Urgent Evoke

A crash course in changing the world.

"Embracing market mechanisms" is the way to implement lasting change

One of the opening chapters of the 10th anniversary edition of the "Cluetrain Manisfesto" rephrases one of the 95 theses of the original in the following way: "Markets are relationships". This is what a Nigerian pastor travelling with the author some years after the manifesto's first publication said in response to the original claim, which went: "Markets are Conversations". If this pastor is right and if this is indeed the case, and if we really live and want to live in a globalized market, the simple question is: What kind of relationship do we want to have with each other in this world?

What I derive from the 33 wisdoms of innovation in Africa is that there are three dimensions to keep in mind when undertaking to tackle large-scaled problems and that these can be represented as three obvious questions: who is suffering, how can the issue be improved and what resources are available to do so. One of the 33 wisdoms in my view defines the perspective and the nature of the relationship I find most desirable to have with my fellow citizens on planet earth: Equal footing and an conversation on eye-level. This wisdom is "Embrace Market Mechanisms". And here is why:

The still prevalent paradigm of help is to pick a good cause, go and raise funds and use the proceeds (after removing a more or less due share to cover the expenses) by delivering a free service at the place of need. In two cases I find this to be a valid approach: disaster relief on the one hand (a disaster being a disruptive event that disables the victims to help themselves), on the other hand educational services to help ignite the creative potential of vast numbers of people that would otherwise remain untapped. Both cases represent a kind of help that empowers self-help. In my view the money funding these purposes qualifies as seed capital.

In most other cases I find the relationship formed through this model of aid to be detrimental to all parties involved by creating dependencies on the continued existence of the need that constitutes the good cause. As the saying goes: Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach the man how to fish, and he may feed himself for the rest of his life.

A market understood as a relationship encourages a change of perspective. If there is a good cause, then why not consider it a good business opportunity? To make business long lasting, you must take your customer seriously. This means you have to know who you’re dealing with, what constitutes his culture, his self image, who he (generic pronoun sine genere) wants to be and what he desires.

If we are in the business of helping others help themselves, we cannot succeed by forcing upon them our image but might succeed by helping them express their own image. To do so a certain quite deep knowledge of this image might help to see things from the other's perspective. A need identified in this way has true potential of becoming a business. If this involves technology and products, we need to know what resources define the material culture and how to work with those to avoid fundamental external dependencies.

Since lasting impact can only be achieved by mass adoption, the products and services must be priced well within the range of affordability and the available sales channels must be identified and used. We must listen to the markets we wish to serve. The real asset we have to work with is advanced know how and a playfully scientific, problem-solving mindset.

Example: Stoves. Millions of painful deaths are accountable to badly burning stoves or cooking on open fire. Amy Smith and many others approach this problem not by trying to change the dietary or cooking customs and making open fire obsolete, but by trying to improve the quality and cleanness of the burning process of stoves and fuels made from local resources. Thus the cultural self image remains intact, but the impact on health and life expectancy is lessened or removed. Now teach local artisans to produce the stoves and fuels involved and you increase welfare and GDP. The dependencies created by this approach are mostly within the target society itself. If a market is established in this way, then there is nothing that might keep anybody from investing in clean burning stoves and fuels.

The only return on a donation you see is a clear conscience when looking up and gratitude when looking down. The return on a patient investment like in the example above can be seen by looking levelly in the eyes of your business partners.

Views: 28

Comment by Greg Stevenson on March 4, 2010 at 9:04pm
Hear Hear. Level the playing fields. Eliminate Agricultural subsides in Europe and North America NOW! Transfer agricultural technologies to ensure safe food products to the 3rd world. Drop Tariffs, Trade freely. Enable dignity, not dependence.

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