Charles Tsai

I have officially launched a new social innovation competition both online as well as at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada. Fun for A Change is a design competition that encourages youth to come up with fun ways to create positive change. It’s about getting people to “do the right thing” and change behavior by [...]

On the first day of the 8th Annual Games for Change Festival in New York, there was one question on everyone’s mind: “What’s Al Gore going to say at a gaming conference?” Maybe he will announce a game on climate change? Imagine saving “climate refugees” from the island of Maldives and ferrying them to a [...]

What a difference a decade makes. In 2001, when I worked with the Creative Visions Foundation to produce PBS GlobalTribe, the first T.V. series of its kind that showcased people we now refer to as “changemakers” and “social entrepreneurs,” we avoided using those terms, afraid they were too esoteric for the general public. Today, social [...]

What a difference a decade makes. In 2001, when I worked with the Creative Visions Foundation to produce PBS GlobalTribe, the first T.V. series of its kind that showcased people we now refer to as “changemakers” and “social entrepreneurs,” we avoided using those terms, afraid they were too esoteric for the general public. Today, social [...]

“Why do you focus on youth?” is a question I get asked from time to time about my work with social entrepreneurs. I was even asked this question by a freshman at UCLA during my recent lecture there on The Green Generation, which showcased countless examples of young people around the world developing their own [...]

I’m excited to announce that I’ve started blogging periodically for the Huffington Post, mostly for their Impact section. The first article was prompted by my recent visit to Argentina, where I took two students I mentor to speak at the largest TEDx event in the world – TEDxBuenosAires. I’ve since written about a new Creative [...]

I’m happy to see that the World Bank‘s Development Marketplace has prominently featured my toolkits in its Toolkits section. Development Marketplace provides funding for early stage social entrepreneurs and has given away millions of dollars to ore than 200 organizations through its global competitions. The toolkits are part of the support the Development Marketplace provides [...]

Well, the TEDx talk at Princeton turned out to be more than just a talk. In preparing for that speech, I managed to embark on a new path for my work in this sector. The question I’ve been struggling with for a long time is: “How can we spread best practices so that social entrepreneurs [...]

I’m happy to announce I will be speaking at TEDxPrincetonU on December 3. The theme is social entrepreneurship.  I might have a thing or two to say about that. My plan is to answer once and for all that all important yet elusive question, “What is social entrepreneurship?” Without giving away anything, I will simply [...]

Before leaving Ashoka’s Youth Venture, I had proposed that we organize a TEDx event just for young changemakers and social entrepreneurs.  Well, it finally came to pass. Yesterday, a dozen or so youth and some adults spoke at the very first TEDxYSE (Youth Social Entrepreneurship). It was truly inspirational from beginning to end and I [...]