GDI was born to build – but we, along with over 400 other social agitators who signed an open letter to President Trump, believe in building bridges, not walls. Last week, GDI Founder + CEO Andrew Stern signed the letter on behalf of GDI. The full text is below. Dear President Trump, As leaders who […]
“Small Merchants, Big Opportunity: The Forgotten Path to Financial Inclusion” – a new report commissioned by Visa and authored by Dalberg and the Global Development Incubator – explores how micro and small merchants represent both a path to financial inclusion, as well as a huge commercial opportunity for financial service providers. Drawing on conversations with […]
GDI was pleased to be joined on stage by President Bill Clinton and representatives from some of our 20 cross-sectoral partners as we made a Commitment to Action with mhNOW, an initiative to engage 30 cities by 2030 to close the mental health gap, at the Clinton Global Initiative Annual Meeting. Read the press release below […]
As an incubator, GDI strives to ensure our initiatives are always working toward defined endgames. For some initiatives, this journey involves ‘exiting’ GDI after 24-36 months of partnership. We believe the focus on exits makes us more accountable to our funders and partners to help build initiatives that are sustainable beyond the first three stages of our […]
Princeton’s Innovation for Successful Societies verified the success of the Liberia President’s Young Professionals Program in a recent report from their independent evaluation of the program. The case study tells the story of a newly-democratic country without a capable civil service. An excerpt is below: In 2005, when Ellen Johnson Sirleaf became Liberia’s first democratically elected post-conflict […]
What is blended finance? Convergence CEO Joan Larrea admits she didn’t always know, and many others don’t either. When I meet counterparts from development banks, philanthropic institutions, and the private sector, I find there’s still confusion about what exactly blended finance is. Where does it fit in the landscape of impact investing? How does it […]
The number of multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSIs) in the social impact space has increased dramatically over the past few decades. Known by many names—including coalitions, public-private partnerships, and alliances—these types of organizations naturally appeal to those seeking transformative change. They offer a powerful model to solve increasingly complex global development problems, particularly because they bring together […]
Building on our report “More than the Sum of Its Parts: Making MSIs Work,” GDI urges funders and founders to remember the question of “whether” is just as important as “how” when thinking about launching a multi-stakeholder initiative for social impact. Click the link below to read the full article. Source: Stanford Social Innovation Review […]
“Private investors do not typically fund the construction of rural roads in Africa, say, or vaccination drives in villages, even though the returns on such investments are often enormous. That is because the returns are either hard to monetise, or the risks are too great for the private sector to tolerate. The point of blended […]
Tendrel, a new global professional association for entrepreneurs committed to social impact, launched this week at the Skoll World Forum. GDI has incubated Tendrel since fall 2015, providing strategic expertise, helping build core operational infrastructure, and formulating the organization’s initial branding, positioning, and communications strategy. A a member-driven organization, Tendrel gathers entrepreneurs in local peer groups, or […]
