| | | | Giving Single Women A Chance  I am infamous for having 40 tabs open on my computer at any given time. It is actually a miracle that my computer doesn't crash more often - props to MacBooks. While sifting through my tabs last night, I finally got the chance to read an article from Women's eNews that has been open for at least a week - " India's Single Women Resist Stigma, Demand Rights." And this got me thinking hopefully. India is building its civil society in a very conscious manner, especially through women's movements. Women are being empowered. They are becoming strong voices and strong advocates. And they are no longer just thinking locally, but they are taking their issues and their grievances to the national level. They are protesting their treatment in Indian society as second class citizens, often ostracized, left behind, or forgotten. The article focuses on single women in India: "Single women in India outnumber the population of Canada. And these 36 million women, as counted by the 2001 census, only represent those who are legally divorced, separated, and widowed. There is no official estimate of abandoned, deserted, and unmarried women, multitudes of whom live invisibly, often at the mercy of callous family customs and beyond the reach of public welfare." So how can social enterprise get involved? While NGOs can focus on issues of empowerment, social enterprise can provide jobs. These single women, "invisible" to society, need jobs. They need routes through which to earn a livelihood. They have no husband on which to rely. Social enterprise can provide jobs. There are a multitude of examples of enterprises run for women, by women. From female Dalits running their own newspaper to creating and implementing the marketing strategy for rural producer groups to starting a taxi fleet with female drivers that caters exclusively to female customers, women are successfully harnessing social enterprise for their own gains. Laying claim to their rights, breaking with the traditions of their caste or community, things seem to be progressing for women in India. - Adrienne Villani | Sankalp Corner: Book Box  Book Box conceives of a "book" as a reading experience that can travel in print and other audio-visual media. Their belief is that the print media, though desirable, is severely limited in its ability to bring reading to the masses of children in India, spread across 600,000 villages, speaking a variety of languages, and often living on less than US$2 a day. As a result, Book Box has created the concept of "AniBooks," or animated books, to support emerging literacy and language skills. Overcoming the distribution challenges of print by piping reading to children on digital and electronic media, narration on screen comes with same language subtitles. Over the next 3 years, apart from increasing their line of "Anibooks," Book Box plans to enter broadcast media. | Beyond Profit Issue 3: Fresh off the Press Kissing the Tiger: Peace as a Pre-requisite for Development  Peace is a pre-requisite for development as a whole. It creates an enabling environment for the fundamentals of a society's progress: human capital formation, infrastructure development, and markets subject to the rule of law. Roshan Paul and Sarah Jefferson, both of Ashoka, explore the intersection of peace and social entrepreneurship, an emerging field in the global development dialogue. Visit our blog for the full article. Subscribers, once you've seen the issue, we'd love to hear your opinions. They help us improve. Take a quick feedback survey here or email us at ideas@beyondprofit.com. If you'd like to become part of the elite (but growing) group we call "subscribers," please click here. | Where You Can Find Us... Social Movements for Women and Children Jan 27, New Delhi, India Over the past few years, India has been witness to the "urbanization of poverty." Social Movements for Women and Children is designed to address social movements for change - not just the current social, economic, and cultural frameworks under which most of urban India operates, but also the theoretical and empirical issues. Starting with an overview of why there are no effective movements for children, the seminar will then examine the intersection of female empowerment movements and nonprofit work. Jan 29-31, XLRI Jamshedpur, India Breaking away from the format of outlined agenda, specified topics, and fixed speakers, the 2nd National Conference on Social Entrepreneurship is designed to collaboratively explore, discuss, learn from each other, and co-create. Organized into working groups, each group will be anchored by a social entrepreneur. This aims to facilitate learning by actively involving the participants in collaboratively solving real, live problems, ;which are of their interest and concern; to leverage the rich experience and competence available in the participants' community to address real challenges, issues and opportunities facing the sector; and, to bring about relevant "take-home" learning (solutions and alternatives) for the participants, which can be implemented. Feb 27-28, Cambridge, Mass, USA "Redefining Service for the 21st Century." Over the last decade, the word "service" has become multi-dimensional, stretching beyond basic volunteering to encompass fields like microfinance and corporate social responsibility, among others. This year's theme highlights the emerging trends in social enterprise that benefit society through the public, private, social, and non-profit means. The Social Enterprise Conference is one of the world's leading forums to engage in dialogue on social enterprise and debate with leaders from across the world. Over time, the Conference has become the arena to explore revolutionary ideas that challenge the prevailing status quo and inspire a call to action. | | |  | Beyond Profit, a new social enterprise magazine, presents the stories, people, and ideas behind social ventures by bringing you first-hand insights and expert commentary. | | | | |
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