Soul Economy

There is certainly increasing coverage in the media about CSR and CSR events taking place are also on the rise. So why the growing interest? What is the current status? Where to from here?
Firstly however, it is useful to define CSR. While there are many definitions available, the World Business Council for Sustainable Development is [...]

There are 1.3 million SMEs in Australia, accounting for 96 per cent of all businesses (Sensis, Feb 2007). With SMEs playing such a prominent and important role, I was keen to find out the more about how they are giving back to the community. Much of the research focused on corporate philanthropy in the form [...]

Growing world issues combined with limited government funding to address these and the number of super wealthy wanting to “give back” on the rise, has lead to an increasing focus on “social entrepreneurship”. What does this term mean? There is much discussion on the definition of “social entrepreneurship”, “social entrepreneurs” and “social enterprises” and many [...]

I was recently reading the report of the 130 social entrepreneurs surveyed by SustainAbility and The Skoll Foundation “Growing Opportunity: Entrepreneurial Solutions to Insoluble Problems”. I was particularly interested in their views of the progression of businesses in regards to sustainability. They refer to 3 phases:

Mindset 1.0 — driven a compliance and regulations
Mindset 2.0 — [...]

There is increasing evidence to indicate that the ethical consumer is on the rise. So what is an ethical consumer? The definition in Wikipedia is:
“An ethical consumer is one who practices ethical consumerism”, which is “buying things that are made ethically. Generally, this means without harm to or exploitation or of humans, animals or the [...]

I recently read “The New Philanthropists” by Charles and Elizabeth Handy. What an excellent read filled with inspiring stories of what they refer to as “new” philanthropists” meaning that they “don’t fit the old mould of grant-giving foundations, …They are hands-on, pioneering and entrepreneurial…” Charles Handy also refers to them as true “social entrepreneurs”.
This then [...]