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Click here to subscribe to the monthly FLOW newsletter.
Our highlight this month is our Working for Good curriculum, videoconference/webcast,
and business plan contest. The curriculum, a 76 page document
which is available to anyone for study or pleasure, may be downloaded
from our website. Anyone can watch the teleconferences live on
May 2nd, 3rd, and 4th, at 10 a.m. EST. And they will be available
via online streaming for several months through a link from our
website. It should be a fascinating exchange.
Global Nomads Group, which has produced videoconferences for 15
years, is dedicated to “fostering dialogue and understanding
among the world’s youth.” The Working for Good program is designed
to
put specific content in that dialogue by focusing on “liberating
the entrepreneurial spirit for good.” We intend to use the Working
for Good curriculum going forward as the foundation for introducing
young people around the world to the positive power of personal
commitment to excellence and service, entrepreneurial endeavors,
and a society that is supportive of excellence, service, and
entrepreneurship.
We are also planning future videoconferences based on specific
FLOW curricula. These videoconferences may be broadcast, webcast
and streamed, thus providing a visual media introduction to
FLOW concepts, and each one will be tied to a written curriculum
that
guides participants to a deeper understanding of FLOW principles.
Because world peace must be at the top of everyone’s agenda
for the future, our next focus will be on the development
of a deep
foundation for peace through prosperity and commerce. Although
the democratic peace is important, recent research by Erik
Gartzke of Columbia shows that economic freedom is fifty
times more
effective than democracy at reducing violent conflict. Meanwhile
the public,
and the peace movement, are entirely unaware of this finding.
FLOW’s first specific mission, therefore, is to broaden
awareness of this finding. The more of us who understand the foundations
for peace in economic freedom, the more effectively we can
work together to create a lasting global peace.
The five components of economic freedom, as measured by
the Fraser Institute Index (on which Gartzke’s research
was based),
are:
- Size of Government: Expenditures, Taxes, and Enterprises
- Legal Structure and Security of Property Rights
- Access to Sound Money
- Freedom to Trade Internationally
- Regulation of Credit, Labor, and Business
Most of the subcomponents on which these measures are
based use objective statistics in the Fraser Index,
which is why
we prefer
their economic freedom index to the more subjective
WSJ/Heritage economic freedom index. The Fraser Index was
developed by Milton Friedman and other free market economists
in
an effort
to formulate
precise, objective criteria for economic freedom.
Most people are unaware that the developing world
is poor and prone to war because they are economically
un-free.
There is
an increasingly robust body of research correlating
economic freedom
with peace, prosperity, and well-being around the
world
as measured by income per capita, investment per
capita, adult
literacy,
infant mortality, child labor, healthy water, low
corruption, civil liberties,
political stability, etc.
Although Scandinavian countries are often considered
to be “socialistic,” it turns out that they are
among the
most highly
ranked nations
on the Fraser Economic Freedom Index. The Anglosphere
nations (including Hong Kong and Singapore) rank
more highly, as
do the UAE and Oman, but no other developing world
nations do.
If each
nation in Africa, Asia, and Latin America became
as free market as Scandinavia, we would have a
far more
peaceful,
prosperous,
and happy world.
I encourage you to read the Working for Good materials
and watch the webcasts both for their intrinsic
merits and as
a prototype
of future programs. Working for Good outlines
a personal ethos that will help people in the
developed
world
be happier and
more effective. That same personal ethos, in
combination with economic
freedom, will provide a foundation for global
peace and prosperity.
Our Member Platform this month is written by
Jeff Klein, FLOW Executive Director and Chief
Activation
Officer,
and producer
of Working for Good. The piece, entitled “Liberating
the Entrepreneurial Spirit for Good,” is adapted
from the
Working for Good curriculum.
FLOW members and friends in New York can join
Jeff at Susan Neiderhoffer’s next FLOW gathering
on Thursday
May 4th.
Also on our home page is a piece I recently
wrote entitled “A Tale of Two Idealists,”
which I will
let speak for
itself.
FLOW is a complex and ambitious project;
the implications of liberating the entrepreneurial
spirit for good
are as diverse and multifarious
as human nature itself. In order to help
people
get a handle on this delightful and surprising
world we
are
thus starting
with
a personal ethos, and moving directly
to a specific strategy for creating lasting
peace.
In closing, we would like to congratulate
our friends Ingrid Vanderveldt and Lyn
Graft of
IVEEA Productions
on the launch
of “American
Made,” CNBC’s the first original prime
time program. The program, hosted by
Ingrid, celebrates American
business leaders and
the American Dream. FLOW co-founder
and CEO of Whole Foods,
John
Mackey will be featured in an upcoming
episode.
The program airs Mondays
at 8:00 and 11:00 pm EDT.
Please forward this newsletter and any
other FLOW materials to your friends,
of all walks
of life,
cultures, and
political persuasions,
and let us know what responses you
get. We believe that there is a positive
future to
be created,
and we want
as many partners
as we can get in creating that future.
Keep working for good,
Michael Strong, CEO & Chief Visionary Officer
P.S. FLOW is above all a forum of free exchange for its members in the quest
for sustainable peace, prosperity, and happiness. We welcome your
feedback to the content of this newsletter and all FLOW activities
and publications. Please send your thoughts to contact@flowidealism.org.
P.P.S. Please join one of our five themed discussion groups, and participate
in our active and growing community, at www.flowrealism.org or www.flowidealism.org (FLOW, where idealism and realism both lead to the same place).
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JOIN FLOW to
"Criticize
by
Creating"
~Michelangelo
Would you like to join us to liberate
the entrepreneurial spirit for good?
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