second article in a four-part series on rebuilding the economy, explores the inherent problems with our current extractive economy and calls on nonprofits to promote an economy that is both sustainable and equitable.
This is the first article in a special four-part NPQ series that addresses the role of nonprofits in rebuilding the US economy. We urge our readers to get involved in the discussion it engenders and in experimentation with new forms of ownership of our economic engines. If our collective goal is sustainable, equitable communities, this series and the webinar series to follow will help us all focus on the practical vehicles to take us there.
Next week, NPQ will run a cluster of four articles, taken from the Summer 2018 issue of Nonprofit Quarterly magazine, on how to build a more democratic economy. This is the start of a year-long campaign to more fully explore this ever more emergent field which will include a series of seven monthly webinars starting in the fall, buttressed with supporting materials. This series will work to boost understanding and foster conversation of how nonprofits and movements can most effectively respond to our nation’s rising inequality.
