by Marco Quaglia | Aug 29, 2015 | The Urban Media Lab
Collaboration with citizens to realize potential benefits deriving from practices of social innovation is an emerging challenge for European cities. Examples are increasing in number day after day, and the growth is so consistent that is almost impossible to get in line with it. What is rather possible, and in a way desirable, is to cluster them and to underline some features that are becoming more and more paradigmatic, even at the cost of breaking some conventional wisdom. And by doing so, promoting the spread of best practices across national borders.
Administration’s budget are under tight constraints. It is becoming some sort of a refrain in the last years, but it is also an undeniable fact. Cities in particular, are in the unpleasant situation of being asked improvement in their social services (mobility, housing, food, and so forth) with no extra budgets.
That settled, it is also true that difficult situations are the perfect humus for innovation of any kind. This is even more true in urban contexts. Amersfoort (The Netherlands) and Gdansk (Poland) are just two of these. Here, both the central administrations and citizens are working together to go beyond old problems, problems made even worse by the above-mentioned economic context. The two cases are also paramount examples of two different cultures of governance, which have grown up amid different historical backgrounds: a bottom-up approach in Amersfoort, and a top-down in Gdansk.
Amersfoort offers an example of a design process that was progressive and based on the collaboration with the city administration. In 2014, the city launched the Year of Change, a year to rethink the governance of the city towards a model based on shared responsibility and collective leadership. The city administration was witnessing a fait accompli: beyond the retrenchment of the administration, citizen-driven initiatives were blooming. Citizen-initiatives were quickly seen as an asset, and above all as an opportunity. The field in which initiatives were spreading were: urban development, sustainable food consumption and many other. The only thing the administration was asked to do was to assume a new position towards social innovation, to leave the floor to social innovators and to limit its role in the action of removing old barriers (legal in particular).
In Gdansk the situation was and still is slightly different. Once that acceptable standards of living were reached, in fact, the administration, putted under pressure by the citizenship, decided to move towards social innovation practices. Immaterial values, such as happiness, quality of life, cultural development and so forth, gained relevance once again on the political agenda. An important role to support this vision was taken by some experts and practitioners: the Club of Gdansk an informal think-tank – had a crucial role in bringing together civil servants and NGOs representatives with the aim of prioritizing issues for the city. The common values of the group were: trust, participation, honesty, responsibility and transparency. The outcomes of this club’s meeting were used to co-design programmes and strategies. In Gdansk is a limited èlite that started the revolution, but the result is nonetheless remarkable, and the citizenship is starting to have its say in the process.
As already said, if we could just step back and look at the whole continent, what we would see could resemblance a session of acupuncture – with projects instead of needles – throughout Europe. Amersfoort and Gdansk are just two of these needles. That being said, their relevance lies in the different theoretical and functional approach to social innovation that they engender. On the one hand, Amersfoort looks like the textbook example of social innovation (citizens-driven, and so forth); while on the other Gdansk seems to throw that same textbook out of the window (a city that change under the tutelage of an enlightened leadership, policy-makers and some experts). What it truly does, however, is to cast a new light on the idea of social innovation. The idea of social innovation is just an “hollow shell” without first-hand experience of each society’s characteristics (culture, history, social structure, civil society – see Robert D. Putnam’s Making Democracy Work – etc.). A process, successfull in a city, might be a colossal failure somewhere else, if blinly replicated. Good thing is that citizens and administrations seems to already acknowledge that.
I contesti urbani sono da anni i luoghi in cui professionisti, cittadini e studiosi possono mettere in pratica progetti di innovazione sociale. In tutta Europa si moltiplicano questo genere di esperienze con una velocità mai vista. Se da una parte dunque è impossibile analizzarli uno ad uno, quello che è possibile trarre da una loro analisi, è l’estrapolazione di pratiche. Gli esempi di Amersfoort (Olanda) e Danzica (Polonia) sono importanti dunque ben al di là dell’innovazione e dell’efficacia dei loro singoli progetti. Quello che ci consentono è infatti la possibilità di analizzare delle pratiche all’interno di contesti che si differenziano per situazione economica, culturale e storica. La lezione che ne traiamo è che non esiste un singolo modus operandi per innovare la governance di beni e servizi nei contesti urbani, ma che l’innovazione sociale, per rendere onore al proprio nome, deve adeguarsi alle singole realtà, senza alcuna pretesa di standardizzazione.
by Federica Maranesi | Jul 16, 2015 | The Urban Media Lab
Did you know that every 30 minutes you complain about problems, your problem solving neurones are passing away? That sounds incredible, but still dramatically true. The worst comes thinking that is not just one person, or two, or four people to have this kind of attitude. It is a sort of epidemic disease that brings people, and consequently the society, to complain when a crisis comes up. Why? Because complaining is just easier.
We could say, as many already know, that word “crisis” has a double meaning, especially for the oriental cultures tradition. It means at same time “risk” and “opportunity”. Indeed, as history teaches us, when a situation arrives at its caos point and consequently to its saturation point, something has to change. At this moment, creativity and resilience take the stage. Nevertheless, without going deep in linguistic research, it is already illustrative itself the fact that when you complain, instead of having a problem solving predisposition, makes part of you literally dying.
The crisis is part of our lives. Our grandparents had to face the war, our parents had to deal with the cold war and the flared trousers (and this explain many things). Anyway, our task is to deal with the crises whether you like it or not. The financial crises, the political crises, the economic crises, the security crises, the social one, the food security one, the communitarian, the job market, youth employment, the citizen participation, the public administration ones. So the next question I have is: do you want part of yourselves to die? Do we want to die? I can hazard a guess that the answer is no.
Therefore, now it is maybe the right moment for us to take confidence with the word “resilience”. Yes, because it seems that we have got used to the term “crisis”, even with its Asiatic meaning, but not the one, which explain how to get the opportunity. Resilience is the ability of a system to adapt to change. If we want to be more specific, just to better understand, we could say that:
- In computer science, resilience is the ability of a system to adapt to the conditions of use and resist wear in order to guarantee the availability of the services provided.
- In ecology, resilience is the ability of a living material to repair itself after a damage, or that of a community or an ecosystem to return to its initial state after being subjected to a disturbance, which amended that state.
- Inpsychology, resiliencyis the abilityto respondpositivelyto thetraumatic eventsofhis lifepositivelyrearrangethe face of difficulties.
If it sounds good, it is better to know that from July 27th to August 1st, at Macomer, a little city in Sardinia (Italy) there will be the Festival of Resilience 2015. A group aged 20 to 30 years, all over Italy and the world, students and workers, realists and dreamers, has created the Propositivo project, which promotes the Festival. They have the intent to highlight the many examples of virtuous practices present on the territory, which share a vision of reality with a positive, innovative, sustainable and resilient attitude. The Festival will be focused on Sardinia territory. This trip will affect specifically the territory of Marghine-Planargia. This year the Festival aims to put together a team of experts at national level that can dialogue with the territory of central Sardinia and its protagonists, looking for new ideas to recover the local economy, rural tourism, participation and open government, in a resilient way. They want to start launching their project “Brainsurfing”: a week of traveling brainstorming to find the best proposal, which will be spread through the Festival and turned into concrete projects through the direct involvement of citizens.
The festival will provide:
- The realization of BrainSurfing: a meeting between brainstorming and couchsurfing, involving local professionals under 35 to talk about the territory to national experts. During the week of traveling meetings between Macomer and Bosa, they will discover the critical issues and new projects for the Marghine and Sardinia;
- A presentation to the population of the results obtained through the Brainsurfing;
- Workshops through the sharing of outcomes on how to implement the projects arised;
- The involvement of local producers and innovators on Sardinian issues and the pread of their initiatives;
- The creation of two days of cultural activities, theatrical, literary, musical and multimedia events.
6 days to get involved in what is our, in what is about us. 6 days to remember that we do have a brain and neurons that are actually made to create ideas, to make thing going better. If complaining is an epidemic disease, it is also true that resilience is a cure as much contagious as the crises is. Having a resilient attitude is not easy, for sure, but it is powerful. The kind of things that scares usually complains, which makes afraid that everything could really change. However, the very important thing to think about is: what will happen, if nothing changes?
by Leonardo Rossi | Jun 22, 2015 | The Urban Media Lab
An Italian Foundation (CON IL SUD) wants to revalue some buildings (14 to be exact) according to projects made by the local communities, enterprises and institutions. CON IL SUD granted 4 million euros in order to enact such propositions aimed to allow the community to enjoy such common goods in a sustainable way.
This is the third edition of this call that previously managed to enforce 21 projects with a cost of 8 millions euros.
The Foundation asked to the cities of the south of Italy to propose some buildings and places eligible to this end, and 14 out of the 22 proposed were choose. 5 of those are in Sicily, 7 in Puglia and 2 in Campania.
The legal property of this good will be given by the owner (the region) to the organization that won the call for that building for at least 10 years, in advance of knowing what the use will be, and the requests made for the financing of the renewing of a public good cannot exceed 500.000€.
On their website is it still possible to see the full list of the public goods that are part of the call and everyone can present an idea or a project, even when the call will be over on 14th of July 2015.
This experiment aims to make clear that every community wants to cooperate and to put their efforts together in order to achieve a better lifestyle and a better world for everyone to enjoy.
La Fondazione CON IL SUD alla sua terza edizione per la riqualifica dei beni comuni; terza edizione con I fiocchi
La Fondazione CON IL SUD vuole, con la terza edizione di questo bando, rivalutare 14 beni comuni presenti in Sicilia, Puglia e Campania, grazie ad un fondo di 4 milioni di euro.
Grazie a questo bando i progetti scelti saranno sovvenzionati fino ad un massimo di 500.000€ per le spese di ristrutturazione e i vincitori avranno la proprietà del bene assegnato per almeno 10 anni.
Sul sito internet è possibile consultare la lista completa dei beni comuni scelti e, anche dopo la chiusura del bando che si terrà il 14 luglio 2015 sarà possibile proporre idee e progetti.
by Leonardo Rossi | May 15, 2015 | EducationLabs
What happens when a region is scourged by a natural disaster, like an earthquake? There is the time grief, of course, and the time of reconstruction, involving an extremely delicate phase: the healing of the victims’ souls.
That was the motivation that pushed the Ministry of the Tourism and Cultural Activities to fund an initiative, the “Beni Comuni Project”, that gathered the ETR Foundation, ATER and eleven Provinces (Campogalliano, Carpi, Cavezzo, Cento, Concordia sulla Secchia, Finale Emilia, Mirandola, Novi di Modena, San Felice sul Panaro, San Possidonio, Soliera). Their goal was to recover and reunite the spirits of the communities threatened by the 2012 earthquake by an active participation in the organization of public events with the main goal to foster the sharing sense.
This idea is much needed in a time where society tends to be more and more egoistic, full of technological barriers that allows people to communicate easily with one another, but at the same time tends to label those who cannot afford such connections as “social pariah”. Stimulate the spark of active cooperation and sharing may ignite again an essential characteristic of the human soul that is slowly dying as the society evolves.
The Project reunites 24 partners: from schools to theatres and music schools: through the organization of public events, shows, concerts and readings, this group wishes to foster the reconstruction of the populations that survived the earthquake, thanks to arts and artistic expression. In the words of a member of the Project: “a way to allow the community to restore the spaces destroyed by the earthquake and start again with a stronger sharing
spirit”.
This approach is really valuable, also because allows the people’s mind to wander off such grief and crisis and their souls to understand that nothing is over and everything can be solved, as long as there is a common goal and a common support. Act as one, survive as a whole.
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Cosa accade a una comunità quando essa viene distrutta da un cataclisma naturale, come un terremoto? Ovviamente c’è il tempo del dolore, e dopo la ricostruzione inizia una fase delicatissima: la rigenerazione degli spiriti dei cittadini.
A tale proposito è stato finanziato dal Ministero dei Beni e delle Attività Culturali e del Turismo e promosso dal Comune di Carpi in collaborazione con ERT Fondazione e ATER il “Progetto Beni Comuni”.
Esso coinvolge undici Comuni (Campogalliano, Carpi, Cavezzo, Cento, Concordia sulla Secchia, Finale Emilia, Mirandola, Novi di Modena, San Felice sul Panaro, San Possidonio, Soliera) del cratere sismico con l’obiettivo di rinsaldare e ricostruire le identità delle comunità minacciate dal terremoto del 2012 attraverso la partecipazione attiva alla costruzione di eventi artistici che abbiano come orizzonte primario il senso della condivisione e dello stare in comune.
L’idea alla base del Progetto è encomiabile, e potrebbe essere spiegata in vari modi, ma il modo migliore è utilizzare le parole di un esponente del Progetto: “Il progetto Beni Comuni ha un valore intrinseco e speciale. Non è solo un programma destinato alla fruizione, ma un laboratorio di produzione culturale che coinvolge professionisti dello spettacolo ma anche e soprattutto i cittadini. Uno spazio artistico composto da tanti luoghi […]. Un modo concreto per le comunità di rimpadronirsi degli spazi violentati dal sisma e ripartire, con uno spirito di socialità condivisa”.
Questa idea è necessaria anche per un altro motivo: essa consente di far vagare la mente delle vittime del sisma lontano dal dolore e dalla sofferenza, e far capire che nulla è perduto e tutto è superabile, se si collabora e ci si aiuta nella comunità: Agisci come uno, sopravvivi come gruppo.
by Edoardo De Stefani | Apr 30, 2015 | The Urban Media Lab
According to a dictionary definition, cities are originally considered as any settlement where inhabitants decide to establish a community. In its simplicity, a city is an elaborate organization with fixed boundaries and certain powers of government over a densely populated area of citizens.
Ideally there are pertaining characteristics or belongings to a city, which are both physical and non-tangible. Alternatively, we can say that a city needs specific institutional arrangements and governing powers, certain structures, various resources as well as a minimum number of inhabitants.
However, if there is an urban community, a more or less tacit social contract will also be there. It means that the relationship between citizens, institutions and governance structures is defined by certain arrangements, which are the result of a complex process of social bargaining.
Public services are also part of this cluster of bargained arrangements and intuitively, every city proposes a different setting.
Virtually, it is impossible to satisfy all the preferences of the individuals, namely the organs of that specific society. Nonetheless, if anyone would feel to be unluckily born in the wrong place, here there is a game to plan your next departure.
Istatopoli, as called by its creators from ISTAT, the national institute of statistics, is a basic simulation that allows everyone to become mayor of his ideal city. In particular, giving the possibility to choose how to distribute services and public goods among the private, public or non profit sector, it is possible to understand which city in Italy fits mostly with our individual preferences.
The game is essentially based on a set of data that were collected in 2001 and it is complemented by an appealing map that shows in a glance how general services, like water, culture, health and instruction are nowadays distributed in Italy.
For further references or to become mayor for a day, click here for the game!
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Un divertente gioco può trasformarsi in un interessante esperimento di cittadinanza attiva.
L’obiettivo di Istatopoli è quello di far comprendere al cittadino come ciascuna scelta in termini di responsabilità e fornitura di servizi, possa creare città diametralmente opposte.
Scegliendo di assegnare la distribuzione dei servizi tra pubblico, privato e non profit, il giocatore definisce i parametri della sua città ideale. Infine, da un confronto con il database ISTAT, è possibile riconoscere quale sia la città che realmente si avvicina più alle nostre esigenze personali.
Per giocare e ulteriori informazioni, fare click qui.
