Do Something - the International Summer School on Social Innovation

The event was co-organised by the Social Innovation Exchange (SIX) whose home is at the Young Foundation, along with Health Launchpad. Also amongst those attending were SIX’s core partners including School for Social Entrepreneurs; the Canadian Centre for Social Innovation, Philips Design from the Netherlands; the Calouse Gulbenkian Foundation who sponsored the event and Asix, the Australian and New Zealand version of SIX.

In Innovation Nation, American John Kao, quotes painter Jasper Johns, “Do something. Do something to that, and then do something to that. Pretty soon you’ve got something.” But, that “something” could be socially innovative (at least from a certain point of view) and exceedingly bad for mankind: Hitler’s concentration camps come to mind. So what kind of “something” were the social innovators in San Sebastian interested in creating?

One definition of social innovation is that it’s about finding new ways to satisfy unmet social needs. Certain problems are proving intractable - climate change; an ageing population; long term chronic diseases; economic inequality. So, how do we generate social change from the bottom up, rather than top down, releasing the capacity in people to find fresh solutions?

Geoff Mulgan of the Young Foundation, at the summer school’s opening presentation, talked of the importance of “connectors” who treat “No” as a question and who work across professions, drawing inspiration from a broad range or resources - for instance, science, arts, management and activism.

He also pointed out that innovation only becomes imperative when crisis looms and social problems grow worse. Then, systems fail to work and institutions react to the past rather than give priority to the pressing challenges of the present. In the UK, for instance, the NHS is still centred on acute hospital care - but over 15 million people suffer from chronic diseases, such as arthritis and diabetes, that require a different kind of support.

“Thinking differently”, working against the grain, breaking down barriers, bringing well known ingredients together in a different alliance, are among the routes to successful social innovation. Thinking differently, for instance, led to Red Nose Day; combining comedy, public participation, social need and television. Thinking differently is responsible for keyhole surgery and The Samaritans.

Thinking differently was the main motif in the life of Michael Young, after whom the Young Foundation is named. He breathed social innovation, creating amongst other organizations: the Open University, the Consumer’s Association and a precursor to NHS Direct.

In San Sebastian, the summer school offered a range of examples of thinking differently in the form of services, processes, research and projects. Kim Yon- Hee from the Hope Institute in Seoul, described how a “Complaints Festival” encourages individuals to voice their dissent on a web site and how they are encouraged to work to correct the problem - important in a country new to democracy.

Jack Heath from Australia set up Inspire, a web based organisation designed by and for young people that offers support to the 75% of youth who have mental health problems and who don’t seek help. Inspire also encourages this group to make a practical difference and become active citizens. Another way of saying they matter.Since 1997, teenage suicide rates in Australia have dropped by 55%.

Alessandra Dal Colle detailed the workings of Banca Prossima, the only bank in Europe that lends soley to the third sector: 250,000 non-profit organisations that support the needs of over 35 million people. The bank funds projects with a high social value. Profits do not go to shareholders but to a special solidarity fund.

Representatives from Mondragon Co-operative Corporation (MCC), the co-hosts of the summer school, described how the largest and most successful co-operative in the world provides work for 80,000 people in 264 businesses including a Co-operative University.

Social innovation has been a constant theme for over fifty years. MCC’s work resonates with the efforts in the UK to find work for the long term unemployed and the poorly skilled. At the heart of the co-operative’s philosophy is that employment, a fair wage and self-respect are directly link to well being and good health.

From Holland, Joeri van den Steenhoven, founder of Kennisland (Knowledgeland) “a think tank that does” said his aim was to create, “a smarter Dutch society” - more vigilant, critical and participatory. He gave an example of one of the many schemes, the Kafka Project (now being adopted by the Welsh Assembly) that, prompted by citizens, investigates unnecessary red tape and works to reduce it.

None of these projects could have been as effective four decades ago. What’s made a difference is the web; grass roots community activists connected globally.

However, huge challenges remain. One is diffusion. Invention is the creation of an idea; innovation is its development, implementation and scaling up. Diffusion is the valley of death for social innovation. The Darzi review of the next stage of NHS reform pointed out that while £3. 6 billion of public investment went into health innovation in 2007/8 (with very mixed results) only 4% of that was spent on diffusion.

A second issue discussed at summer camp was that of methods and tools. Robin Murray and Julie Caulier-Grice of the Young Foundation spoke of their work in collating over 250 different ways to conduct social innovation.

These include the Health Launchpad notion of acting as an incubator or accelerator for ideas, investing seed money and offering professional support. Another avenue is to seek out positive deviants , those who find their own solutions, against the odds to the challenges they face. For example, in the health field, changing harmful behaviour (too much alcohol; too little exercise) successfully devising their own motivation so behaviour change - the elusive factor in health policy - does take place.

Another concern raised constantly over the three days was the long term purpose of social innovation. If it is a means to an end - what precisely is that end? Innovation is not improvement. The latter is about small incremental steps, the former implies deep social change. But a number of the social innovators at the summer school came from countries only just engaging in democracy; their activism is in countries in which the radical element of social innovation has to be covert or it will be harnessed before it can have a catalytic impact.

“Mass collaboration” and "participation” (Wikipedia et al), are words often seized upon to describe the democratising potential of the world wide web. However, collaboration and participation are neutral actions without political roots. Collaboration and participation can be used by any and all political parties. So, what else makes social innovation distinctive as a force for radical change? Does it involve a common set of values that apply internationally? And if it does, what are they?

Some participants at the summer school disagreed. They said they saw social innovation as a spark to light the flame but how brightly that flame burned was not their concern.

Others argued that social innovation was vital to the creation of a socially just world in which individuals are recognised as more than shoppers , consumers and labour fodder; and in which their capacity to work together for the common good is recognised and utilised; politics minus the cynicism.

“What this is, is the beginning of a movement, - but what kind of movement it is, I’m not at all sure,” said one of the participants from the USA. “That’s why it matters all the more that, across the globe, we learn from each other’s mistakes; we share the successes and we see what we can build together. ”

Or, as futurist Eric Best pointed out, in social innovation, “There is a profound difference between getting it - and getting it done.”

Roll on next year’s international summer school.