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February 16th, 2011

Social Capitalism - The Real Deal

Stodgy, conventional corporations and constraining, archaic non-profit models are a thing of the past.

The real game changers today will be innovative companies that place a high value on social capitalism. Social capitalism (a.k.a. cause capitalism) is roughly summarized as a transparent for-profit business with value-based objectives. These are just some of the reasons to align your business with this model:

  • Innovation
  • Creativity
  • Forward-Thinking
  • Prosperity in the Form of Jobs (Traditional Principles in Capitalism)
  • Creating Solutions for Complex Societal Problems
  • Sensible Stewards in their Communities (New Principles in Social Capitalism)

I could advocate in volumes about the merits of social capitalism. As this blog post is about the virtues of social capitalism I'll refrain from sending a shot across the bow at other antiquated business models. Suffice it to say that both conventional corporate models as well as many non-profit models are not sustainable, economically or socially.

Harvard Business Review (HBR) wrote a great article on this topic recently, titled The Big Idea: Creating Shared Value. It's a great read with several insightful comments that eloquently explain the concept of social capitalism. The money quote from the article is this:

"Not all profit is equal. Profits involving a social purpose represent a higher form of capitalism, one that creates a positive cycle of company and community prosperity."

HBR really hits it out of the park here. They are advocating for the very business model that ReCORK ascribes to. We're hell-bent on creating a business that benefits everyone that associates with us: be it through our social causes (tree planting, recycling, education on sustainability...) or through our responsible, (not-yet) profitable business model that will benefit our partners through providing valuable services and innovative products.

I really believe that consumers, financial institutions and to some degree governments need to recognize the higher value of social capitalism.

Posted by: Matt Hughes at 2:22 p.m.
Filed under: General
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On February 16th, 2011, Foo said:

The next step is creating worker co-operatives that function as Socially Aware and Capitalistic corporations. That way in addition to the "causes", the workers themselves can significantly benefit from their labours.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worker_cooperative should get one started. see some of these charts to show why in general workers are getting screwed and entrepreneurs/investors are getting rich off the worker's labours http://www.faireconomy.org/news/ceo_pay_charts

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