Corporate citizenship, social entrepreneurship, public/private partnerships – these important recent trends are based on the approach of using the energy and methods of companies and markets to address social challenges. One manifestation of this approach is philanthrocapitalism – a term coined by Economist business editor Matthew Bishop – whose protagonists include, for example, Bill Gates, Bill Clinton or George Soros.

What is interesting about this trend is that, unlike earlier forms of philanthropy, contributing to the common good is seen not as something that happens after or in addition to economic success or as an act of charity that is practiced on the side, so to speak, but as an intrinsic moment of a certain type of economic activity – in this sense, it is a sui generis cross-sectoral approach.

This approach, however, has its limitations. The first guest in our new series, Fireside Talks on Corporate Citizenship, was Michael Edwards, author and senior visiting fellow at the Brooks World Poverty Institute at the University of Manchester. He says: “To put it very simply, civil society and the market are asking different questions, not simply finding different answers to questions they hold in common about providing goods and services with more social impact.”

The fireside talks are being realized in cooperation with the German Center for Corporate Citizenship (CCCD).

Location:
This event took place at 6:30 p.m., at the Berlin office of the BMW Stiftung Herbert Quandt.