Jeremiah Stanghini

Updates to JeremiahStanghini.com: Papers & Series

I noticed that I’d been getting some more traffic than usual to my about page, so I thought I’d read it and see what it says (it had been a while since I’d seen it). Upon reading it, I realized that it needed some updating… so I’ve gone ahead and done that. I’ve tried to make it a little more universal than it was in the past, so I won’t have to update it as frequently (though, is a yearly update really that unrealistic?)

Anyway, the real reason I wanted to give you an update about the website is for a new page that I’ve created: Papers & Series. You’ll see this on the banner above my name on the right-hand side (it’s an important feature!) On this page, I’ve collected all the papers/series that I’ve posted here online. So, if you remember me saying something about a series on American Public Policy, but couldn’t find the link, you’ll now be able to see all of the links in that series. Or maybe something about telepathy and psi phenomena? Yes, they’re in there, too.

The best part about this page is that I’m going to continually update it. So, when I post a new series, I’ll also update that page to show that the new paper/series has been posted to the website. If you haven’t read all my series, I highly suggest checking them out. There’s likely something in there that you’ll like. Also, be sure to check back soon as I continue to dig through my old papers and share them on here.

Quick Thoughts on the George Zimmerman Trial

Up until now, I’ve done a relatively good job of avoiding any of the coverage of the George Zimmerman trial. There are plenty of uninformed opinions flying around and plenty of partisan positions espoused. I’m not a lawyer nor am I familiar with the self-defense laws of Florida. I couldn’t possibly have an informed opinion.

Nonetheless, I happened to catch some discussion of the trial on NPR, while I was running some errands yesterday. I was a bit shocked to hear how some of the trial has progressed and some of the things that seem to be important (one of the witnesses not speaking the “Queen’s English“). My thoughts about the situation stem from some of the things I heard back when the event first transpired last winter.

I don’t remember where I heard it, (this is *kind of* important), but I remember thinking that it seemed noteworthy. It was one of the 911 tapes that were released. The conversation was between Zimmerman and the 911-operator. Zimmerman was calling in about the person he saw walking in the neighborhood (Trayvon Martin). I don’t remember if he said ‘suspect,’ but the folks on NPR today seemed to think that he did. While that would be important, it’s not the point that I’m going to make, so I’ll move past it.

On this call, after Zimmerman alerted the 911-operator about Trayvon Martin, the 911-operator said that there was someone on the way. I don’t quite remember what was said in the interceding section, but the 911-operator must have gotten the impression that Zimmerman was going to start following Trayvon Martin because she said something to the effect of, “I’m going to need you to not follow him.” Let me say that again. The nine-one-one operator said don’t follow him. Of course, we all know that Zimmerman went on to follow Martin. I haven’t even really brought into the equation that Zimmerman was a “self-appointed” neighborhood watchman.

Bear with me for a second as we just boil down to the fact that Zimmerman didn’t follow the directions of the 911-operator. Would you do that? I most certainly wouldn’t. If I’m calling in because of an emergency of someone I see outside walking down the sidewalk, I’m not going to jump out of my house and try to follow him. I might go upstairs (if I had an upstairs), to watch where he goes. I’m not a trained police officer or security guard. What would possess me to think that I’m smarter than the 911-operator and begin following someone who I’ve just labeled “suspect?”

As I said in the beginning, I am not a lawyer, but this seems like it’s an important part of this case. And not just inside the case, but outside of the case. Do other citizens make a habit of not following the direction of 911-operators?

Spiritual Development of the Frog: Spiritual Development of Frogs, Part 2

In yesterday’s post, we looked at the first half of a paper I wrote about the spiritual development of frogs. There was a focus on the biological development of frogs. Today, we’ll look at the second half of the paper and wrap it up. In this half of the paper, we really get into the “creative” part. Enjoy!

Spiritual Development of the Frog

It is conceivable that all species have some form of spiritual development. It would be ludicrous to assume that we, as humans, are the only species that can experience spiritual development. Given this, it is fair to assume that frogs experience spiritual development. As we learned from an earlier section in this paper, biological development can be tied to spiritual development. As such, a frog’s spiritual development is markedly similar to their biological development.

A frog’s life begins as an egg. Not many eggs make it past this stage, so the eggs that do make it past this stage, must have something rare about them. The eggs that survive this stage have something exceptional about them. These eggs are already into stage one of the spiritual development of a frog – protection. In this stage of spiritual development, the frog has to have the intuitive capacity to have chosen the right egg to be born into that will not be eaten by a predator. Not all eggs make it to stage one of spiritual development, so the eggs that do, are already ahead of the game. It is necessary to say that those eggs that do not make it to stage one are eggs that have remained in stage zero, which is called undifferentiated.

Once an egg has made it past the stages of undifferentiated and protection, they move into becoming a tadpole. In this stage, the tadpole undergoes many transitions. During the tadpole stage, the tadpoles that mature too quickly are not only subject to predation from other species, but from their own kind! Tadpoles that fall into this trap do not move onto the next stage of spiritual development – safety. Those tadpoles that have the compassion and understanding of what is going on in their bodies portray an air of safety to them. They are aware of what is in their environment that can harm them and know not to mature at a rate too quickly, so as not to upset the other tadpoles. To this point, we have learned that a frog begins as an egg in biological terms and as undifferentiated in spiritual terms. If the egg that is chosen is ‘protected,’ then the frog spirit that chose the egg moves onto the next biological stage of tadpole and to the next stage of spiritual development of protection. If the tadpole is smart and ‘safe’ enough, then they are permitted the opportunity to undergo a metamorphosis. Before this stage of metamorphosis, the tadpole has moved into the spiritual stage of safety.

The tadpoles are now far enough on their spiritual journey to have gained the title of ‘safe.’ It is the title ‘safe’ required by the frog Gods before they will permit the tadpoles an opportunity to move through the metamorphosis stage. This metamorphosis stage for tadpoles biologically, is the shift they make into the life of being a froglet. In this stage of froglet, the spiritual developmental stage that coincides is ‘becoming.’ The term becoming was chosen because in this stage of froglet, the frog is not quite a frog and not quite a tadpole. It is, by definition, a transitory state, both biologically and spiritually. It is commonly compared to the Dark Night of the Soul, which was a treatise written by a Spanish poet. However, this treatise is commonly referred to a state in one’s spiritual journey for despair, much like the time for froglets – a time of anguish where multiple changes in their body are occurring.

If these froglets can survive the biological changes occurring in them, then they will be granted the ability to move onto the final stage of biological development – an adult frog. In spiritual terms, this stage is referred to as individuation. All froglets that become adult frogs have tails that have undergone resorption, but this resorption of their tails is what separates them from the froglets. This process is an ‘individuation’ of sorts and as such, is the stage of spiritual development. Once the frogs have become adult frogs, they are individuated and then live lives as normal frogs do.

For those frogs that are lucky enough, they will stumble upon, only by way of intuition, the final stage of spiritual development for frogs – communal. This stage is unknown to most of the frog community and is only accessible for those frogs that spend time looking deep within them. All of the frogs have access to this stage, as all frogs are connected, but only the frogs that pay attention and are mindful have the opportunity to access this spiritual stage of communal. Once the individuated frog realizes that there is a stage of communal, they must swim to find it. There are communities of frogs in the Atlantic Ocean who live on an island not known to any species, except for the communal frogs. These frogs have transcended what it means to be a frog and are living in a state of complete bliss. Being in the company of other frogs who have reached the communal stage only further amplifies a frog’s state of bliss.

Conclusion

There was reasoning offered for pairing biological development with spiritual development. There was an explanation of the biological development of a frog. The stages of biological development of a frog are as follows: egg, tadpole, froglet, and adult frog. The stages of spiritual development of a frog were explained. The stages of spiritual development of a frog are as follows: undifferentiated, protection, safety, becoming, individuation, and communal.

If you liked this paper/series, you might want to check out some of the other papers/series I’ve posted.

Biological Development of the Frog: Spiritual Development of Frogs, Part 1

In continuing to dig through some of the archives of papers I’ve written in the past, I thought I’d share a fun one I write while attending Sofia University. This paper was for a class in the Psychology of Spiritual Development. The prompt for the paper was for students to ‘construct our own synthetic model of spiritual development that integrated/incorporated two or more traditional or psychology models.’ I don’t remember where I got the idea to couch this in the context of frogs, but I remember that this made it more fun to write. Also, I remember the professor telling me that he really enjoyed reading the paper. I hope you do, too!

This paper will give a summary of the biological development of frogs and pair spiritual development with the stages of biological development that a frog experiences. There will be reasoning offered as to why biological development belongs with spiritual development by way of support from other models of spiritual development. The biological stages of frogs are egg, tadpole, froglet, and adult frog. The spiritual stages of frogs are undifferentiated, protection, safety, becoming, individuation, and communal.

Biological Development and Spiritual Development

Biological development occurs across the lifespan from birth to death and it is arguable that spiritual development occurs across the lifespan, too. As we grow and age, we are forever embedded in a learning process. When we are babies, we learn mostly from our parents because they are constantly taking care of us. As we grow out of our baby stage, we begin to learn from other people in our environment, which could include siblings. We then move into early childhood and adolescence where we are not only learning from our parents, but we are learning from teachers, classmates, and any number of other people in our environment (bus drivers, strangers, cashiers, etc.) During these learning experiences, our body is also growing. Our body is in a constant state of change. When we are born from our mother’s womb, we are in one state of being – biologically speaking. This state we begin as babies is not even the same state that we are in the next day. There are multiple processes happening within our body that help us grow. Just as these processes are helping our body grow biologically, there are also spiritual processes that are taking place at the same time.

In M. Scott Peck’s, Stages of Spiritual Growth, Peck highlights that most children are in Stage one on his model. Peck has four different stages of growth and notes that most people progress from stage one to stage two (although not everyone does). Peck is not the only professional to posit that spiritual development occurs at certain ages. In James W. Fowler’s, Stages of Faith Development, Fowler highlights that Stage Zero occurs between birth and two years of age. Fowler has six stages of faith development (including stage zero), that people can progress through. Just as Peck noted with his stages of spiritual development, Fowler notes that not everyone can progress through the stages of faith development. Fowler’s stage six is reserved for those who have reached a state of being liken to that of Mahatma Gandhi or Mother Teresa. The case has been made for a similarity between biological development and spiritual development. In the next section, there will be a description of the biological development of a frog.

Biological Development of the Frog

Before we can understand the spiritual development of a frog, we need to understand the biological development. The unique factor in the biological development of frogs is that there is a metamorphosis. Before there can be a metamorphosis, there must be eggs. The majority of frogs start out as an egg. Most of the time, female frogs will lay eggs in the water, but sometimes, they will lay them on land. If these eggs are laid on land, they will be laid very close to the water. When the female frog lays eggs, they do not just lay one egg, but multiple eggs. These eggs are the subject of much predation and as a result, most frog eggs do not survive. However, those eggs that do survive from predators will hatch within one week.

Once the eggs hatch, they become tadpoles, which are sometimes referred to as polliwogs. Tadpoles have an oval body with long and vertically-flattened tails, much like the image of (a) in Figure 1. In this stage, the tadpole is completely submerged in water. There are no lungs, but there are external gills for respiration. The tadpoles do not have eyelids, nor do they have front and hind legs, but they do have tails that they use for swimming. These tadpoles typically eat algae. Tadpoles are very vulnerable to predation, just as the eggs. Something interesting to note is that their counterparts (fellow tadpoles) may eat tadpoles developing quicker than their counterparts do. That is, the late bloomers survive longer, which is not something that is common among other species, specifically humans. Tadpoles that develop early would grow hind legs faster as in (b) of Figure 1. Tadpoles can remain tadpoles for as long as one year depending on the time of year that they hatch. If they hatch into tadpoles near winter, they may stay as tadpoles through the winter.

Towards the end of the tadpole stage, frogs undergo a metamorphosis. There is a dramatic transformation in a frog’s physiology. These tadpoles develop hind legs and then front legs. The tadpoles will lose their external gills and develop lungs. The intestines shorten in length as they begin to shift from an herbivorous diet to a carnivorous. The position of their eyes shift to allow for improved binocular vision. This shift in their eye position is important and mirrors their shift from prey to predator. At this stage, the tadpole is no longer referred to as a tadpole, as this is inaccurate. However, it is referred to as a froglet. The image of this description can be found in (c) and (d) of Figure 1.

In the final stage of development to adult frog, the froglet undergoes a transformation known as apoptosis, which is the technical term for programmed cell death. The apoptosis for the froglet occurs in their tail. Instead of the tail falling off as in some other species, the froglet’s tail undergoes resorption, which is the technical term for the process of losing substance. This process can be seen by looking at Figure 1 from (c) to (d) to (e). In this section, there has been an explanation of how the frog undergoes biological development beginning with the egg. Then, there was a depiction of the process as a tadpole and as a froglet. Finally, there was a description of an adult frog. In the next section, there will be ties made between the stages of biological development and the stages of spiritual development.

Note: Check back tomorrow for the last two sections of the paper (spiritual development of the frog and the conclusion).

What Does the Dalai Lama Want for his Birthday?

The Dalai Lama turned 78 (does he look 78?) this past Saturday. If you were invited to his birthday party, what do you think he’d ask you to get for him? He’s clearly not a man who seeks out material possessions, so a new car/house wouldn’t be in order. Would you believe that all he wanted was empathy? No? Then, you should watch his birthday message.

Please, keep your own mind, your own heart, more compassionate. More sort of, spirit of, seriously or genuinely, sense of concern of others well-being. And with that sort of motivation, if possible, serve other, helping other, other people, also other animal, if you do not have the opportunity to serving, then at least, resisting harming them.

The laughing at the end is priceless. He has such an infectious laugh.

Political Implications of the SCOTUS Decision on the Voting Rights Act

More than a week ago, the Supreme Court of the United States rendered a decision on a case that had implications for the Voting Rights Act (VRA). The Court ruled that the formula from Section 4 of the VRA was unconstitutional. The decision has certainly enraged liberals and the political left as is clear in Justice Ginsburg‘s dissent:

[T]he Court’s opinion can hardly be described as an exemplar of restrained and moderate decision making. Quite the opposite. Hubris is a fit word for today’s demolition of the VRA.

Because of this outrage, I’ve seen some people argue that this decision was good for liberals/democrats because it will ignite those potentially disenfranchised people to vote. From Ross Douthat:

Well, to begin with, voter identification laws do not belong to the same moral or legal universe as Jim Crow. Their public purpose, as a curb to fraud, is potentially legitimate rather than nakedly discriminatory, and their effects are relatively limited. As Roberts’s majority opinion noted, the voter registration gap between whites and blacks in George Wallace’s segregationist Alabama was 50 percentage points.

… But voter ID laws don’t take effect in a vacuum: as they’re debated, passed and contested in court, they shape voter preferences and influence voter enthusiasm in ways that might well outstrip their direct influence on turnout. They inspire registration drives and education efforts; they help activists fund-raise and organize; they raise the specter of past injustices; they reinforce a narrative that their architects are indifferent or hostile to minorities.

W.W. from The Economist finds Douthat’s analysis “quite plausible.” Both articles referenced the same information I talked about yesterday: the missing white voter.

I don’t know that I necessarily agree with this assessment.

In Wisconsin a couple of years ago, citizens were pretty excited about recalling Governor Scott Walker. Some folks were really upset by Gov. Walker’s actions on collective bargaining. Democrats, Gov. Walker is a Republican, thought that they could seize this opportunity to recall the Governor. There were over 1 million signatures to recall the Governor. It seemed like there was lots of momentum and people engaged in the recall. However, during the recall election of 2012, Gov. Walker won more of the vote than he did in the gubernatorial election of 2010.

There’s another example from this past election: The Affordable Care Act. Otherwise, known as “ObamaCare.” In March 2012, when the Supreme Court heard the arguments for the case, Karl Rove wrote in the Wall Street Journal:

This week’s historic Supreme Court hearings on President Obama’s health-care overhaul will have huge political ramifications.

Then, in June, when the decision was rendered, there was this from The Weekly Standard:

In the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision upholding the constitutionality of Obamacare, the principal choice now facing Americans on November 6 will be whether to keep Obamacare or to repeal it.

Republicans and conservatives thought that ObamaCare was going to give them the chance they needed to have a Republican elected President. It’s safe to say that it didn’t turn out the way they wanted. Not only did Republicans not elect a Republican President, but they also lost seats in the Senate (when they anticipated winning more seats).

Neither of these examples perfectly map onto the VRA decision, but it seems to me that there’s a bit of an overreaction in assuming that this decision is going to be a lightning rod for Democrats. I’d say that it’s “too early to tell” how this will affect the upcoming 2014 and 2016 elections. For now, the one of the only things that can be said about the political implications of the VRA: We’ll see…

More Civilized Conversations, Less Screaming Over Each Other

A few days ago, I happened to catch a segment from All In With Chris Hayes. He had on one of the people I follow on Twitter, Tim Carney. Part of the reason that this is noteworthy is because Carney is of a different ideological perspective from Hayes. Carney writes for the Washington Examiner, which, in 2008, supported McCain for President and in 2012, supported Mitt Romney. And Chris Hayes, a host on MSNBC, probably voted for Obama in the last two elections.

Anyhow, the segment comes after Hayes previews the show and introduces the topic: the ‘missing white voter.’ This particular usage of the phrase comes from a series of articles (I’m not the only one who likes to write series!) in Real Clear Politics by Sean Trende where he makes the argument that Republicans needn’t get onboard with immigration reform in order to win future elections — they just need to appeal to those white voters who didn’t vote in the last election.

After the introduction from Hayes, Carney begins making his points. One of things I thought was worth noting was how Carney talked about Rubio. From what I’ve seen/read, many conservatives think that Rubio will have a good shot at being elected President in 2016. So, when Carney seemed to make points against Rubio, I was a bit surprised. On the whole, I really enjoyed the brief back-and-forth between Hayes and Carney — they’re both smart commentators. Most importantly though, I liked that it didn’t appear that the two of them were getting caught up in the ideological talking points. It seemed like they were really talking about the substance of what Hayes introduced in the segment. I wish that cable news was more like that segment and less like a game of one-upmanship to see who can scream the loudest to convince the viewers that, ‘they must be right because they were more angry.’

Note: If the interview (or this discussion) intrigued you, I highly recommend checking out the article from Tom Edsall on the New York Times’ Opinionator. He has a really good summary of the idea that Republicans should just focus on white voters.

Look Closely and You’ll See that America Values Philosophy and Idealism

About a month ago, I talked about the best kept secret to traveling – tours. Since that post, I’ve been back into DC a few times to visit the monuments and the other sites that there are to see. There was something that struck me as particularly poignant — the US values philosophy/ideals without even knowing it.

You wouldn’t know it to watch TV, go the movies, or listen to the radio, but deeply embedded within the US is a value of philosophy and ideals. What makes me say this? Well, in visiting the monuments, you can’t help but think this. All of these important people in American history and what’s the unifying theme (besides America) between them? They had an ideal or a philosophy and they remained steadfast in pursuing that philosophy. FDR, MLK, Lincoln, Washington, Jefferson, George Mason…

Speaking of George Mason: even though I just finished an MBA from George Mason University, there were some things I didn’t know about the man that I found particularly interesting. For instance, did you know that he was a mentor to Thomas Jefferson? How about that he was the smartest man that George Washington knew? Or, how about that he wrote the Virginia Declaration of Rights? And that Thomas Jefferson borrowed heavily from the Virginia Declaration of Rights in drafting the Declaration of Independence?

I wonder if there will be a time (again?) when these American values will be more apparent. That is, when they will be more overt.

After one of these trips into DC to see the monuments, I found myself sitting on a bench outside one of the stores in the Mosaic District. I was looking up at all the store fronts and thinking to myself how distracting consumerism can be. I had just spent the day steeped in American idealism — learning and reading about some of the important figures in American history and now I found myself dropped into consumerism. It [consumerism] seemed so small after FDR, MLK, and Jefferson. It seemed almost insignificant. The most appropriate word I can think of for my thoughts that day: distracting.

It really seemed like everything was distracting. That is, everything but the philosophy/idealism I had spent time with that day. The stores and consumerism — it was distracting away from the philosophy and idealism. To be fair, maybe it’s not reasonable to always be thinking about idealism and philosophy. Maybe it’s fair to sometimes indulge. I should also clarify that I’m not judging consumerism, no.

I was just noticing that after spending a day with idealism, consumerism seemed… distracting.

US Congress: 48% Millionaires, US Population: 2.85% Millionaires

I recently saw an article in The Atlantic with the title: Does the Rise of the Super-Wealthy Require New Global Rules? It’s a provocative question based on a book by Chrystia Freeland, Plutocrats. I highly recommend taking the time to read it! Anyway, while the article was good, there was something near the beginning that caught my eye and made me think:

When the 113th Congress opened in January, the number of millionaires in its ranks rose to 257 out of 535, or just over 48 percent.

My first thought — that’s a lot of millionaires in Congress, isn’t it? Forty-eight percent! Then I thought, that percentage probably doesn’t hold for the whole population of the US. Meaning, 48% of the United States probably isn’t made up of millionaires. In fact, it’s not. A study found that there are 9 million millionaires in the US. If we use the clock on the US Census Bureau, we can say that there are approximately 316 million people living in the US. So, if we divide 316 million by 9 million, we get a percentage of… 2.85%. Meaning, 2.85% of the US are millionaires. And yet, 48% of Congress are millionaires. Is something wrong here?

The US has a representative democracy. This means that a group of elected officials represent the people who elected them. Maybe it’s just me, but isn’t the keyword here representative? Do we really think that a Congress in which 48% of the body are millionaires can accurately represent a population in which only 2.85% are millionaires?

If you’re an American, this is certainly something worth thinking about today as you enjoy your holiday.

PS: Happy Independency Day!

The Cross-Section of Social Entrepreneurship and Externalities: Social Entrepreneurship and Externalities, Part 4

In the first post in this series, we looked at the definition of social entrepreneurship. In the second post in this series, we looked at the definition of externalities. In the third post, we looked at some solutions to externalities. In today’s post, the last in this series, we’ll look at the cross-section of social entrepreneurship and externalities and wrap up the paper.

The Cross-Section of Social Entrepreneurship and Externalities

Let’s revisit our definitions of social entrepreneurship and externalities. Social entrepreneurship is the application of innovative solutions to society’s most pressing social problems in the form of massive wide-scale change, usually to the system. Externalities are a cost/benefit experienced by someone who is not a party to the transaction. Just by looking at those two definitions, my first inclination is that externalities are absolutely essential to the understanding of social entrepreneurship. Given that many of society’s most pressing social problems – in some people’s minds – can be traced back to a transaction that resulted in the negative externality, it’s hard to imagine how externalities wouldn’t be essential to the understanding of social entrepreneurship. With that being said, let’s look at some examples where these two concepts meet.

The current Director of the Skoll Center for Social Entrepreneurship, Pamela Hartigan, recently wrote a book chapter entitled, “Creating Blueprints for Business in the 21^st Century: Social Entrepreneurship Shows the Way.” In it, she talks about the specific role of social entrepreneurs in the economic ecosystem. “Economic literature often pays much less attention to the role of positive externalities than it does to negative externalities. In so doing, it neglects the primary drivers of social entrepreneurial action.”[1] Hartigan goes on to say that neglected positive externalities should be a main focus of social entrepreneurship. A really good example of this is Wikipedia, which was created by Jimmy Wales (who is also an Ashoka Fellow). Based on that citation alone, one would have to think that externalities are part of the understanding of social entrepreneurship, but let’s see if there are others.

A paper written by a professor at INSEAD, which is consistently one of the top business schools in the world, called A Positive Theory of Social Entrepreneurship offers some more insights into neglected positive externalities. In fact, the author’s first proposition states that, “addressing problems involving neglected positive externalities is the distinctive domain of action of social entrepreneurship.”[2] It looks like Santos and Hartigan share similar viewpoints in that neglected positive externalities are a key to social entrepreneurship. These two examples make it pretty clear that neglected positive externalities feature in the field of social entrepreneurship. Let’s move onto different examples to see if any other key points arise.

If you recall, one of the solutions to externalities had to do with the internalization of the externalities. There’s a book chapter entitled, “The NYC Watershed agreement: sustainable development and social entrepreneurship,” written by Joan Hoffman. In it, she addresses some of the challenges that are faced by those in watershed collaborations (combination of economic and environmental goals). “The economic concept of externalities, or impacts of market transactions on third parties, can be extended to describe the need for social entrepreneurs . . . The new organizations fostered by social entrepreneurs are designed to internalize consideration of these externalities.”[3] It turns out that social entrepreneurs, if not by intention at least by accident, are directly addressing problems of externalities through some of the solutions that have been proposed by economists and academics.

In answering our question about whether externalities are essential to the understanding of social entrepreneurship, we have inadvertently answered the second question: are economic theories of externalities used in the professional understanding of social entrepreneurship? In this last reference, we saw that not only was there a reference to an economic theory of externalities, but there was a reference to a solution of externalities (as offered by economic theory). As a result, I think it is safe to say, “yes” to both questions.

Closing Thoughts

In this paper, we have explored definitions of social entrepreneurship and externalities. We have explored some of the muddiness around both of these definitions. We have taken a closer look at some of the different kinds of externalities (positive, negative, positional, etc.). We have looked at some of the proposed economic solutions to externalities. Then, we looked at the cross-section of externalities and social entrepreneurship. We dove deeper into the intersection of these two concepts to find that at the heart of social entrepreneurship is an inclination to solve some of the externalities facing the planet. Lastly, we were able to answer, “yes” to the two main questions of this paper: “Are externalities essential to the understanding of social entrepreneurship?” and “Are the economic theories of externalities used in the professional understanding of social entrepreneurship?”

In closing, I wanted to revisit one of the ideas put forth by Barnett and Yandle in their paper, The End of the Externality Revolution.[4] Specifically, I want to address their idea that there aren’t any externalities – only inefficiencies. As someone who has had very little training in economics, but a great deal of training in some of the other social sciences, I can appreciate this reframing of externalities. In fact, I think it is appropriate to repackage our understanding of externalities as part of the “main” function of the transaction. In calling them inefficiencies, I don’t think that Barnett and Yandle are doing this. I think both names – externalities and inefficiencies – are not entirely representative of the true state of affairs. In doing research for this paper, I came across a quote that I think captures the essence of what I’m trying to say. It was written in the aftermath of the financial collapse of 2008,[5] [emphasis mine]:

The good news is that I think the economic system we will build next will be one in which environmental and social costs will no longer be externalities; costs that get pushed off the balance sheet. The cost of doing business to the planet . . . will now be factored in.

[1] Lopez-Claros, A. (2010). The innovation for development report 2010-2011: Innovation as a driver of productivity and economic growth. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

[2] Santos, F. M. (2009). A positive theory of social entrepreneurship. Social Innovation Centre: Working Papers, 1-51.

[3] Perrini, F. (2006). The new social entrepreneurship: What awaits social entrepreneurial ventures? Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar Publishing Limited.

[4] Barnett, A. H., & Yandle, B. (2009). The end of the externality revolution. Social Philosophy and Policy, 26(2), 130-150.

[5] Jones, K. (2009). When more mission equals more money: The more a business focuses on its social mission, the more revenue it will generate. Stanford Social Innovation Review.

If you liked this paper/series, you might want to check out some of the other papers/series I’ve posted.