Entredonneur

= concept meaning 'giving to the in between', proposed to balance the concept of Entrepreneur which means 'taking from in between' and has therefore a predatory significance

Description

"The entredonneur is a 'creative giver'

• My term 'entredonneur' (Wood, 1990) was not intended as a direct criticism of 'enterprise' itself
• Nevertheless, offers an invaluable practical counterpoint to it
• The most extreme idea of 'taking' is as unlikely as an extreme idea of pure 'giving'
• However, by placing the two at opposite ends of a continuum we are better able to map the transition from one to the other
• It may help us to identify how business, and other modes of enterprise, might be re-envisioned
• It implies a less wasteful mode of living within an (inevitable) solar economy
• In theory, at the macro level, tendencies to 'pure greed' may balance the will to 'pure altruism'
• With better mapping techniques we might be able to replace this struggle with a reciprocal form of altruism."

(http://attainable-utopias.org/tiki/tiki-index.php?page=EntreDonneur)

Original source of the term: Wood, J., (1990), "COMMENT: The Socially Responsible Designer", Design Magazine, July 1990

Alternatives

An alternative way of expressing this distinction, suggested by Mike Hales, is to use the adjective "extractive" to characterise the entrepreneur, and the word "generative" to characterise the "entredonneur", using the words promoted by Marjorie Kelly. See Generative vs. Extractive Ownership.

More Information

• https://metadesigners.org/Entredonneur-Glossary
• http://writing-pad.org/EntreDonneur
• The Cultural Shift Research outcomes
• The Wisdom of Nature = The Nature of Wisdom (PDF)
• possible alternative, mentioned by Neil Cummings here at http://culturesofresilience.org/communities-of-evaluation/: Donorpreneurs‎
• Generative vs. Extractive