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Blue Sweater

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The Blue Sweater: Bridging the gap between rich and poor in an interconnected world
By Jacqueline Novogratz
Published by Harper Collins
Pages: 314, $14

Jacqueline Novogratz is an American woman with a dream to ‘change the world’. In this book she engagingly narrates the story of her life from the time she began working in Africa to the success of the Acumen fund, a charity that she established.
(Novogratz, 2011, Pg 298) ‘Solutions to poverty must be driven by discipline, accountability, and market strength, not easy sentimentality - many of the answers to poverty lie in the space between the market and charity’.
In a world where (Koga,2013) charity means giving money away to the poor, Novogratz addresses the reason many of the traditional charities have been unable to completely eliminate poverty. Her idea is to bring about a more sustainable change by using what Novogratz(2011) calls ‘Patient capital’. (Anderson, 2011)This concept was later chosen by Forbes as one of the most powerful ideas of the year 2011. (Novogratz, 2011) In the first few days of her arrival in Africa, Novogratz is plagued by resistance both to her American-ness and the changes that she suggests. After numerous struggles, her tremendous resilience finally gains her acceptance in a microfinance start-up, Duterimbere. In the fledgling organization a lot is learned through trial and error and her passion for work shines through, even during the many challenges thrown at her. Here, for the first time she experiences the widespread corruption prevalent in third world economies and its effects on people.
(Novogratz, 2011)Her work in Duterimbere and the bakery touches upon the important concept of financially independent women in a patriarchal society. One of the most notable threads is where they make the decision to charge the local women interest on loans and treat them as customers as opposed to charity cases. Here, you see the beginning of a logical approach used later in Acumen where the beneficiaries are given the tools and the responsibility to control their lives.
(Novogratz,2011)The book does digress some when talking about the Rwandan genocide, but her conversations with both the victims and the accused make a gripping part of the story. The heart rending plight of the people makes you question why people do what they do and the ability of the Rwandan economy to bounce back as demonstrated by success of individual people is astounding.
In the last part, she talks about the origination of the Acumen Fund and its work in different countries. Here we are introduced to the concept ‘patient capital’ which according to Novogratz(2011) is ‘an approach to investing that recognizes the difficulty and time it takes to build sustainable, affordable, scalable solutions to poverty’. Using Acumen she hopes to bring an improvement in the society by leveraging the power of markets.
(Coster, 2011)Time and again in the book, Novogratz has emphasized the use of data in the assessment of the viability and success of projects. Through this you learn the importance of listening to the people involved directly and their feedback. The unique concept of measuring the success of the organization in terms of the impact it has on the society seems precise for its role as a charity. But this is very challenging as there are a multitude of other factors that could impact the social change that is being targeted, making it a difficult scale of measure.
Her descriptions of people and places are almost romantic in their viewpoint, which is often in sharp contrast to the reality that they face. (Novogratz,2011)The success story of the poor sunflower farmer in India who was provided irrigation touched me personally because of my agriculture background.
The book is a crossover between a memoir and a primer on third world economy. While this makes it easy to understand and an interesting read, there is some superfluous personal information that could have been replaced by more relevant details on the success of Acumen.
This captivating narrative is by no means perfect, but it gives us plenty of food for thought. Novogratz has taught the world the possibility of a whole new approach to charity. She has taught me that sometimes a single decision is all it takes to follow your dreams. At the end of the book you realize that her story - a ‘regular’ woman impacting lives all over the world, is a better example of an interconnected world than the story of the Blue sweater. (742 words)

Reference 1. Anderson.C, 2011, Christian Anderson: The Year’s 7 Most Powerful ideas, Forbes, Retrieved from: http://www.forbes.com/sites/nicoleperlroth/2011/11/02/chris-anderson-the-worlds-7-most-powerful-ideas/ 2. Coster.H, 2011, Can Venture Capital save the world, Forbes, Retrieved from: http://www.forbes.com/sites/helencoster/2011/11/30/novogratz/ 3. Face Value – The Patient Capitalist ,2009, The Economist, Retrieved from: http://www.economist.com/node/13692513 4. Farrel.M, 2009, Saving the world one loan at a time, Forbes, Retrieved from: http://www.forbes.com/2009/03/25/economic-development-africa-opinions-book-review-microfinance-philanthropy.html 5. Gonnerman.A, 2012, Book Review: The Blue Sweater, Retrieved from: http://www.adamgonnerman.com/2012/02/book-review-blue-sweater.html#ixzz39MlbrkQx 6. Koga.K, 2013, Cash to the poor – Pennies from heaven, The Economist, Retrieved from: http://www.economist.com/news/international/21588385-giving-money-directly-poor-people-works-surprisingly-well-it-cannot-deal 7. Novogratz.J, 2011, The Blue Sweater – Bridging the gap between rich and poor in an interconnected world, United States: HarperCollins. 8. Walter.H, 2009, Philanthropy and Development in Emerging markets, Bloomberg Businessweek - Innovation & Design, Retrived from: http://www.businessweek.com/stories/2009-03-02/philanthropy-and-development-in-emerging-marketsbusinessweek-business-news-stock-market-and-financial-advice

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