Thursday, 11. May 2023
ESIA partners from all five consortium countries came together in Copenhagen to share their learnings and experiences over the past two years.
The two years of this EU funded project to develop and establish national competence centres in our respective countries have come to an end. Our consortium – the European Social Innovation Alliance (ESIA) – concluded this project with a final exhibition where we shared challenges, achievements and learning along the way.
The start of this project coincided with the COVID pandemic which hampered meetings in person early on. With regular online sessions and different digital formats to exchange and learn, we were able to deepen our relationships and strengthen our transnational cooperation.
Our final event in Copenhagen, Denmark, presented key milestones in the process of promoting social innovation and creating the structural conditions for a social innovation competence centre. To close this multifaceted project, our partners from the Social Innovation Exchange (SIX) invited us to share our learnings creatively through an exhibition to encourage us to reflect upon our work over these past two years from a different angle. The final event sharing session was moderated by Louise Pulford from SIX.
The team from the United Kingdom was represented by two colleagues from the Glasgow Caledonian University. They took us on an adventurous tour through the land of ESIA. Six stages of the voyage showed the difficult and strenuous quest to enhance social innovation in the UK where their efforts mainly focused on the ecosystem in Scotland. While Brexit poses its difficulties to further engage in European funded projects, the Scottish partners stressed their ongoing interest to continue the work of the competence centre and to find other ways to maintain close connections with European partners in the future. The efforts to engage with the Scottish government have had promising outcomes, so the partners are hopeful for future activities to strengthen the social innovation ecosystem.
Social innovation action in Poland has been and will continue to be steered and supported by the Shipyard Foundation. Faced with the consequences of the war on Ukraine, the Polish partners have had a lot to cope with. They were engaged with quick response action to help many Ukrainian people coming to Poland while also forming new connections within the social innovation ecosystem in Poland. The ESIA consortium gave the incentive to engage with new stakeholders that they have not interacted with prior to the project. The future of the work on social innovation in Poland heavily depends on the outcome of the coming election and how this will affect public institutions and the infrastructure. The team of the Shipyard Foundation is dedicated to continue their work on a national level, e.g., plans to form an incubator.
The social innovation sector in Estonia is still young but developing well. The Estonian team is the only team within the ESIA consortium that has government ministries as part of their team, namely the Ministry of Interior as well as the Ministry of Social Affairs. All partners are eager to continue the work on supporting and building the social innovation ecosystem in Estonia. Currently they are working on the social innovation 2030 vision document which is envisioned to be a stepping stone to invite more government ministries and other actors to work on a national strategy of social innovation in the future.
Six core partners and four affiliated partners have been involved in shaping the German competence centre. With that many actors involved, tasks and work packages had to be distributed within the team. The German team had to work differently from the other smaller teams within the ESIA consortium, which presented its own strengths and challenges. Looking back on the two years of setting up the national competence centre, milestones were achieved and closer connections built. The diversity of the German partners also allowed us to reach the social innovation ecosystem more extensively. Some of the German partners have secured a project with the government ministries that allow the national activities to continue. At the same time, there is an interest to keep the involvement on a transnational level and to deepen the connection with partners across Europe.
Denmark’s relationship to social innovation is ambiguous. On the one hand, the history of the country’s social system and infrastructure are deeply ingrained in the development of the social state. Yet on the other hand, the term social innovation is used just by a few. The Danish Design Center and the Akademiet for Social Innovation, who was also the host for this final event, are actively working to push for more conversations on social innovation in Denmark. Looking into the future, Danish initiatives like “The path for all” will continue as well as their efforts to push for a national strategy on social innovation. With the plans of establishing a “Future museum” the Danish partners keep pursuing their mission to be the connector of connectors building a “hub of hubs”. On a transnational level, they value and appreciate the inspiration and knowledge exchange among the European partners.
ESIA’s final event opened up the space for all partners to share their reflections of the achievements, challenges and learnings from the past two years. The last time for now, this diverse European group enjoyed the opportunity to connect and learn from each other. With hope, excitement and some uncertainty, ESIA partners move into the future ready to pursue their actions to promote and strengthen the ecosystem of social innovation – nationally and transnationally.
The final event took place in Copenhagen on April 21, 2023.
The European Social Innovation Alliance is a joint project of Centre for Social Investment, Danish Design Centre, Danish Social Innovation Academy, Diakonie Schleswig-Holstein, FASE GmbH, Foundation for Civil Society, Glasgow Caledonian University, Institute for Work and Technology, Phineo gAG, Social Entrepreneurship Netzwerk Deutschland e.V., Shipyard Foundation, Social Enterprise Estonia, Social Innovation Exchange, Tallinn University, Technical University Dortmund, Võru County Development Agency with the lead partner Social Impact gGmbH and is funded by the European Commission via the European Social Fund and the European Programme for Employment and Social Innovation.
