Hot! Latest Newsletter!

CatComm's latest newsletter is hot off the press!!

Feel free to use this as a tool in getting the word out about CatComm. In particular, I included a letter that explains the urgency of the PledgeBank pledge in meeting our needs so that CatComm can continue to develop in 2006 and beyond. See posting "A Letter to the CatComm Community" from earlier today. Make sure to share this letter within the context of the newsletter itself, which hightlights our work and achievements since September 2000.

Check out the PDF newsletter.

Michael Herman blogs the Pledge

Michael Herman has just blogged our Pledge here. Michael works as executive facilitator, consultant, coach, and colleague, in meetings, markets and movements, in groups, organizations and communities -- to get the most important things done, in the easiest possible ways.

Here's what he wrote:

Support CatComm at PledgeBank

SmallChangeNews

PledgeBank is doing this year, in grand style, much of what a number of us have been working on since last year, in small ways, as SmallChangeNews. Theresa Williamson, an Omidyar Network friend and colleague has posted this there:

“I will set up a $10 monthly donation to CatComm (or $120 annually) but only if 399 other people will too, and only if one philanthropist will match our joint donations dollar for dollar.” — Theresa Williamson, Founder and Executive Director

Deadline to sign up by: 31st December 2005 So far… 39 people have signed up, 360 more needed

Meeting this pledge will make CatComm permanently sustainable! It’s as simple as $10 a month! Catalytic Communities’ mission is to develop, inspire and empower a global network of communities generating and sharing solutions.

CatComm connects communities through spaces both physical and virtual. The “Casa,” our model networking hub in Rio de Janeiro offers a space for face-to-face events and Web access for community leaders across that metro region, while our Community Solutions Database and other online tools make searchable, detailed, community-generated solutions to everyday challenges available across languages and borders.

Theresa and CatComm are doing some really fantastic work in Rio. We could use more of her model up here in the States and elsewhere around the world. This funding will help make that possible. Please support CatComm as you are able!

- Michael Herman

A Letter to the CatComm Community

This letter, explaining the importance of the PledgeBank initiative, has just been published in CatComm's latest newsletter. I thought it was important to post it here, too, so those debating whether to support the organization get a sense of the present urgency:

Dear Friends,

Catalytic Communities has come a long way over these past five years. As the only organization working actively to build a global network of grassroots community leaders, hundreds of community groups now depend on us to bring them together, to facilitate their learning through peer networks across borders.

But a nonprofit organization is not an easy thing to sustain, especially in trying times when there are so many vital demands on our philanthropic monies, when urgent catastrophes tug at our heartstrings.

That is why I am calling on you now. Catalytic Communities finds itself today at its most fragile moment in five years. This is ironic given the exciting position we are currently in, the reputation we have built, the brilliant team we now have to take the work forward, the planning process we have just completed for three years of promising work to come…

But it is the current reality: if CatComm does not receive US$96,000 in pledges by year’s end to cover its basic costs in 2006, we will have to reduce our current programs, compromising much of what we have built over the past five years.

For this reason we have launched the PledgeBank challenge, to bring realizing this year-end goal within the reach of our current network of supporters and collaborators. If 399 people join us in committing to a $10 monthly donation at www.pledgebank.com/catcomm by December 31st, our work will be able to continue throughout 2006, and beyond.

I hope to greet you with a heartfelt **thank you** message on January 1st, that together, we have done it! Please help us meet the Pledge.

Sincerely,

Theresa Williamson
Executive Director

What Patrick said...

Patrick Donohue, founder of BRINQ (www.brinq.com), sent out the following message to his network in support of the CatComm Pledge...

To see his original message, click here: http://www.brinq.com/news/CatCommPledge.html

Here is the full text of Patrick's message:

Dear Kady,

I want to share with you an opportunity to support an organization I really believe in and one that I think you would find worth supporting as well.

Over the last year-and-half my work has taken me deep into low-income communities in Kenya and Brazil, developing business models to combat poverty while enabling huge new markets and opportunities. One key lesson we’ve experienced is that often it’s the small and passionate organizations that are creating the greatest results. Catalytic Communities (CatComm), in Rio de Janeiro, is one such organization, employing an innovative model to combat the problems of poverty in the developing world.

Catalytic Communities is organized around the belief that for every problem a community faces there exist other communities throughout the world experiencing similar challenges, many who have come up with solutions to such problems on their own. CatComm therefore focuses on creating a new type of community: a global network of community leaders generating and exchanging local solutions, both via CatComm’s physical spaces in Brazil and its virtual spaces (http://www.catcomm.org/, http://www.comcat.org/, www.ComCatz.org)

I discovered Catalytic Communities after a chance encounter last year with their founder, Theresa Williamson. I was so inspired by what CatComm was doing in Brazil that I convinced the World Resources Institute to fund a teaching study of the organization, which will be taught at business schools to demonstrate the power and challenges of locally grown solutions. Catalytic Communities just celebrated its 5th birthday and is now seeking to be replicated throughout Latin America and around the world. Support from people like you and I can enable it to grow its world-changing network and enable thousands of communities to become self-sustaining partners in the world. If we and 399 others make this commitment, CatComm’s annual budget will be met in 2006, and that’s giving as little $10 a month.

"I will set up a $10 monthly donation to CatComm (or $120 annually) but only if 399 other people will too, and only if one philanthropist will match our joint donations dollar for dollar."
— Patrick Donohue

Deadline to sign up by: 31st December 2005Join us in empowering a global network ofcommunity solutions!

JOIN THIS PLEDGEat http://www.PledgeBank.com/catcomm/

At the same time, by joining this pledge, you will help launch PledgeBank.com in the USA. PledgeBank was launched earlier this year in the UK, and much like Catalytic Communities, PledgeBank leverages the power of networks to create change, revolutionizing the ability of civil society to organize itself around common goals You can learn more about PledgeBank at http://www.PledgeBank.com/

Please pass this message on to your friends, sharing with them what gets you excited about Catalytic Communities. Also if you are ever in Rio de Janeiro, I highly recommend visiting Catalytic Communities community hub in downtown Rio. Through CatComm I've experienced some incredible parts of Brazil I never would have seen otherwise.

All the best,
Patrick


“Everybody knows the proverb about how it’s better to teach a man to fish than just to give him a fish, but there’s a step beyond that: it’s better that a man’s neighbor is the one teaching him to fish, his peer. If some expert swoops in from afar you miss half the value of the interaction because of the inequality in that relationship. But if it’s his peer teaching him? Then the man is much more likely to offer something in return. You are much more likely to create a real sustainable relationship rather than just a new dependency.” – Theresa Williamson, Founder, Catalytic Communities

To read two articles we've written about Catalytic Communities see:
Side Effects - A Day in the Community http://www.BRINQ.com/workshop/archives/2005/09/20/side-effects-a-day-in-the-community/
Learning to Swim - Back in Brazil http://www.BRINQ.com/workshop/archives/2005/09/03/learning-to-swim/

JOIN THIS PLEDGE at http://www.PledgeBank.com/catcomm/

Tell Your Friends

Here are some ideas of what you can tell your friends about CatComm when you encourage them to sign the Pledge!

ABOUT CATCOMM

From our 3-Year Plan Executive Summary:

Tailored solutions exist, isolated in communities across the globe, for virtually any mentionable social or environmental challenge. Community sewerage systems, housing programs, HIV prevention initiatives, actions for democracy, day care, religious tolerance, and forest preservation are but a few of the projects one may stumble upon in some of the lowest-income communities in the world, all organized by local residents. Yet these initiatives struggle to survive for lack of visibility and support. And others who could be inspired by them have no idea that they exist.

It is for these reasons that Catalytic Communities (CatComm) was founded in 2000: to develop, inspire and empower a global network of communities generating and sharing solutions. Communities generate solutions all around us. But these efforts have never before been networked and publicized, nor have their protagonists had widespread access to one another, broader visibility, or tools and resources that can support them.

CatComm provides a unique new approach to community empowerment. By developing physical and virtual spaces for community exchange, we are creating for the first time in history the basic infrastructure that allows communities to share solutions across borders. The "Casa," our model networking hub in Rio de Janeiro offers a space for face-to-face events and Web access for community leaders across that metro region, while our Community Solutions Database and other online tools (http://www.catcomm.org/) make searchable, detailed, community-generated solutions to everyday challenges available across languages and borders. Our full website is now available in English, Spanish and Portuguese.

When we began, a decision was made to develop CatComm during a slow and thoughtful “proof of concept” period working closely with local leaders. Rio de Janeiro was chosen as the pilot city. From its inception in late 2000 through the end of 2004, close relationships and trust were built with local leaders and needs were assessed. The importance of physical space and face-to-face interactions among community leaders, along with Web-based tools and spaces, was made clear. During this period CatComm became a reference in Rio de Janeiro among local leaders, and the organization’s network grew to well over 1100 by word-of-mouth.

Today, our website has grown to include over 100 thoroughly detailed community projects from eight countries, with an equal number of positive success stories relayed to us by community organizers making use of CatComm’s networking spaces: the Casa and website. Over 11,000 visitors come to our site each month.

Some quotes from friends:

Patrick Donohue explains: "Catalytic Communities is organized around the belief that for every problem a community faces there exist other communities throughout the world experiencing similar challenges, many who have come up with solutions to such problems on their own. CatComm therefore focuses on creating a new type of community: a global network of community leaders generating and exchanging local solutions, both via CatComm’s physical spaces in Brazil and its virtual spaces (http://www.catcomm.org/, http://www.comcat.org/, http://www.comcatz.org/)...

'Everybody knows the proverb about how it’s better to teach a man to fish than just to give him a fish, but there’s a step beyond that: it’s better that a man’s neighbor is the one teaching him to fish, his peer. If some expert swoops in from afar you miss half the value of the interaction because of the inequality in that relationship. But if it’s his peer teaching him? Then the man is much more likely to offer something in return. You are much more likely to create a real living relationship rather than just a new dependency.'"

RESULTS

• In Rio de Janeiro alone, Catalytic Communities has documented over 80 community initiatives, from the manufacturing of ecological bricks and couches made of plastic bottles, to community sewerage and housing programs. We've found communities that peacefully rid themselves of drug traffickers, and communities that avoid them from the get go. Community soup kitchens, daycare centers, and cultural preservation initiatives. After school sports, theatre groups, and fieldtrip programs...
• Today CatComm supports over 500 community leaders from 72 neighborhoods in Rio de Janeiro at its Casa and, through its website, some 11,000 unique visitors monthly from 65 countries, that learn from the 110 community programs now listed in the organization's unique Community Solutions Database. Look where we've come in 5 years! Imagine where we'll be in 5 more!
• More importantly, community groups from Rio's favelas and African communities have shared with us over 100 successes they have experienced thanks to their participation in this vibrant and growing network! To view these success stories, click here.

A Message to Current Supporters

Dear CatComm Supporters,

As you know, Catalytic Communities cares about the way it raises funds. We are constantly developing new strategies for achieving financial sustainability while meeting our mission. PledgeBank, a new initiative launched in the UK earlier this year and which we are helping launch in the US, offers an amazing new opportunity for us to leverage our networks. There are three ways in which you -- our supporters -- are in a special position to help:

1. Confirm your commitment to Catalytic Communities by signing the PledgeBank pledge. Many of you are Sustaining Partners or regular investors in CatComm. You may even be committed to us at more than a $10 monthly or $120 annual level. All the more reason to sign the pledge! You will simply be confirming what you already plan to do! This is particularly vital in helping the Pledge "catch on fire!" Once we have the first 100 signers -- many of whom will be current supporters simply recommitting themselves -- the sooner we can outreach to broader networks through a PR campaign. To sign the Pledge, visit www.pledgebank.com/catcomm
2. Leverage your networks of contacts in support of CatComm! Do as Patrick Donohue did, and prepare your own mailing to 10-20 close friends asking them to join in this important effort. Tell them: for the price of a few gallons of gas each month, they will be ensuring that Catalytic Communities can expand its efforts in 2006. To view Patrick's sample email, click here.
3. Visit the Campaign Countdown Blog at http://catalyticcommunities.blogspot.com and leave comments testifying to your excitement and belief in CatComm's approach to development and social change!

Social Edge Plugs our Pledge

Shortly after we launched the PledgeBank pledge today, Social Edge, the Skoll Foundation's site for social entrepreneurs, posted the following:

How a Brazilian Social Entrepreneur is Raising Funds.
Theresa Williamson, founder and executive director of Catalytic Communities, set up a $10 monthly donation on PledgeBank to make her Rio de Janeiro-based organization permanently sustainable. The twist: "I will do it only if 399 other people do it, too, and only if one philanthropist matches our joint donations dollar for dollar." More than 20 people have already signed up. Visit PledgeBank to find out more.

Pledge Launch!

Dear Friends,

We are writing to ask you to lend a hand to our efforts this holiday season. You can make your simple commitment here www.pledgebank.com/catcomm and read on for more details.

As Thanksgiving approaches, most of us reading this message have a lot to be thankful for. We have a cosy bed awaiting us at night, more than enough nutritious food on our tables, friends and family we can count on. We also know that in places, some far away and some not so far, there are people who go without these necessary treasures.

But what we often overlook is that in those same places where people are in need of basic necessities, there are others with solutions. In Rio de Janeiro alone, Catalytic Communities has documented over 80 community initiatives, from the manufacturing of ecological bricks and couches made of plastic bottles, to community sewerage and housing programs. We've found communities that peacefully rid themselves of drug traffickers, and communities that avoid them from the get go. Community soup kitchens, daycare centers, and cultural preservation initiatives. After school sports, theatre groups, and fieldtrip programs...

We are now writing to ask you to sign a pledge this Thanksgiving, a pledge to sustain an organization that has for five years been undertaking a significant task: networking and bringing visibility to community efforts around the world, efforts that work, efforts that are normally ignored and undervalued, at the grassroots level. We are asking people for a simple pledge of $10 a month. By reaching out to 400 friends and supporters, we'll ensure CatComm's core 2006 budget! Join the 23 others that have already signed the pledge!

For the price of a few gallons of gas each month, you will be ensuring that Catalytic Communities can expand these efforts in 2006. Today CatComm supports over 500 community leaders from 72 neighborhoods in Rio de Janeiro at its Casa and, through its website, some 11,000 unique visitors monthly from 65 countries, that learn from the 110 community programs now listed in the organization's unique Community Solutions Database. Look where we've come in 5 years! Imagine where we'll be in 5 more!

Rather than tell communities how to organize, Catalytic Communities was founded to create the basic infrastructure so that communities could share -- across borders within a region, and across the planet. But sustaining this work takes effort: it will take your commitment.

This is the place: www.pledgebank.com/catcomm.

Read the latest article about the CatComm Pledge on NextBillion.net.

We can't wait to see your beautiful names at www.pledgebank.com/catcomm! After December 31st the Pledge will be deemed inactive. We hope to be greeting you with a fabulous New Year's message on January 1st, that the pledge has been met! We need 400 signers until then, so help us get the word out! We will contact you in the New Year with various options to facilitate your donation process, including options of donating monthly and also up front.

Sincerely,

Theresa Williamson, Mike Crum, Patrick Donohue, Jean Russell, and Shirley Salmeron

Please note:

• If you already support CatComm, please consider confirming your 2006 commitment by signing the pledge.
• Committed supporters interested in leveraging their networks in support of this campaign, click here for a page we've created with support materials. You can view our complete 3-Year Plan here, also.
• This Pledge is valid through December 31st, 2005. If we do not get the full 400 signatures by then, the pledge will be deemed inactive.
  

If you would like to UNSUBSCRIBE from this list, please do not click on unsubscribe below. Instead, email unsubscribe@catcomm.org with the message "unsubscribe" in the subject line. Thank you!

Catalytic Communities is a 501[c][3] tax exempt not-for-profit organization.

email: theresa@catcomm.org

phone: 202-318-3223

web: www.catcomm.org

NextBillion.net - The Power of Peer Networks

In an article on the Power of Peer Networks, Patrick Donohue, founder of BRINQ, discusses the promise and potential of CatComm's use of PledgeBank, a UK organization, to launch its year-end funding drive, by leveraging networks. Published in NextBillion.net, a site of the World Resources Institute, the article has been reposted here:

The Power of Peer Networks - Individuals vs. Scale

About CatComm, PledgeBank and replication vs. scale.

“Everybody knows the proverb about how it’s better to teach a man to fish than just to give him a fish, but there’s a step beyond that: it’s better that a man’s neighbor is the one teaching him to fish, his peer. If some expert swoops in from afar you miss half the value of the interaction because of the inequality in that relationship. But if it’s his peer teaching him? Then the man is much more likely to offer something in return. You are much more likely to create a real sustainable relationship rather than just a new dependency.” – Theresa Williamson, Founder, Catalytic Communities

Can individuals change the world? It's all a matter of leverage...

At BRINQ we've been exploring the creation of peer networks for local innovators in the Base of the Pyramid, particularly for innovation in toys and all things play! And although we've already written a number of recent articles about them, we thought it was a good moment to again bring up our friends in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, who exemplify the power of peer networks. Those friends of course are the folks at Catalytic Communities (CatComm) , who we recently entered into a partnership with to help fundraise and expand their local world-changing network globally.

Why our intense interest in Catalytic Communities? Raw admiration for their work aside, we're just heeding the advice of Njeri Muhia, an economics professor at Egerton University in Njoro, Kenya who mentored us on participatory methods for development. Njeri told us, "Instead of trying to build entirely new infrastructure in poor communities, first try doing something new with existing capacity and groups." In Brazil, Catalytic Communities has already built a powerful peer network of community leaders and innovators drawn from amongst Rio de Janeiro's 750 squatter communities (favelas) and such a resource provides huge opportunities to new ventures like ours. In fact, through our work on the Base of the Pyramid Protocol, we found that networks like CatComm's are invaluable in seeking out new opportunities for business and development.

Then there's PledgeBank, a UK based organization launched earlier this year that also leverages the power of peer networks. Pledges made at PledgeBank.com can be anything from fundraising for your favorite cause, volunteering at a local charity, to finally kicking that nasty nicotine habit. The key is that PledgeBank pledges go into effect only after you recruit enough of your peers to make the same promise: "I will do this if 1000 other people pledge to do so too!" PledgeBank therefore harnesses and encourages the power of individuals to become groups, and it doesn't even need to be people who know one another, just ones that share a common cause.

Both organizations enable individuals to band together to create new movements, to allow the local to join with the global, and in doing so change the world. Given that similarity,it's only natural that Catalytic Communities would decide to use PledgeBank for its 2005 fundraising drive.

"I will set up a $10 monthly donation to CatComm (or $120 annually) but only if 399 other people will too, and only if one philanthropist will match our joint donations dollar for dollar."
— Patrick Donohue

Deadline to sign up by: 31st December 2005

Join us in empowering a global network of community solutions!
JOIN THIS PLEDGEat http://www.PledgeBank.com/catcomm/

It turns out that it's not the big foundations but the individuals like you and I who are the most powerful philanthropic force around. Lynne Twist, author of the book The Soul of Money and award winning fundraiser (she's raised some $200+ million for non-profits, all from individuals) gave us this statistic when we met her last week: of the $250 billion donated in the United States last year, the vast majority was donated by individuals, close to %80. And most of those individuals are in the $150k a year and under group, not just the Bill Gates of the world.

What does this all mean for business? Well, we believe that the organizations which learn to create peer effects - those that catalyze an explosion of grassroots innovation and growth - are the ones that will lead the future in the Base of the Pyramid. A successful model will not be one that just "scales", but instead one that embraces replication and adaptation. The former is about mammoth organizations whereas the latter is all about networks of individuals.

And if you don't have that network yourself, find a way to become a peer of one that does. All you need is a little leverage...

"All that is valuable in human society depends upon the opportunity for development accorded the individual." - Albert Einstein

Additional Resources:
Catalytic Communities - also available in Portuguese and Spanish
PledgeBank - and CatComm's Pledge Challenge
Base of the Pyramid Protocol - BoP Protocol resources at BRINQ.com
Side Effects - A Day in the Community - BRINQ article about CatComm
Learning to Swim - Back in Brazil - BRINQ article about CatComm

Posted to the BRINQ Workshop - about CatComm, PledgeBank and replication vs. scale.