Race 1 circa 1972-1979 Having gained independence as a nation in a bloody war with what is now called Pakistan, Bangladesh was a country with less infrastructure than any other; it got hit by a cyclone that caused a local tsunami killing twice as many people as the 2004 SE Asia Tsunami, and then a million people died of famine. Out of these 2 disasters were born, what in a life of searching innovation systems,  are my and dad's votes for the 2 most purposeful systems in the world: BRAC & Grameen. By 1979 BRAC was already proving itself as most empowering local-up NGO and Grameen was testing a concept of how the world's poorest people could own their bank, and what goals would they define in their race to end poverty in groups of 60 village women each designed round a space called a village centre for mutual development as well as individual entrepreneurial exchange.  

Race 2 Circa 1980-1987
Grameen bank was incorporated by law as being owned by the rural poor in 1983 and quickly proved its sustainability spreading branches through Rural Bangladesh not just in helping the poorest women in the world to become income generating, or in encouraging savings accounts after a year of which the poorest illiterate woman became a shareholder in her bank, but in designing communal investment solutions- eg the most basic housing design to have a monsoon proof roof, a cyclone-proof stability, and a pit latrine for hygiene. Almost immediately awarded the Aga Khan prize for architecture, Grameen went on to issue 700,000 sub-sub prime loans not one of which harmed the bank's record as earning the safest repayment ratings in banking history. Meanwhile, BRAC started to design whole industry value chains multiplying from the bottom up.
 
Race 3 Circa 1988-1995
Grameen Trust started proof testing worldwide viability of microcredit and friends of Bangladesh briefed the president elect Clinton in late 1992 of how Bangladesh was pioneering the best models ever sustained for ending poverty. Ideas for millennium goals were planted which most of the world's leaders pledged the new millennium and networking generation’s united goals around. The Great and the Good started to pay field visits to Bangladeshi villages including the extraordinary Queen Sofia of Spain, and Hillary Clinton. Over in Indonesia, a pioneering developer of microcredit was the mother of a future American President - Barack Obama.

Race 4 1996-2001
Inside Bangladesh , 1996 saw Grameen investing the poor's money in mobile telephony and solar energy. The exponential impacts of both become more extraordinary by the day. The immediate impact was what had previously been largely separated village centres became the most extraordinary hub network - today 140000 Grameen Village centres are ending digital divides.  And, Bangladesh is now a world lead in mobile network architectures - see eg http://www.grameensolutions.com  and http://bracnet.net International microcreditsummit was launched with a goal within a decade to reach 100 million poorest families around the world with banking for the poor. While grassroots microcredit networks did indeed connect up , the world's big leaders got distracted from their millennium goals with tragic conflicts spiraling. Instead of a humanly empowering start to the 21st century, globalisation took on a form remarkably similar to the way the 20th century started in Europe.

Race 5 2002-2008
Can the world’s greatest end-poverty networking systems also be humanity's great peacemakers. Nobel Peace jury bravely thought so. And what emerged was Dr Yunus inviting the world to come and study the missing system link that Bangladesh had designed during race 1 - the world's only true sustainability investment modeling. This brings us to the greatest human race 2009-2015. Will the net generation make poverty museums our very own space race. The system designs are their . The collaboration networking medium of internet and microsummit are there. Yes We Can needs to to help connect it.  Tell us if you co-create a starting line or join our searches at http://futurecapitalism.ning.com/