Generosity and Patient Capital

Post on: http://blog.acumenfund.org/2011/01/11/generosity-and-patient-capital/

By Sasha Ditchter

Activity and interest in the “impact investing” space is accelerating. There are now more than 192 “impact investing funds” and JPMorgan thinks this could be a $1 trillion market. Not surprising that Lucy Bernholz, writing in the Stanford Social Innovation Review, ranked “impact investing” and “social entrepreneurs” as two of the top 10 Philanthropy Buzzwords of the Decade.

Meanwhile, Matt Bishop of The Economist just argued this week that 2011 will be the year of reckoning for social enterprise.

There’s no doubt – with everything that is happening in the microfinance space and with the growth of our sector – that we all should face and will face increased scrutiny. Now is our chance to define what we are building and why, to define the terms of success and failure, and to build the tools to hold ourselves accountable.

In this talk at the NextGen:Charity conference, I describe how I see the threads of philanthropy, investing, generosity and patient capital weaving together to fight poverty.