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February 4, 2000
Ashoka Founder Discusses Social Policy Entrepreneurship
PRINCETON, NJ -- William Drayton, the founder of Ashoka: Innovators for the Public and a 1984 winner of the MacArthur "genius" fellowship, will speak on "Promoting Social Policy Entrepreneurship Worldwide" at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs on Wednesday, February 23, at 4:30 p.m. in Robertson Hall, Bowl 1.
Ashoka, founded by Drayton in 1980, is named for a third-century BC emperor of India who, guilt-stricken after a conquest, renounced violence and devoted his life to the public good. The organization identifies and supports social entrepreneurs around the world, men and women whom they describe as "practical visionaries" who have the entrepreneurial drive and skills to bring about large-scale social change. More than 1,000 Ashoka fellows in 34 countries have been named since 1981. They focus on fields such as the environment, education, health, human rights, economic development, and civic participation. The group chooses as fellows people who will, Drayton has said, leave a "scratch on history."
Before winning the grant that allowed him to found Ashoka, Drayton served as an assistant administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency under President Carter, where he designed an assortment of market-based approaches to environmental regulation, including tradable "pollution rights," which today figures largely in the Clinton administration's plan to curtail greenhouse-gas emissions. He also spent ten years at the consulting firm of McKinsey & Company, helping to retool public and private institutions.
Drayton's lecture is sponsored by the Woodrow Wilson School.