Social Innovation in the Netherlands

Euclid Network Board Member Chris Sigaloff, of Dutch organisation Kennisland, reports that Social Innovation is finally getting attention in the Netherlands.

As previously published by Euclid Network, Knowledge and the Waag Society (an institute for art, science and technology) have jointly created a manifesto for social innovation, the idea stemming from a meeting held with Euclid Network with regards to setting up Social Innovation Network Netherlands. This manifesto will be used to influence the political parties in the run up to elections this September. You can find it here.

This development is an important first step for the country, since for a long time the concept of Social Innovation and civil society was not widely accepted and was not in accordance with its use in Europe.

Possible reasons for this are:

• the term ‘social innovation’ was in the hands of the Labour Unions and was narrowed down to the social circumstances employees had to work in (workplace improvement). The focus was on new forms of management, self-organisation, new mobile ways of working, labour productivity etc.
• In the Netherlands civil society has a long tradition of being organised by institutions. There is an intricate system in place where different groups in society are represented by their own governing bodies.
• Social entrepreneurship is not seen as being distinct to regular entrepreneurship.
• There is a long standing faith in the ‘economic growth model’ and a strong state which is in charge of societal renewal.
• The Netherlands is in a phase of being anti-Europe. This results in a focus on the Netherlands instead of on Europe.

For this reason, Euclid Network has a potentially important role to play in the Netherlands: It gives support to local initiatives; it bridges the gap between the Netherlands and Brussels; it provides the possibility to operate in European networks. In recent years it has given valuable input to strategic meetings and provided Kennisland, one of the country’s leaders on social innovation, the possibility to participate within Europe, thereby strengthening the support for Social innovation in the Netherlands.