The End of Foreign Aid as We Know It: The Profitable Alleviation of Poverty in A Globalized Economy

This chapter defends the following thesis: Poverty can be alleviated, if not eradicated, both locally and globally, but only if we change our narratives about global free enterprise and only if we rethink our mindsets regarding how poverty issues are is most effectively addressed. The chapter begins with an overview of the current state of the economic landscape with particular focus on – and criticism of –the failures of strategies employed since the middle of the last century. We then explore how a transfer of roles and responsibilities for global poverty from these traditional development practices to innovative, private, for-profit organizations will result in appropriate incentives, stakeholder interest maximization and the potential for the eradication of both poverty and the unfulfilled needs of the abject poor. We exemplify the power of the for-profit model through case studies based on both actual experiences and economic assumptions, as discussed in the chapter.