Changemaking Networks Book
In the first network effects playbook for social entrepreneurs, Ashoka Board Member, Sushmita Ghosh, presents the five core principles and accompanying strategies for harnessing changemaking network effects. Sushmita distilled these conclusions from extensive interviews with Ashoka Fellows who have pioneered global Changemaking Networks. These networks have successfully orchestrated the coming together of several systems, their players, and concerned citizens to serve positive social change goals—such as “Zero Homelessness,” “Health Care Without Harm,” and “Holding Power to Account”—harnessing changemaking network effects.
Ashoka is delighted to share a must-read for every social sector organisation, company, funding agency, student, or concerned citizen who cares about a new way of organizing mass changemaking to outsmart and outpace the world’s biggest problems.
Exploring and designing strategies to activate changemaking network effects, so many more people participate and contribute to your vision to reach exponential impact, is one of the three pillars of ASPIRe, along with platform thinking and open-source technology.
ASPIRe team members Maria Zapata and Ira Snissar have been working closely with Sushmita over the past two years to co-power the book, and in this process, ASPIRe has been a very important source of learnings, insights and inspiration for all of them.
Written for action-takers, it leaves every reader with a clear sense of how to get started on building Changemaking Networks. Today.
Leveraging Platforms
for the Good of All
We conducted research on 14 cutting edge platforms for the good of all led by Ashoka Fellows around the world in key sectors, such as education, health and finance. After a thorough research of their models and a series of in-depth interviews with these Fellows, the paper "Leveraging platforms for the good of all" unveils learnings and patterns that are summarized in nine key design principles that define how platforms for good behave.
It is important to keep in mind that a platform is an entire approach and isn´t just a mobile app or a website; it is a holistic model that creates impact by facilitating exchanges of value between two or more interdependent groups.
ASPIRE FIELDBOOK
The ASPIRe Fieldbook is a guide to leveraging platforms for impact at scale. It has been written for social innovators interested in exploring how to build platforms for system change.
We have seen that when designed and governed deliberately for ‘the good of all,’ platforms hold a powerful promise for activating agency on a large scale and advancing an ‘Everyone a Changemaker’ world: one that responds quickly and effectively to social challenges, and where each individual has the freedom, confidence and societal support to address any social problem and self-identify as a driver of change.
FOSS HANDBOOK
Explore the FOSS Handbook, a valuable resource that features a curated collection of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) solutions for social sector. Originally created by the collaborative efforts of the ASPIRe team and its partners for the OASIS Summit in Bangalore on September 14th, 2023, this handbook will be useful for non-profits seeking user-friendly, easily deployable tools.