While the hippie movement can be explained and characterized in a number of ways; it can alternatively be simply summarized as one of history’s most famous statement against the status quo.  Of course, if we flash forward to present day we’d find that the protagonists have since grown up and ironically now make up the new status quo, which seems a lot like the old one.  Stupid wars are still being fought, much of the world is underdeveloped and our economic systems are still motivated by greed.

And yet, these idealistic and enlightened youth mobilized in ways previously unimaginable to change the world. They marched en masse, they flaunted their sexually liberation and they used peaceful means to make a point especially when rallying against war. They employed novel approaches that embodied their identity and believed that the world would be a better place because of their existence.

Does this in any way sound familiar?

Change is certainly inevitable but what is less certain in the present is who exactly is driving this change. I contend that when historians look back the answer will be quite clear: young entrepreneurs.

Today’s young entrepreneurs, an increasingly rising number relative to the past, are of different bread than their predecessors. Sure, they’re still interested in making money, but the rise of social enterprise and socially-valuable web-based platforms are dramatically changing the world.  They have realized that making a statement today is best done through business after noticing that at the end of the day, your impact is typically dictated by your financial position.

A recent article asked baby boomers, many of whom come from the aforementioned generation, if they have collectively spawned a ‘failure generation’.  I couldn’t help but wonder if their parents asked the same thing when they were out there enjoying free love, drugs and rock and roll. Today’s generation is far from a failure – they are simply doing things different whether it’s the business they create, the age they marry or the point they decide to ‘grow up’.  They are making a statement and doing it most provocatively through the systems that the former hippies now understand the best.