Social Innovation Eurovision

Jan Jakub (Kuba) Wygnanski is a sociologist by training. He started his public activity as a Solidarity activist in Poland. Kuba started several NGOs including KLON/JAWOR Association and Forum of Nongovernmental Initiatives (FIP) which plays a key role as representative of the Polish Third Sector. He was the initiator and coordinator of a multi-year systemic project of the Polish Model of Social Economy. Currently, Kuba is the President of the Unit for Social Innovation and Research SHIPYARD.

Kuba shares the work of the Shipyard Foundation in Poland, an organisation that works on  multiple levels from working with civic organisations on the ground to supporting incubators to shifting systems in public participation. He talks about the social innovations happening in Poland currently, in response to the recent crisis in Ukraine.

Minna works as a civil society advisor at the Estonian Ministry of the Interior. Her role includes policy making in the field of social innovation and social economy at a national level and she believes that social innovation plays a key role in finding solutions to very complex and sometimes unpredictable societal problems.

In this episode, Minna shares about her work in the Estonian government and the unique socio-historical context of innovation in Estonia – which straddles between both the digital and social, local and national spaces.

Geoff Mulgan is Professor of Collective Intelligence, Public Policy and Social Innovation at University College London. Over the years, Geoff has had many roles - as a CEO, social entrepreneur, policy-maker and author, working at different times in civil society, government, technology and academia, always curious about how the world works and how it can be changed for the better.

In this episode, Geoff talks to us about why social innovation matters and how the field has developed in the UK context. He shares his lessons about how to institutionalise social innovation, the importance of learning from other places and what gives him hope for the future.

Until recently, Katrin Elsemann was the Managing Director of the German social entrepreneurship network, SEND and the co-founder of two social enterprises. SEND was founded in order to increase communication and collaboration between social entrepreneurs as well as to build bridges with actors outside the social entrepreneurship scene, aiming to improve the general ecosystem for social enterprises in Germany.

During her time in SEND, Katrin has led a successful social innovation advocacy campaign with German political leaders which was critical in putting social innovation onto Germany’s national agenda. Katrin shares her insights on working with political leaders across various ideological spectrums and what it takes to create a successful advocacy campaign for fostering a national social innovation ecosystem.

Stéphane Vincent is the founder and director of "la 27e Région" (Region 27), a French action-tank dedicated to the public sector created in 2008. La 27e Région plays the role of a “public transformation lab” and explores new ways to improve public policies and policy making, inspired by service design, ethnography, open source and "makers" cultures.

This episode addresses public innovation and co-creation in the french context. Stéphane discusses creating a new social contract, reframing relationships with the public sector and the ways in which public sectors can innovate and transform. Tune in to hear Stéphane’s insights from decades of working with the public sector in France.

Amalia was previously elected as a member of the Athens Municipality City Council and vice mayor for civil society and innovation from May 2014 to September 2019. She created the digital platform “synAthina” which was further developed into an idea that won one of the five Mayors Challenge awards of 1 million euro from Bloomberg Philanthropies in September 2014.

Prior to the Municipality she was working as an independent documentary producer since 1998. She has a B.A. in Social Anthropology from the London School of Economics and an M.A. in Media Studies from the New School for Social Research in New York in 1991.

In this episode she shares her role as an intermediary and translator in between funders, governments and civic society.

Filipe Almeida is the President of Portugal Social Innovation, a visionary government initiative that mobilises European funds to promote social innovation and social entrepreneurship, and develop the social investment market in Portugal.

In this episode, Filipe talks about how the Portuguese government developed a national policy to catalyse the social innovation ecosystem over the last decade. He also provides his vision for a connected future in Europe. Tune in to hear key learnings in experimental social financing solutions, cross sector partnership building and the Portuguese nation-wide social innovation capacity building support strategy.

https://inovacaosocial.portugal2020.pt/en/about-us/portugal-inovacao-social/

Uffe Elbæk is a Danish social worker, author, entrepreneur, politician and founder of the political party The Alternative. In 1982, he founded an open platform for cultural and social entrepreneurship called Frontløberne and in 1991, he established The KaosPilots, an alternative business school in Aarhus. From October 2011 to December 2012 he served as the Danish Minister of Culture. He is currently a Member of Folketing (Danish Parliament).

In this episode, Uffe shares his decades of experience working across different sectors.

This episode comes at an interesting personal time for Uffe as he concludes his final term in parliament. Uffe reflects upon more than 40 years of work experience. He observes that the best of entrepreneurs are outsiders - people who didn’t feel they fitted into mainstream culture. This episode also highlights the power of civil society in the Danish context, the climate crisis and the potential of relationships to create webs of social change. Do not miss out on this inspiring conversation!

Hosted by So Jung Rim and Louise Pulford, music by Evan Schaeffer, produced by Fié Neo.

How can better collaboration between bees and trees create a better Europe?

This podcast will explore the interaction between social innovators and the environment they function in. The bees are the small, nimble organisations and the people with new and creative ideas. The trees are the big, resilient organisations that work at scale. We need more cross pollination between the two, and more connected networks.

We will zoom in and out of what makes social innovations work in different places around Europe and beyond, discussing the interaction of micro and macro approaches. We will bring you the perspectives from practitioners and thought leaders to policy makers and artists at the heart of social action.

We hope the podcast will leave you feeling hopeful about a more sustainable and equitable future for Europe. We hope it will inspire you to create change in your own communities, workplaces and worlds.

This podcast is part of The European Social Innovation Alliance (ESIA), funded by the European Commission. 

Hosted by So Jung Rim and Louise Pulford, music by Evan Schaeffer, produced by Fié Neo.