Displaying Archive for the ‘opportunity’ Category

An empty stomach is not a good political adviser.

Connie K. Duckworth / January 12th, 2011 / posted in afghan people, business social responsibility, economic sustainability, opportunity, social change, social investment / 1 comment

An empty stomach is not a good political adviser.

– Albert Einstein

Everyone I know personally or professionally shares a singular perspective—how glad we are to see 2010 in the rear view mirror. The past two years, in fact, have been exhausting on every front—economically, politically, globally—and our collective fatigue level is high. It’s hard to run life unceasingly at DEFCON 2. At the same time, there’s an innate optimism that comes with flipping to the blank slate of a new calendar year. It refreshes our spirits, revives our energy, stiffens our resolve and restores our hope for positive change.

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Empowering Women, Empowering Their Children

admin / October 7th, 2010 / posted in afghan women, afghanistan families, economic sustainability, events, opportunity, social responsibility / no comments

With Child Health Day on Monday and U.S. National Children’s Day coming up this Sunday, October is a month dedicated to improving the lives of children in our global community.

At ARZU STUDIO HOPE, our mission is to empower women weavers in Afghanistan; and by doing so, we also strive to help their families. As the saying goes, “Educate a woman and you educate a family.” ARZU believes in this statement, with education being a main priority.

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Frugal Thinking

Connie K. Duckworth / August 23rd, 2010 / posted in business social responsibility, economic sustainability, opportunity / 1 comment

I recently read an interesting report by Booz & Company called ” The Importance of Frugal Engineering.” It cites the development process of the Tata Nano car as a case study to illustrate the imperative of this approach in designing products for the developing world. To me, the idea of “frugal” can and should be extended to the larger platform of international development. This is the vision of sustainable community development that is very different from the standard approach taken today.

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Afghan Women’s Rights Are Non-negotiable. Full Stop.

Connie K. Duckworth / July 15th, 2010 / posted in afghan women, afghanistan women, economic sustainability, opportunity / no comments

Washington’s trial balloon of “reintegrating” the Taliban raises red flags for those of us working to help Afghan women keep their seat at the table in the “new Afghanistan.” We’re worried that women will get traded away when the final deal gets cut, and we know this would be a disastrous mistake.

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What Afghans Want

Connie K. Duckworth / June 28th, 2010 / posted in afghan people, economic sustainability, opportunity, social responsibility, sustainable community / 2 comments

This week, the press has been in full “scoop” mode. Since I am not a reporter, a talking head, a think tank expert, an academic, a government employee (whether military, political or civil), or even a “vampire squid,” (although I did spend 20 years at Goldman Sachs), I am certainly insufficiently credentialed to opine on the military or political strategy of how the U.S. and ISAF are prosecuting the war in Afghanistan.

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Operation Magic Carpet Ride

Connie K. Duckworth / June 21st, 2010 / posted in afghan people, afghan women, economic sustainability, opportunity, social programs, sustainable economic development / 3 comments

If my blog has been conspicuous by its absence for the last ten days, at least I have a good excuse. I’ve been in Afghanistan – at Camp Leatherneck, Northern Helmand Province to be precise – at the invitation of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force. Needless to say, it’s been a once in a lifetime experience.

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Forced Marriage: A Crime Against Humanity

Connie K. Duckworth / June 1st, 2010 / posted in afghan women, opportunity, social change, social responsibility / no comments

Memorial Day’s New York Times article entitled “Afghan Child Brides Escape Marriage, but Not Lashes” is a graphic reminder of what’s at stake for girls and women in Afghanistan today. This is 2010 and the laws of civil society are supposed to now govern this country.

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For the Country to Work, Everday Afghans Need Work

Connie K. Duckworth / May 17th, 2010 / posted in afghan people, afghan women, economic sustainability, opportunity, social change, social programs, sustainable economic development / 1 comment

I founded ARZU STUDIO HOPE after a single visit to Afghanistan. I had no experience in the field of “International development,” no political agenda, and no special expertise. What I did have was some common sense and a firmly held point of view that a job is the universal enabler of hope for a better future. What I have come to understand is that it is also the universal equalizer in a civil society. I have come to see the right to work for one’s living as a basic human right.

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The Davos of Doing Good

Connie K. Duckworth / April 15th, 2010 / posted in events, jeff skoll, opportunity, skoll foundation, social business enterprise, social entrepreneur, sustainable economic development / no comments

In 2008, I had the extreme privilege of being inducted into the Skoll Foundation “family”, a most amazing cohort of social entrepreneurs, assembled by the visionary entrepreneur Jeff Skoll. Since then, first-hand exposure to the rock stars of social change, like Bunker Roy (www.barefootcollege.org), Wendy Kopp (www.teachforall.org), the Kielburger brothers (www.freethechildren.org) and the Kiva guys (www.kiva.org) to name only a few, is simultaneously exhilarating and incredibly humbling.

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International development is a big business — as in billions of dollars big

Connie K. Duckworth / March 12th, 2010 / posted in business social responsibility, economic sustainability, investment, opportunity, social business enterprise / 1 comment

Having worked on Wall Street for my entire career, I sure never knew where the “real money” was hiding. Most of the money for humanitarian assistance comes from the governments of developed countries. Actually, I’d guess that hundreds of billions get aimed each year at improving the lives of the citizens in developing countries around the world, by a whole cast of development organizations. Here are a just a couple of examples.

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is our federal government agency responsible for allocating and distributing American foreign aid. Its stated objective is to “extend a helping hand to those people overseas struggling to make a better life, recover from a disaster or striving to live in a free and democratic country…” In 2009, Congress appropriated about $26 billion for USAID’s handshake. Assisting in the execution of this mission are the for-profit “Beltway bandits”, the private consulting companies circling Washington, DC along Interstate 495.

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