by Edoardo De Stefani | Oct 6, 2014 | The Urban Media Lab
The new millennium is the era of changing spaces, dynamic perspectives and euphoric crowding.
A sense of novel social planning sprouted in the fields of the urban ecosystem, while contemporary economic, cultural and digital trends are pointing out alternative projections for the use of properties and public spaces.
The narrative of top-down impositions cannot catch up with the priority lane of collective tracks; there is no space anymore for watertight compartment, for aseptic modes of public governance.
It is time for supporting the sentiments of the citizens, to raise the interest of those who really live the neighborhood and to connect them.
There is a flourishing community of “re-activators”, those who follow the flux of social innovation and believe in the mantra of urban galvanization.
Here is the community for sharing spaces and ideas; we are inspired by the art of sharing collaboration.
Not only for newcomers: the “Co.making cities” workshop is at its second edition and will show up the arsenal for a direct confrontation and experimentation on territorial governance, active citizenship and co-working spaces.
The 15-16-17-18 of October the city of Bari will host at the Impact Hub the modules of Reactivicity Reloaded, promoted by Pop Hub and Coompany.
Four days workshops for boosting the interactions between citizens and urban spaces, an opportunity to start-up the ultimate urban and cultural trends.
Save up the date and stay tuned!
Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/277673929107242/
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/reactivicity.ldb
Registration at: http://www.eventbrite.it/e/biglietti-reactivicity-reloaded-comaking-cities-13457446585
Web: http://www.reactivicity.org/
http://www.pophub.it
With the contribution of: http://www.laboratoridalbasso.it/laboratorio/reactivicity-reloaded/
by Edoardo De Stefani | Sep 27, 2014 | The Urban Media Lab
Every society relies upon certain codes of communication and standards of interaction. We are the expression of the modern culture of digitalization, whereas everything goes fast on the lines.
But the standardization of the terms “global” and “digital” in our vocabulary has nothing to do with real world; technology and social media innovation have certainly redesigned the way of sharing experiences and concepts, but truly not the focal apparatus.
Art is worth an example, notably the way of living artistic performances.
The dogma of passive audience is the best demonstration of how we are too often laced within the boundaries of spotted parades, whereas no one has anything to give, except for the artist.
Many observers certainly noted this parasitic attitude -or mainly social laziness- in the context of urban living and spacing.
That is why MoMA (Museum of Modern Art) envisioned a strategy to energize the people and involve them far beyond the limits of physical spaces, thanks also to Fiona Romeo, director of digital content.
The idea of linking the visitors’ experience to the artistic content is not new (Polisemylab), and certainly we would like to imagine a new conception of spaces: not old fashioned and decadent urban containers for storing artifacts, but maybe some avant-garde space that eventually will show us the future -far beyond the limits of physical imagination.
Overcoming the digital divide is new mantra, as well as studying a new algorithm for unifying independent variables, as authors and audience usually are.
Expanding digital experience as the parallel binary for the analogue world, this is the new trend.
Further details at: Wall Street Journal
by Edoardo De Stefani | Sep 1, 2014 | The Urban Media Lab
The International Association for the Study of the Commons (IASC) – a no profit organization strongly committed to the improvement of governance and management through the creation of sustainable solutions for the effective use of commons, common-pool resources, or any other form of shared resource in developing or developed countries – following the success of the 2012 edition – is organizing a 2nd Thematic conference on Knowledge Commons. The aim of this conference, which be held on September 5- 6, 2014 at New York University School of Law, is to analyze how knowledge, information, and other shared intellectual resources are governed by describing the latest developments in the interdisciplinary study of knowledge commons. During the conference, a deep investigation ofhow knowledge commons work, their origin, and the factors which determine their endurance and which threaten their efficacy will be provided. In particular, this year’s program, through paper tracks and policy sessions, will give special attention to knowledge commons in the fields of medicine and environment. Among the participants, keynotes speakers will be Yochai Benkler, Jack N. and Lillian R. Berkman Professor for Entrepreneurial Legal Studies at Harvard Law School, Eric Von Hippel, T. Wilson Professor in Management at MIT Sloan School of Management, and Michael McGinnis, Professor at the Department of Political Science and Senior Research Fellow in Political Theory and Policy Analysis at Indiana University, Bloomington.
LabGov is devoted in bringing together multidisciplinary researchers, scholars, academics and practitioners for promoting and spreading the paradigm of Commons and any related form of action within the community. The Lab is committed in developing a new institutional design and experiencing the practice of commons among different disciplines and actors; hence, we strongly recommend not to miss the 2nd thematic conference on Knowledge Commons.
Spread knowledge, share ideas, feed talents: be Commoners.
Further information at:
http://iasckc.nyuengelberg.org/#about
http://www.nyuengelberg.org
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by Edoardo De Stefani | Jul 21, 2014 | EducationLabs
Social economy has become nowadays a fashionable argument within the panel of the public administration forum; indeed in time of cultural and social crisis, new paths for social innovation are to be fully explored.
It would be nonsense trying to define univocally what social innovation is and how it should be made, however it is possible to track a mainstream in terms of where the compass has to be set: this is the case of the new frontier of social cooperation, which entails the possibility to create a physical and digital hub whereas people work together exchanging ideas, projects, competencies and experimenting innovation as consequence of the autonomous initiatives.
In this sense we can talk about active citizenship, both in terms of liberal expression as well as a function for a renewed economic productivity.
Thus it seems that a structural revolution shall be started from below, as far as the bottom up approach is eventually able to capture the sensitivity of the urban spaces and people.
Again, the idea of creating a common co-working space is the best option to fit the needs of a socio-economic renovation.
The mounting sense is to design a meta-content for social enterprises, which could promote occupation, economic production and social equity and fairness.
The time for urban re-generation has come, so that building a strong network of active citizenship has become the unavoidable premise for social innovation.
Bearing in mind that the founding idea of social innovation is the creation of tangible areas whereby it could be possible to install ideas and incubate projects, we should focus our attention on the working laboratories and their typologies.
To this end, it is worth mentioning the FabLAb initiatives that are very active on the urban territories.
In particular the “Millepiani co-working space” in Rome (http://www.millepiani.eu) hosted an important event on 18/7/2014 to set the basis for launching a territorial network of FabLabs.
The event aimed at exchanging ideas, experiences, suggestions and reflections among those interprets of the social fabric in order to collect and express a common sentiment to the public administration.
The new politics of collaboration, whose basis is promoted within the “Lazio Creativo” planning, is currently providing funds for the development of cultural activities.
In parallel, the regional legislation of “Regione Sicilia” seems to be able to set a milestone in terms of institutional innovation, since it has started recognizing the value of social innovation and its capacity building both in terms of economic productivity or as a form of social inclusiveness.
However, the institutional apparatus is still anchored to a persistent fragmentation of the territories and to an uncertainty of the governance method.
Given all the uncertainties and concerns about the future of the social innovation, in terms of development of active hubs for citizens, the working group composed by the associations that attended the meeting has committed itself to investigate the following dynamics and themes:
1) Fundraising and accession criteria
2) Added value of the social enterprise
3) Governance method and redefinition of public space
4) Pact of collaboration with the public administration
5) Census of actors and activities
6) Real estate speculation
7) Political project – civic targeting- social dialogue
Stay tuned.
by Edoardo De Stefani | Jun 5, 2014 | The Urban Media Lab
In the wake of the event that took place on 4th of June 2014 at Luiss Guido Carli University in Rome “Responsabilità, sostenibilità e innovazione sociale: quale futuro? Il salone della CSR e responsabilità sociale” organized by NeXt Nuova Economia per Tutti, we seek to elaborate the node of social responsibility in light of the participants ‘perspective, including the author’s.
The aim of the workshop was to conceptualize the collaboration as a means to enhance the value of the business chain and to appraise the principles of corporate ethics and cooperative partnership, which stems from a bottom-up innovation.
Developing a network of cooperation and collaboration among citizens, enterprises and public administration (PA) is the first step for defining new roles in the civic society and to demarcate the power of active citizenship on the territory.
The issue of CRS (corporate social responsibility) is crucial and represents the core of the debate since the era of post-capitalism is demanding for a more inclusive growth and for a social enrichment, in light of the promotion of social quality as the new reference-index for business value.
Trustiness toward PA and enterprises is directly linked to CSR policies and the ability to instill a social profit within the framework of institutional debate, could enable the neural activation of the real centers of sustainability, namely cities and citizens.
The social renewal is path-dependent from collaborative processes and from the active sharing of competences and interests through practices of co-working and digital networking, which should bridge knowledge and information to the various poles of participation.
The new paradigm of sustainability shall be recalibrated under the umbrella of a welcoming ecosystem, which should streamline bureaucratic procedures in favor of new agile forms of sharing economy.
It is very important to create and foster communities, as well as to consider the importance of social ties among citizens and civic society as the direct incarnation of a collective assumption of responsibility. Empirical data are showing a growing attitude in developing and applying cooperative models of participation to social, cultural and economic processes. The bottom-up approach could in this sense represent the materialization of the identity of a given society.
The social exclusion is against the necessity to replicate a model of isomorphism at the level of enterprises; the perception is that we need to promote a value of adherence between the business processes, the functioning of the PA and the participation of stakeholders, including consumers: the lines of leadership and the relationships among relevant actors shall be arranged upon a comprehensive system of values that reflect social needs and sensations.
Building up a CSR innovation means to mirror the stakeholders’ interests in view of a pact of social collaboration and cooperative project management, to be intended in the broad sense of territorial inclusion.
Several companies are nowadays committed to an integrated CSR strategy and more importantly, is far more prominent the widespread tendency of investors to commit themselves to actions of social responsibility (SRI: social responsible investors).
Finally, the scope of CSR policies is to foster the creation of a shared value (CSV) and to pursue a new mode of understanding among different generations and civic roles. The virtue of partnership is the new reference for creating an added value, as a double-layered sword that could cut the inefficiencies of economy and society.
We are ready to change as representatives of both the world of the academia and enterprises, but a third pole for triangulation is necessary. In light of this necessity, our hope is to launch the challenge of responsibility to the institutional actors; a wind of change is already blowing.
