KOTN: How to Build a Business Worth Believing In

Ben & Jerry’s. You know it. You love it. It’s one of the most iconic brands of the last 50 years, blending inventive flavors, a joyous hippie spirit, and a bone-deep commitment to social impact. Then in 2000, Unilever came calling with $326 million, and what followed is a 25-year masterclass in what happens when corporate oligarchs try to gut the social mission of a business with one hand while using that reputation to sell more product to the public on the other. This is the story of a remarkable friendship, the powerful market forces that try to shape even the most well intentioned businesses, and their fight to get their company back. ----------- The How to Change the World Podcast is produced by World Within Studios with PRX. Producer and Composer: Alexandre Miller Editors: Eve Weston and Martin McGreevy

Standing Rock has been home to the Lakota people for centuries. When the Dakota Access Pipeline threatened their water and their land, the world showed up. Most people left when the cameras did, but the people of Standing Rock stayed, and today we're talking about what happened next. My guests today are Joseph McNeill of the SAGE Development Authority at Standing Rock Nation, and Alex Honnold, the professional climber who free soloed El Capitan and climbed Taipei 101. Maybe more importantly, Alex founded the Honnold Foundation, which has teamed up with SAGE on something that's never been done before. These two are friends, and they have a lot to teach us about energy sovereignty, overcoming huge odds, and the future of how we power our communities. ----------- The How to Change the World Podcast is produced by World Within Studios with PRX. Producer and Composer: Alexandre Miller Editors: Eve Weston and Martin McGreevy

Friends, this was a fun one. I’m somewhat embarrassed to say, I didn't know who John Green was until relatively recently. We met on a Zoom call where I first learned about the fan-owned English Football Club, AFC Wimbledon. Now we’re working together on a film about the power of community ownership through the lens of sports, which feels particularly relevant as more and more soccer teams get snatched up by some of the worst humans on earth. You probably know John from his smash-hit novel and its film adaptation, The Fault in Our Stars, or from Vlogbrothers, the YouTube series he's run with his brother Hank for nearly two decades, or maybe from Crash Course, their series shown in classrooms across America. He's as prolific as he is thoughtful. And, he has a phenomenal new book out called Hollywood, Ending. We talk about his book Everything Is Tuberculosis - and how a disease we've been able to cure for over 80 years, is still the world’s most deadly infection. We also talk about a hope that stands up to scrutiny, why history doesn’t belong to the past, and how we’re both the cause and the cure to most of the things that plague us.

Rostam here. I came up in the worlds of finance and venture capital - worlds that fancy themselves as disruptors and visionaries, but in reality, they reinforce the status quo by further consolidating wealth and power to a few at the expense of the many. Throughout this podcast, we've been making the case that building a truly fair society requires building a fair economy. My guest today both helps us understand what that economy can look like as well as illuminate some of the thinkers and practitioners who have been building it for over a century. Dr. Jessica Gordon-Nembhard is a political economist at John Jay College whose book, Collective Courage, documents a history most of us were never taught - a century-long tradition of Black cooperative enterprise, from W.E.B. Du Bois' economic writings in 1907 through Ella Jo Baker's organizing work and Fannie Lou Hamer's Freedom Farm. Their work presented sophisticated alternatives to an extractive economy, building shared ownership and economic solidarity from the ground up. And the fact that most of us don't know this history isn't by coincidence. In this conversation, we're going to explore what this rich tradition of cooperative enterprise actually looked like, why it was buried, and what figures like Du Bois and Baker can teach us about building an economy that works for all of us.

Income inequality in America has reached levels not seen since the Gilded Age - and by some measures beyond it. The top 1% of Americans now hold more wealth than the entire bottom 90% combined. Our guest today has had a front row seat to how that happens. He was an early employee of the tech oligopoly, and later became a whistleblower testifying before Congress against the very platform he once believed in. Since then, Brian Boland has conducted extensive research into just how much strain our financial system and its emphasis on shareholder primacy is placing on everyday Americans. Through Unlock Ownership, he's now building and making the case for what he calls an ownership economy: a practical blueprint for an economic future that has room for us all. ----------- The How to Change the World Podcast is produced by World Within Studios Producer and Composer: Alexandre Miller Editors: Eve Weston and Martin McGreevy