Ibrahim Betil

An industrialist, enlightened banker, and now social entrepreneur, Ibrahim Betil has contributed to the advancement of full citizenship for Turkish workers and young people throughout his varied career. Starting five years ago, he turned his attention fully to putting in place opportunities for young adults to contribute to positive social action through their own initiative.

Ibrahim Betil is convinced that young people have the power to make democracy an active way of life. To advance this view, Ibrahim is striving to trigger the dynamics of Turkish society by unifying young people—the most dynamic section of society—around community service to solve social problems, thereby nurturing their individual and social consciousness. Ibrahim has experienced that the projects that are the richest in new ideas are the ones that engage young people. He has observed that youth are creative and highly focused when it comes to tackling social problems. Thus, he advocates that allowing young people to use their potential early on in their lives will make the civil society in Turkey stronger and thus the society better off down the road, unleashing the power of real democracy. To carry forward this idea, Ibrahim was one of the founders of Volunteers in Education Foundation six years ago, and then in December 2002, he set up Community Volunteers Foundation (TOG is the Turkish acronym). TOG matches 2,500 university students from 54 Turkish institutions with local and national social change initiatives throughout Turkey, providing a formative experience for young leaders to initiate and contribute to positive social change.

In the last twenty years in Turkey, young people (who constitute one-third of the population) have been left out of social life through an active a-politicization process. This process has continuously portrayed young people as a group that is unreliable, restless and tense. There are some 20 million people between the ages of eighteen and twenty-four in Turkey, but because of the lack of a national organization to bring together this large number of people, they have been largely unable to use their energy or confidently express themselves in society.

Currently the majority of young people participate in the social sector only in very limited ways, if at all. Some sociologists attributed the fact that young people cannot express their ideas and power to a collective state of despair. Due to being distanced from society and lacking the experience of social activism, these young people grow up unaware of or uninvolved in social problems. The result is a passive population of over 60 million and the lack of democratic muscle upon which to build a vibrant society.

Six years ago, Foundation for Turkish Education Volunteers (TEGV) was founded; Turkey’s first national voluntary education service organization for kids. The aim of this effort was to introduce people to opportunities for volunteering. It formed the prototype for the effort Ibrahim is currently pursuing. Through TEGV, Ibrahim introduced the first-ever citizen-base campaign, raising US$1 million for volunteer initiatives through a television-based effort.

Ibrahim started Community Volunteers Foundation with a similar aim to turn the energy of young people towards social benefit. TOG now matches 2,500 volunteers at 54 universities with about 60 local and national social change projects, and provides a range of support for young volunteers that includes training, mentoring, scholarships, internships, workgroup opportunities and networking. By enabling young volunteers to develop and realize social service projects, Ibrahim activates the civil initiative and creates social awareness in society. TOG aims to create a youth population that claims its own future by preparing young people to take responsibility for what they disapprove of in the society, by strengthening commitment to an independent and active civil society, and by helping young people understand the development of democracy.

Already, Ibrahim’s Community Volunteers Foundation has organized two national social service projects in 6 different locations in Turkey involving 35 universities and 2,000 university students, developed a monthly publication about community volunteer news and opportunities (accessible on the Web at www.tog.org.tr), and helped form social service clubs at 30 university campuses in Turkey that aim to bring young people together around common social goals.

Twice a year young volunteers and representatives from different regions and universities meet to share their experiences and exchange views of the projects they realized in the past six months. Best practices are shared and future plans elaborated. National events are 2-3 day activities that take place in three cities simultaneously and bring together up to 1000 young community volunteers from all around Turkey; creating social awareness in the society.

In 2003 TOG offered scholarships to 15 students with financial need, to volunteer for four hours or more per week, and keep their grades high; in 2004, the goal is 50 students. In 2003, TOG provided internships at 46 students; in 2004 the goal is 500.

Once the Community Volunteers Foundation is well grounded in Turkey, Ibrahim will carry the movement beyond national borders and introduce Turkish young people to other groups worldwide in order to enable a cultural exchange and a global cooperation in social service.

During his school years, Ibrahim always strove to go beyond what his classes required of him. He was a part of the social service club during his junior high and high school years in an American high school (Robert College) in Istanbul and worked towards improving the student life on campus. He was also president of the student government during high school and university.

When he graduated from university, he started out as an industrialist. In eight years, he founded a model industrial corporation and fought for the rights of his employees. He even educated his own employees on unionization. Later, he worked in banking—first as an employee, then as the founder and owner of a bank. During his fifteen years in banking, he was an innovator of alternative approaches. He was the first to introduce to the sector the concept that the responsibility of a director goes first to the clients, then to the employees, and last to the shareholders.

Due to weakening economic circumstances and new interests, Ibrahim transferred ownership of his bank and became the founder and vice president of a new alternative democratic movement. When his movement got below the 1 percent floor in the election, he decided that the only way to make change in society is through social service.

With this determination, he founded the Volunteers in Education Foundation (or TEGV) and directed it for four years. In TEGV, he organized the first-ever citizen base campaign in Turkey and collected over $1 million despite the fact that the campaign coincided with economic crisis in Turkey. This national television campaign contributed significantly to his becoming one of the most widely known social entrepreneurs in the country. While Ibrahim’s efforts have more recently shifted to his work with the Community Volunteers Foundation, where he serves as director, TEGV remainsa highly regarded organization contributing significantly to civil society. Ibrahim is married and has a child.