TED Blog » TED@State

A third way to think about aid: Jacqueline Novogratz on TED.com

Shanna Carpenter — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 09:54:14 +0000

The debate over foreign aid often pits those who mistrust “charity” against those who mistrust reliance on the markets. Jacqueline Novogratz proposes a middle way she calls patient capital, with promising examples of entrepreneurial innovation driving social change. (Recorded at TED@State, June 2009, at the US State Department, Washington, DC. Duration: 17:05)

Twitter URL: http://on.ted.com/3O

Watch Jacqueline Novogratz’s talk on TED.com, where you can download this TEDTalk, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances from our archive of 500+ TEDTalks.

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Let my dataset change your mindset: Hans Rosling is our 500th TEDTalk

Emily McManus — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 10:00:00 +0000

Talking at the US State Department this summer, Hans Rosling uses his fascinating data-bubble software to burst myths about the developing world. Look for new analysis on China and the post-bailout world, mixed with classic data shows.(Recorded at the US State Department, June 2009 in Washington, DC. Duration: 19:57)

Watch Hans Rosling’s talk on TED.com, where you can download this TEDTalk, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances from our archive of 500 TEDTalks.

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Stewart Brand proclaims 4 environmental 'heresies' on TED.com

Shanna Carpenter — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 10:25:54 +0000

The man who helped usher in the environmental movement in the 1960s and ’70s has been rethinking his positions on cities, nuclear power, genetic modification and geo-engineering. This talk at the US State Department is a foretaste of his major new book, sure to provoke widespread debate. (Recorded at TED@State, June 2009 at the US State Department in Washington, D.C.. Duration: 16:42)

Twitter URL: http://on.ted.com/1Y

Watch Sophal Ear’s 2009 talk on TED.com where you can download this TEDTalk, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances from our archive of 475+ TEDTalks.

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New rules for rebuilding a broken nation: Paul Collier on TED.com

Emily McManus — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 11:00:00 +0000

Long conflict can wreck a country, leaving behind poverty and chaos. But what’s the right way to help war-torn countries rebuild? At TED@State, Paul Collier explains the problems with current post-conflict aid plans, and suggests 3 ideas for a better approach. (Recorded at TED@State, at the US State Department, June 2009, in Washington, DC. Duration: 17:03)

Watch Paul Collier’s talk from TED@State on TED.com where you can download this TEDTalk, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances from our archive of 450+ TEDTalks.

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Q&A with Clay Shirky on Twitter and Iran

tedchris — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 21:30:00 +0000

NYU professor Clay Shirky gave a fantastic talk on new media during our TED@State event earlier this month. He revealed how cellphones, the web, Facebook and Twitter had changed the rules of the game, allowing ordinary citizens extraordinary new powers to impact real-world events. As protests in Iran exploded over the weekend, we decided to rush out his talk, because it could hardly be more relevant. I caught up with Clay this afternoon to get his take on the significance of what is happening. HIs excitement was palpable.

What do you make of what’s going on in Iran right now.
I’m always a little reticent to draw lessons from things still unfolding, but it seems pretty clear that … this is it. The big one. This is the first revolution that has been catapulted onto a global stage and transformed by social media. I’ve been thinking a lot about the Chicago demonstrations of 1968 where they chanted “the whole world is watching.” Really, that wasn’t true then. But this time it’s true … and people throughout the world are not only listening but responding. They’re engaging with individual participants, they’re passing on their messages to their friends, and they’re even providing detailed instructions to enable web proxies allowing Internet access that the authorities can’t immediately censor. That kind of participation is reallly extraordinary.

Which services have caused the greatest impact? Blogs? Facebook? Twitter?
It’s Twitter. One thing that Evan (Williams) and Biz (Stone) did absolutely right is that they made Twitter so simple and so open that it’s easier to integrate and harder to control than any other tool. At the time, I’m sure it wasn’t conceived as anything other than a smart engineering choice. But it’s had global consequences. Twitter is shareable and open and participatory in a way that Facebook’s model prevents. So far, despite a massive effort, the authorities have found no way to shut it down, and now there are literally thousands of people aorund the world who’ve made it their business to help keep it open.

Do you get a sense that it’s almost as if the world is figuring out live how to use Twitter in these circumstances? Some dissidents were using named accounts for a while, and there’s been a raging debate in the community about how best to help them.
Yes, there’s an enormous reckoning to be had about what works and what doesn’t. There have been disagreements over whether it was dangerous to use hashtags like #Iranelection, and there was a period in which people were openly tweeting the IP addresses of web proxies for people to switch to, not realizing that the authorities would soon shut these down. It’s incredibly messy, and the definitive rules of the game have yet to be written. So yes, we’re seeing the medium invent itself in real time.

Talk some more about the sense of participation on Twitter. It seems to me that that has spurred an entirely deeper level of emotional connection with these events.
Absolutely. I’ve been saying this for a while — as a medium gets faster, it gets more emotional. We feel faster than we think. But Twitter is also just a much more personal medium. Reading personal messages from individuals on the ground prompts a whole other sense of involvement. We’re seeing everyone desperate to do something to show solidarity like wear green — and suddenly the community figures out that it can actually offer secure web proxies, or persuade Twitter to delay an engineering upgrade — we can help keep the medium open.

When I see John Perry Barlow setting himself up as a router, he’s not performing these services as a journalist. He’s engaged. Traditional media operates as source of inofrmation not as a means of coordination. It can’t do more than make us sympathize. Twitter makes us empathize. It makes us part of it. Even if it’s just retweeting, you’re aiding the goal that dissidents have always sought: the awareness that the ouside world is paying attention is really valuable.

Of course the downside of this emotional engagement is that while this is happening, I feel like I can’t in good consicence tweet about anything else!

There was fury on Twitter against CNN for not adequately covering the situation. Was that justified?
In a way it wasn’t. I’m sure that for the majority of the country, events in Iran are not of grave interest, even if those desperate for CNN’s Iran info couldn’t get access to it. That push model of one message for all is an incredibly crappy way of linking supply and demand.

CNN has the same problem this decade that Time magazine had last decade. They simultaneously want to appeal to middle America and leading influencers. Reaching multiple audiences is increasingly difficult. The people who are hungry for info on events of global significance are used to instinctively switching on CNN. But they are realizng that that reflex doesn’t serve them very well anymore, and that can’t be good for CNN.

Do you get the sense that these new media tools are helping build a global community, forged more by technology and a desire for connection, than by traditional political or religious divides?
You can see it clearly in what’s happening right now. And it cuts both ways. The guy we’re rallying around, Mousavi, is no liberal reformer. But the principle of freedom of speech and fair elections and the desire for reform trump that.

So how does this play out?
It’s complex. The Ahmadinejad supporters are going to use the fact of English-speaking and American participation to try to damn the dissidents. But whatever happens from here, the dissidents have seen that large numbers of American people, supposedly part of “the great Satan,” are actually supporters. Someone tweeted from Tehran today that “the American media may not care, but the American people do.” That’s a sea-change.

Clay Shirky: How cellphones, Twitter, Facebook can make history

Emily McManus — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 10:00:00 +0000

While news from Iran streams to the world, Clay Shirky shows how Facebook, Twitter and TXTs help citizens in repressive regimes to report on real news, bypassing censors (however briefly). The end of top-down control of news is changing the nature of politics. (Recorded at TED@State, at the US State Department, June 2009, in Washington, DC. Duration: 17:03)

Watch Clay Shirky’s talk from TED@State on TED.com where you can download this TEDTalk, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances from our archive of 450+ TEDTalks.

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TED@State: Hans Rosling asks if your mindset corresponds with his dataset

Emily McManus — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 17:00:00 +0000

Hans Rosling is a data rock star. Pulling health and social data from worldwide collections, he uses his brilliant bubble-making software, Gapminder, to stand our preconceived notions on their heads. Watch one of his three TEDTalks (in 2006, 2007 and 2009) and get ready to re-examine everything you think you know about the developing world.

Live at TED@State, Hans mixed up some classic data shows and some new analysis — focusing on the State Department folks and other government people who made up a good chunk of the audience. He says: “Does your mindset correspond with my data set? If not, one of them needs upgrading.” And he made the clever point that, for most of us, our basic view of the world is determined by the year our teachers were born. His software (and his “solidified laser pointer,” in the photo above — Hans tends to point with anything that he’s got handy) helped to refresh our view of the first world versus the third world.

The first world is traditionally viewed as a place of small families and long lives, while the third world means large families and short lives. But as he shows, this is changing. “Life expectancy,” he says, “is about the bathroom and the kitchen. If you have soap, water & food, you can live long.” And life-expectancy data is changing in the third world. His moving data bubbles show hopeful trends in many African countries (five of which, he points out, have low Western-level rates of child mortality, an indicator of overall health). Rosling pits country against country in child health data — with surprising results for his own country, Sweden.

Rosling concludes by addressing the government employees in the audience: “Thanks to the US for taking such wonderful health data! This is US government at its best.” USAID has funded 25 continuous years of demographic research that lets us understand how the world has changed. As he puts it: “This is not the State Department, this is the World Department, and we have very high hopes for you!”

Discuss this talk and more in the comments section:

TED@State: Jacqueline Novogratz on patient capital in Pakistan

Emily McManus — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 16:40:00 +0000

Jacqueline Novogratz founded and leads Acumen Fund, a nonprofit that takes a businesslike approach to improving the lives of the poor, by investing in entrepreneurs who bring necessary goods and services — water, bread, healthcare — to communities that need it, and who would otherwise depend on traditional charity. In her new book, The Blue Sweater, she tells stories from the new philanthropy, which emphasizes sustainable bottom-up solutions over traditional top-down aid.

At TED@State, Jacqueline talks about a project in Pakistan that encapsulates what her work is about. Drip irrigation is a proven farming technology, but it’s only been available for large farms; Novogratz tells a story of how, with help from grants and then from “patient capital,” this vital tool was made available to smaller farmers.

Investments like this — which are typically unattractive to large investors because the target customers make less than a dollar a day — are the heart and soul of patient capital, allowing an entrepreneur to make something that improves people’s lives and helps them live with dignity and independence.

Discuss this idea and more in the comments …

TED@State: Paul Collier on the steps to rescuing a failed state

Emily McManus — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 16:30:00 +0000

Economist Paul Collier studies the political and economic problems of the very poorest countries: 50 societies, many in sub-Saharan Africa, that are stagnating or in decline, and taking a billion people down with them. His book The Bottom Billion identifies the four traps that keep such countries mired in poverty, and outlines ways to help them escape — a thesis he outlines in his TEDTalk from 2008.

Onstage at TED@State, Collier describes the 3 traditional principles for intervening in a failed state:

1. It’s the politics that matters — first, try to fulfill the political expectations
2. It’s a bad situation but it’s short-term
3. The exit strategy for peacekeepers: an election and a return to prosperity

And, he says, this approach denies reality. Doing good politics is infinitely easier in a climate of prosperity. An agenda of inclusion is key to rebuilding a failed state. But if the object of repairing a state is to hold elections, you create a group of outsiders — the people who lost.

What are the 3 keys to rebuilding a failed state? Jobs, health, clean government.

Most important: jobs, and especially jobs for young men. Because young men need something to do or they create more conflict. How to employ them? Focus on the construction industry -– an industry not subject to foreign competition, and employing lots of young men.

Rebuilding basic services: Too often, in a postconflict nation, all resources for health services go directly to NGOs –- which doesn’t help rebuild the nation from the inside. Instead, help the country develop independent service authorities with standards of accountability for NGOs, to “co-brand” services with gorvernment and NGOs together.

Clean government: A typical postconflict government is out of money. It needs money just to exist. It’s vital to have accountancy and openness to remove the temptation to steal and cheat.

Discuss these ideas and more in the comments below:

TED@State: Loving Zap Mama!

Emily McManus — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 15:59:00 +0000

Zap Mama — a musical entity centered around the gorgeous voice of Marie Daulne — walked regally onstage, just three women and three microphones (and three exercise balls). Looping their voices, they wove their vocal lines into a web of mysteriously cool sound. Echoing and repeating, these three voices contained multitudes.

Zap Mama’s new album, ReCreation, came out just last week. It’s the sixth album for Zap Mama, and the third in its current incarnation as a project for Marie Daulne and an array of collaborators. Watch the video below for the new single, “Hello to Mama” — filmed in Mali, and released in support of mothers around the world. (If you download the single from iTunes, a portion of the cost will be donated to CARE, an organization that fights against maternal mortality.)

Or download the bonus single from iTunes, “ReCreation.”