In his book Target 3 billion, the former India president A.P.J. Abdul Kalam writes: ‘With the exception of China… the global quest for reduction of poverty has at best been stagnant, at times even with outright negative results’. Statistics handheld by the World Bank reveal that 25% of the world’s population lives in poverty (less than $ 1.25 per person per day). Despite the fact that a percentage of the population in the United States and Europe is living in poverty, the majority of the world’s poor live in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, especially India.

In 1960 the American Economic Historian Walt Rostow asserted that countries follow five stages of economic development, from ‘traditional society’ to ‘high mass consumption’. Sixty years later it has become clear that the modernisation theory and its successors are no longer valid. While modernisation has brought about greater efficiency in production and has increased the standard of living for some, the predicament that individuals and groups of people particularly in low and medium income countries find themselves in has often worsened. In North and South, East and West large segments of the population continue to live in abject poverty; a causal relationship between economic growth - measured in GNP (Gross National Product) - and human development and well-being can not be assumed. Negative environmental impact has been underestimated and income inequality has and is increasing worldwide.

Poverty is a violation of social justice and human rights. Harvard professor Michael Porter rightly states that ‘capitalism is under siege’. Already in 1931 Mahatma Gandhi said; ‘The industry should regard themselves as trustees and servants of the poor’. The Buddhist monk and writer Sulak Sivaraksa put it more bluntly: ‘In the post-Cold war, capitalist triumphalism has bred hubris and delusion. Free-market capitalism preached by neoliberal school of economics is a stark manifestation of this. Tolerance for socioeconomic diversity and alternative models of development are almost nonexistent’. He argues that ‘Free-trade advocates do not concern themselves with which the groups in society prosper and which ones fall behind’. Countering this notion, he states that interest in the commons needs to be re-established (in order to address ‘The Tragedy of the Commons’). The Prime Minster of Bhutan, a small Himalayan state promoting Gross National Happiness, instead of Gross National Product, has recently emphasised the need for reinterpretation and recasting of concepts related to good life and a good economy.

Nowadays Gandhi, Sivaraksa, the prime minster of Bhutan and other critics of the dominant neoliberal economic system have many followers in East and West, North and South. Porter and Kramer’s concept of Shared Value Creation, defined as ‘policies and operating practices that enhance the competitiveness of a company while simultaneously advancing the economic and social conditions in which it operates’, (basically a plea that companies should re-establish their relationship with communities and society at large), is however not sufficient. Such models, though significant in re-evaluating the way business is being done, are not enough to bring about the necessary change and ensuring a focus on new, social value creation.

A much more fundamental shift in orientation is needed. It is necessary to revisit the concept of value addition and creation. Returning to the concept of ‘commons’ implies a realisation that mankind needs more, much more than only financial returns from business activities. A realisation that creation of values that are relevant for society as a whole – such as social justice, an improved environment, shift in power equations, sustainable businesses – is the need of the day. This is what genuine social entrepreneurs aspire: to contribute to a better world; a business for a common good (Lynch & Walls). ‘Need’ and not ‘greed’ (Gandhi) needs to be central. Social entrepreneurs indeed as ‘trustees’ and servants to the poor’; with new value creation as the heart of their business.