Why this is on the list
Ashoka has been selecting social entrepreneurs since 1980 and the network now spans over 3,500 fellows in 90 countries. The fellowship is not for people at the idea stage — it is for founders who have already proven a model and are ready to scale it. But knowing Ashoka is on the map matters from the beginning, because it helps you understand what a systems-change organisation looks like versus one that is just doing good work locally. Their website has profiles of every fellow and the problems they work on — it is one of the best places to understand the range of what social entrepreneurship actually looks like in practice.