“The pursuit of private financial gain is what drives inequality and ecological harm.”
This is the perspective of Jennifer Hinton, a leading proponent of the not-for-profit business, which is differs in fundamental ways from a traditional nonprofit organization and, of course, from for-profit businesses. Not-for-profit businesses models are often invisible in the many movements to reimagine our economic system, but the idea is starting to gain momentum.
Jennifer offers a vision of an entirely not-for-profit economy made up exclusively of not-for-profit businesses that de-emphasize profit and growth and instead prioritize businesses as a means for social and environmental benefit.
Together we look at examples and operating principles of this model, we explore how it navigates the capitalism/socialism binary, and we ask what conditions would be necessary for this model to truly offer a bridge to a post-growth, post-capitalist world.
Dr. Jennifer Hinton is a systems researcher, activist, and ecological economist who is a Senior Fellow at the Schumacher Institute and the author of two books: How on Earth: Flourishing in a Not-for-Profit World by 2050 (https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1902/1902.01398.pdf), co-authored with Donnie Maclurcan of the Post-Growth Institute, and Relationship-to-Profit: A Theory of Business, Markets, and Profit for Social Ecological Economics (https://www.researchgate.net/publication/348742711_Relationship-to-Profit_A_Theory_of_Business_Markets_and_Profit_for_Social_Ecological_Economics)
Thanks to Between Friends for the intermission music. Upstream theme music was composed by Robert.
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