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| Ricken Patel |
Avaaz, which means "voice" or "song" in Persian, was set up with the overarching goal of closing the gap between "the world we have and the world most people everywhere want". From the outset it has been unashamedly idealistic and aspirational. Its executive director is Ricken Patel, and his ambition goes back half a lifetime.
When Patel was 18, he was on holiday in Mexico with his family, who live in Canada. One night he sat everyone down, very gravely, and told them he had an idea for making the world a better place. His insight was that most people in the world want pretty much the same thing and what they want is actually quite modest. He was going to mobilise global citizens to act together to achieve this. His family were taken aback, and Patel remembers his aunt making the first remark. "So, you want to be a do-gooder?"
The method he would eventually settle on was only just getting going then: e-mail. Millions of people know "Ricken" as the name at the bottom of the chatty e-mails they receive asking them to take some sort of action.
If they don’t take a simple action (clicking "send"), something bad is going to happen. Or if they click "send", something bad that is going on right now can be stopped. Either way, please do it quick.
Read more: THE MAN BEHIND AVAAZ | More Intelligent Life
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