Maailman muuttajat

Antti Halonen

In the spirit of UK’s Freedom of Information Act HM Government recently launched a website (http://data.gov.uk) where all public information is to be presented in a computer-readable and easily accessible format.

In a nutshell the purpose of data.gov.uk is to open up all non-personal data for free reuse. An easy access to data is believed to encourage citizens to create innovative applications for purposes of different kinds.

The obvious advantage of the free data project is the enhancement of both civic activity and government transparency. It clearly emphasises the importance of an old mantra used by information professionals worldwide – right information for the right people at the right time. In a democratic civic society this mantra basically means that all public information should be accessible to all, at any time.

The open data project could potentially mean a promising opportunity to social entrepreneurship as well. Our society is filled with active and innovative people who only need the last and decisive ignition to jumpstart a successful social enterprise.

Open and free data could just be that ignition. For an example, imagine a scenario where – after collecting and analysing relevant information from the free database – a group of individuals decide to set up a community-owned nursery in an area where there is a high number of low-income families and a shortage of free day care services, thereby empowering the community by increasing the earning potential of families.

It has to be noted, though, that there are already numerous advert-financed non-profit websites online (”mashups”) which present useful societal information in a user-friendly way, both in UK and in Finland. One example of such a mashup is a scheme presented in leading Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat (HS 8.2.2010), which interviewed two voluntary fire fighters who had come up with a mashup that places on map all emergencies reported to the national emergency centre. All income from adverts is invested to further development of the service.

If social entrepreneurs as a group endorse the ideology of open data, then this could be seen as a significant argument for the benefits of freedom of information at large. That is to say, one main initiative behind document publicity has always been the enhancement of citizens’ scope for action.

Naturally this commits social enterprises to even greater transparency within their own administration and governance. Theoretically and ideologically perhaps even more interesting issue is the transparency within social enterprises. Social enterprises are not merely customers benefiting from open data policy but they also have a heavy responsibility to act by freedom of information principles.

Transparency indeed is one of the cornerstone values of social entrepreneurship. As the benefit goes directly – in most cases anyway – to the community, it is only logical that the decision-making processes and accounting are open to community as well. Question is, whether social entrepreneurs can capitalise this golden chance to prove that the necessity of document secrecy in the world of business is merely a myth – if it indeed is.

In the meantime, they can by all means pick all the open data cherries of the freedom of information cake and create a flourishing network of free data –powered social enterprises. And why not teach other enterprises a lesson about the advantages of transparency and open data as well.

Antti Karjalainen

CIA used to be an abbreviation that was spoken of in the dark corridors of Kreml during the cold war, but in the cold January evening in Cardiff CIA was full of life. Cardiff International Arena (CIA) hosted the annual Social Enterprise Coalition conference, Voice10, about a week ago.

Given that Britain is struggling with one of the worst economic periods ever, and preparing for general election, the atmosphere in the conference of a rapidly emerging sector of British economy was fantastic. There is no party like the one thrown by social entrepreneurs. The conference hosted hundreds of delegates and was almost fully subscribed, as usual, including some delegates from Finland; around 100 enterprises had stands outside the main hall and keynote speakers from ministerial level. One did not get an impression of a struggling economic sector.

One of the highlights of the conference for me was Phillip Blonds’ presentation. The man that has been labelled as the ’Red Tory’. He presented his view on how the opportunity for Social Enterprise is really at hand. His case was based on the ways of doing business without costing for environmental or social impact has come the end of its due to people’s frustration and economic climate. In short greed is not very cool anymore. On other hand there is the argument that welfare state as a paternal system has also come to the end of its era. It’s financially unsustainable and it is not empowering people to look after themselves. Former he called the ’right problem’ and the latter ’the left problem’.

From the pressure of these two problems the social enterprise, or rather community powered business that offers public services, could emerge. He did not give many examples, but one could imagine a corner shop, which used to contribute to the community by providing milk and newspaper and an occasional chat with neighbours. Perhaps in the Blond era, the corner shop does all that but in addition it offers a place for occasional health visitor to pop in, or it could be taken over by the local nursery that uses the profit to fund child care for those less well off in the community. Or something much more imaginable where public service is provided in local ownership, governed locally and funded by mixture of revenues streams from contracts to business. Perhaps the most radical suggestion he made was that the red tape around public sector contracts should be scrapped and simplified significantly. Of course he said more and he said it in more sophisticated ways than I can recall here and it was enjoyable. I think his identification of the problem was intelligent and I’m sure he’s got a book in the pipeline, which I look forward to reading. A voice close to the possible future government supporting social enterprise is very welcome.

The difference to last year’s conference, Voice09, was that the organisations that provide support for Social Enterprises were more visible than before. For instance, my local is nursery is exploring the Social Enterprise route, and I had a chat with South-East of England Business and Community partnership network to make some contacts. There was an equivalent organisation present from virtually every part of the country. Of course this can mean that they have just found the Social Enterprise Coalition but more likely it means that the additional funds provided by the government to support SE has found its way to businesses. Another highlight was the launch of the Social Enterprise Mark (hence the bad pun in the title)- they are claiming that they will become as well known as the fairtrade brand. I have no doubt that they will, the idea is brilliant and hopefully consumers will starts to recognise it very soon (fair trade went in 8 years from 1 of 5 consumers recognising it to 7 out of 10 consumers).

The feeling I left the conference with was upbeat and slightly envious. There was a huge amount of social innovation in that room and many great ideas in various stages of execution. When will we see something like that in Finland? (Snif)