Rick Warren at Davos

Via Scoble's QIK video feed I discovered Rick Warren was at the Davos World Economic Forum.  Worth watching.  Quick summary:

He sees 5 problems that are facing the world right now:

1.  poverty

2.  disease

3.  illiteracy

4.  spiritual emptiness

5.  political corruption

He advocates a three-legged stool approach to solving these problems:

1. public sector - government must set the agenda and the priorities for their nations

2. private sector - business must bring innovation, expertise and investment to solving these problems.

3.  faith-based sector - while not usually considered, there are several advantages of involving faith based organizations in solving for these problems:

  a.  universal distribution - in 10 mm villages and 1000 language groups more than the United Nations.

  b.  manpower - 2.3 billion Christians, 1.0 billion Muslims, 800 million Hindus, 700 mm Buddhists.  Over 80% of the world population is part of one faith group or another.

  c.  local credibility - "NGOs may come and go, but the local village priest will always be there."

Great framing of the advantages of involving the faith-based sector in addressing the largest social issues facing the world today, and presented in a way that makes it understandable to people who ordinarily may not see things in a faith-based lens.

Here is the QIK video from Scoble.  He talks a little about his church Saddleback Church and his book Purpose Driven Life.