(by Stefania Capogna) On July 8, 2020, through a multi-voiced comparison on the theme "Between Innovation and Inclusion at the time of Covid-19", the seventh Digital Conference was held, promoted by the DITES research center (Digital Technologies, Education & Society).
The Round Table was created in collaboration with the Link Campus University's DASIC (Digital Administration and Social Innovation Center), the Italian Digital Revolution Association (AIDR), Diversity Opportunity and with the sponsorship of the Volunteer Service Center of Lazio. With the intention of reflecting on possible ways out of the emergency, the focus of the debate focused on one of the most important risks of our society, aggravated by the global pandemic, that of abandoning the most fragile people. In a period where, due to force majeure, we are forced to change our habits and reschedule our lives according to new and not entirely clear needs and priorities, a fundamental objective for social stability is to include those who risk to be overwhelmed by a change too big and too deep to be faced and overcome alone.
It is Sila Mochi who opens the debate by presenting the Women's Inclusion project launched in 2018, with the aim of systematizing the many efforts faced by a plethora of individual women's associations, engaged in various capacities in building a system that knows how to recognize and enhance the gender difference and, at the same time, design a person-friendly society. The testimony focuses on the presentation of the program created by this network which brings together over 33 women's associations under the pressure of the emergency. The illustrated program aims to identify the fil rouge of intervention together with a set of shared objectives around which to recognize and work together for post-Covid. The construction of this broader alliance has led the Inclusione Donna network to draw up a program divided into seven points to bring to the attention of the institutions to guarantee women too, traditionally considered a fragile category and on the margins of the world of work and strategic choices nationals, to be able to make their contribution in all locations and in all fields of knowledge, to lead the country out of the crisis we are experiencing.
Giuliana Cresce (CVS Lazio) shifts the attention to the crucial role played by volunteering during the lockdown, focusing in particular on the experience of the Lazio region, where there is a very deep-rooted network of associations which, during the quarantine, albeit with some difficulty, had offered an essential contribution to the containment of the discomfort aggravated by the various forms of poverty that distinguish this very heterogeneous territory. In fact, Covid-19 has dramatically exacerbated all situations of fragility, isolation and poverty (educational, economic and extreme) present in the area. However, the response to this emergency has been unanimous. In addition to the volunteers already involved in the need, there were also many citizens who spontaneously made themselves available to the COC (Municipal Operational Centers), providing all possible supports. The emergency, paradoxically, has made the infrastructure of volunteering stronger, through a renewed civic activism and a transversal collaboration between multiple associations that have allowed us to read the territory, in its various facets, from another point of view. Although the seriousness of the state of emergency has required to intervene in the first place in the distribution of basic necessities, the network of volunteers that has been created has also guaranteed to contain situations of isolation, provide digital services where they were missing and, therefore , to maintain social cohesion, promoting the inclusion of the most fragile categories. In his opinion, the mapping of needs before Covid-19 was clear enough but the quarantine revealed a completely different picture of the submerged need, and this required activating innovative solutions and more structured responses that could benefit both from the ability to response from the many local associations, both from many new entries in the organized voluntary sector, testifying to the great vitality and strength of a sector that operates every day, in the silence and shadow of ordinary everyday life. In this regard, Cresce recalls that “every day a silent army of human potential at the service of people engages in its daily struggle, often even in the midst of the difficulties that the institutions themselves are able to procure, unable to recognize the value and the precious support of this commitment ”.
A service that must not be trivially read in terms of - albeit significant - economic contribution. But of the even more important generative economy and of the gift that represent the foundations on which social relations have been built and developed since the beginning of time. The experience of Covid-19 for the CSV of Lazio represented a moment of increasing the potential involved through the spontaneous activation of a large part of citizenship; and at the same time the possibility of measuring oneself with the organization and supply of completely new services to respond to indispensable needs in the exercise of full citizenship. But, above all, it provided awareness of a new strength and the relevance of the role played alongside the institutions. A force to which it is not enough to resort only in the management of the emergency, but which must be fully called to co-plan the future of an inclusive society, capable of looking at the various forms of poverty that afflict the system, and that transcend the gap digital.
It is Mariella Bruno (Diversity Opportunity) who takes up and broadens the concept of 'diversity'. The company of which she is founder, in fact, has made diversity its strategic core competence by dedicating itself, through an innovative and unconventional perspective, to diversity in all its forms (accompaniment to the work of the weakest groups due to generational, cultural, gender and disability). The thrust that drives Diversity Opportunity is to propose the enhancement of diversity as an accelerator of innovation, through constant investment, training and cultural transformation, and the recognition and enhancement of technologies as enabling factors. In this perspective, heterogeneity is conceived as a value capable of creating positive comparisons and, therefore, of innovating organizational systems to improve the performance of the productive fabric. In the lockdown phase, all the energies of Diversity Opportunity focused on one of the most forgotten categories of the emergency: young people who have seen the doors of the future locked. Young people are among those who have most felt the sense of abandonment with the closure of all the much sought-after opportunities for personal and professional growth such as internships, internships, integration opportunities, job search. Everything has stopped. This block has been serious for the market and is likely to weigh even more in the re-start phase when we impoverish the resources, talents and potential of an entire generation. For this reason, Diversity Opportunity's response to promote inclusion, through innovation, was played on two fronts. First of all, a series of mini online courses were launched to accompany young people to face this moment of extraordinary difficulty, bringing out strategic skills for work and life such as “learning to be resilient”; rebuild a normal relationship life in a digital key; reorganize the time of life and work, etc. Secondly, the normal selection initiatives promoted by Diversity Opportunity have moved to digital, through digital hackathons in which companies, young people, universities and the Third Sector met to talk of sustainability, inclusion and creativity. The thing that emerged strongly is the need "to create a system with the Third Sector and with the University, because only in this way is it possible to design the future and the change that is already here".
The concept of sustainability is also taken on as a driver of change by Pinuccia Montanari (President of the Ecoistituto ReGe Scientific Committee) who introduces the theme of inequalities and the emergence of the new concept of "biopolitics". Montanari in fact underlines how the pandemic has aggravated old and new inequalities, bringing to light the centrality of some critical issues that act across the board, such as the digital divide that weighs on the possibility or not of participating actively and responsibly in cultural, school and democratic, marking the fate of a country, a territory, a community, also in reference to the possibility of containing the contagion and the exit from the crisis situation. In his opinion, the socio-health emergency has brought out the need for a new vision of community, as community and territoriality are linked to the theme of inequalities. The first observations that can be made starting from its privileged observatory is that the territories that adopt resilient strategies are better able to overcome crises, "as in the case of Emilia Romagna which has put in place the overcoming of the hospitalized vision of pathologies, creating real health corridors that have made it possible to reduce the strong impact of Covid ". The pandemic has highlighted the social disparities and its virulence not only with the most marginalized groups such as the elderly, or people suffering from previous pathologies, but above all the poor, who often add up the initial social inequalities, and those connected to the fact of living in a disadvantaged area, lacking adequate resources, services and care. A glance at the global impact of the virus is enough to understand which countries and populations are most affected. This means that if you want a sustainable future you need to start from a design that is able to put the territory back at the center. The socio-sanitary and economic emergency can only be overcome through a resilient territorial response. The concept of "biopolitics" therefore means an approach in which the territory assumes a central character, within a "glocal" perspective capable of looking at the world system in order to respond unanimously to the search for common solutions. In his opinion, the crisis has taught above all that it is necessary to restart from the environment in order to protect its sustainability through the conversion of production and cultural systems. A path that can be made starting from a technological innovation that is capable of designing new circular economy chains based on reuse, savings and new decision-making matrices. In this sense, policies must become “biopolitical”, ie actions based on the culture of data and the centrality of the person.
And it is precisely in the proposal of an innovative design vision, capable of placing the person at the center that the contribution of Antonio Opromolla (DASIC) is based. A scholar of innovation and the impact that digital technologies can bring to society, he focuses in particular on how digital technologies can support the inclusion of fragile categories, starting with the enhancement of the concept of person. In fact, a good technological solution must be centered on the person in his different abilities at different moments in life. This is why we talk about Human Centered design trying to understand first of all how people, or particular categories of people, interact with a service, to understand the experience of the hypothetical user, its context, the personal and emotional aspects that accompany the experience, with the aim of studying the best solutions for your needs. A design capable of recognizing the centrality of the person integrates the tools of social research. The key word is "accessibility". However innovative this approach may appear, in reality it has its roots in the late 70s and is based on the principle of co-design, capable of bringing out the needs of the subjects through an accompanying path that leads to awareness, and promotes an action to empower citizenship.
And it is precisely from the theme of active citizenship that the intervention of Giulio Scorza (Department for Innovation and Digitization) starts, underlining how the emergency we have gone through has dramatically brought to light, when ever it was needed, whereas the digital divide in this country is an urgent need that cannot be postponed; and the delays accumulated over many years have worsened in the course of this emergency. “An important part of the population has no digital skills; while it is now clear how digital skills and access to technology are precious tools for full citizenship ". For the first time in our country it was said that "the Internet should be a fundamental right". An evidence already underlined by Stefano Rodotà 15 years ago. Today the centrality of digital and innovation in the life of society as a whole is finally evident. This places a great responsibility on the shoulders of policy makers, that of driving digital transformations. A transformation that has to deal with inequalities that not only concern the digital divide but also the different forms of hardship and poverty that amplify the divergences, moving further and further into those who were already last among the last. Scorza points out that the problems are varied and require strong and diversified interventions. First of all, we must deal with the age-old issue of connectivity, as we continue to count families, minorities, communities and territories with zero connectivity that prevents them from accessing any type of service. Furthermore, the issue of accessibility of sites and services must be addressed in order to promote inclusion even in the face of any disabilities. But the biggest challenge is that which concerns the ability to listen to politics and the delays of the administrative machinery. Finally, it should be remembered that on this front the issues to be addressed are complex and too often institutions do not have adequate internal resources and skills to guide this difficult change. Nevertheless, no matter how complex it is, one cannot give up listening. Instead, all the necessary conditions must be created so that listening is translated into a push from below, collaboration with the social forces present in the territories, activation of a citizenship capable of exercising rights and duties, also enhancing the contribution that digital can offer to make this listening and participation itself is ever more effective.
In an attempt to summarize this very rich comparison that has tried to look at the innovation-inclusion couple through a multi-perspective approach, we will focus on some points that seem to represent the common denominator of all the contributions.
In the first place, a fact that appears to be transversal to the various testimonies is the profound crisis of traditional organizational models which are identified in pyramidal and rigid structures, a "compartmentalised" work process and top-down communication, where even policies follow the reassuring logic of linear and automatic implementation, which considers the rules a mere executive act that descends from the center to the peripheries.
To this seems to add a leadership crisis, transversal to many sectors, which is struggling to ferry the complexity fueled by the swirling change brought about by digital in all sectors and aggravated by the global pandemic. The crisis of these traditional forms of government on which the fortune of modern society has developed is inscribed in the crisis of the welfare state, translated into Italian with the concept of welfare state. A model that was born just after the Second World War to guarantee state intervention in the market economy, in order to guarantee the assistance and well-being of citizens, ensuring safety for all social categories; survival in emergency situations; support for particularly disadvantaged categories; access to basic services; equal opportunities in accessing life chances etc. But the current translation of welfare state in Italy has come to take on a negative meaning which underlines its 'passivating' traits which, perpetrated over time, risk depleting the territories, people, communities, progressively limiting listening, proximity and participation spaces, progressively leading to the determination of situations of isolation and detachment in the territories and reducing the strength of aggregation and comparison of the collective actor and intermediate bodies more or less formal.
A further element of continuity, which emerged from all the interventions, is to be found in the energy, enthusiasm and participation of which the various testimonies were bearers through examples of design, innovation and reaction, showing resilience and opening the way to development models focused on the sharing and co-responsibility of local actors. The shared experiences open the trail to alternative socio-organizational models based on an idea of Welfare Community, otherwise known as shared welfare. A welfare idea that addresses the creation of communities co-interested in:
- create the conditions for improving the quality of life of citizens, workers and families, also for the purpose of a better (and sustainable) use of the resources and skills present in the area;
- rebuild livable and recognizable communities based on an idea of proximity able to integrate real and digital to favor virtuous circles of exchange, communication and sharing;
- promoting community empowerment where people are enabled to make informed and responsible choices not only on a personal level but also, and above all, with reference to the repercussions on the community and the future.
To promote a widespread culture of the welfare community, however, it is necessary to leave room for new policy approaches capable of enhancing and making the concept of diversity their own, by recognizing the specificities through which to develop complementarity, synergy and inclusion.
The pandemic crisis has given us the opportunity to discover the versatility and transversality of digital technology on which Italy has always suffered a serious delay. The counterpart to this discovery consists in the risk of falling in love which minimizes and decontextualizes the accompanying processes, assuming it as a sort of panacea for all ills. While it is essential to always remember that behind, inside, before and after digital and every technological innovation there are, and must be, people. There can be no innovation if we forget the foundation behind all technological progress. For this reason, another transversal element to the contributions collected, which inspires and guides change and the recognition of the value and strategic role that territories can and must play when it comes to innovation and inclusion, is the ethical question. Designing a new idea of welfare, oriented to the concept of community (welfare community), means anchoring individual and collective action to the idea of social co-responsibility which, on the one hand, is aimed at active, participating and responsible citizens but on the other. undertakes to enable all citizens to express their resources by removing the legacy (the historical, cultural and contextual heritage) that invalidate their full and responsible participation. In this regard, Sen talks about the capabilities approach, because it is true that digital creates many opportunities for integration, inclusion and decentralization but also creates many new invisibles that can be such for many diversified reasons ranging from economic to cultural poverty. , cognitive, emotional and social.
Lastly, a further element of transversality that underlies the various interventions concerns the fear of seeing wasted the opportunity for redemption that is played around the cohesion force released by these "aggregating concepts" such as: inclusion, sustainability, circularity; equity. In fact, the risk is that of emptying these concepts of meaning through the rhetorical drifts that accompany great occasions without having the strength to translate them into concrete actions capable of directing interventions. Interventions that could find inspiration in Thompson's five-R rule that to pursue social innovation it is necessary to: rethink; redesign; restructuring; reinvent and realign. But the drama of the global pandemic taught the value of resilience which somehow summarizes and actualizes this concept.
This reasoning can be concluded by paraphrasing a speech by Kurt Vonnegut (Thoughts of a Free Thinker, speech for the award ceremony, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, 1974). "There are many things that can be done but perhaps the most daring and most important thing we can do today is to create stable communities", where to be recognized, met and listened to, to overcome that risk of isolation that grips us and that has represented the most serious threat and fear of the global pandemic. The positive and not to be dispersed legacy of this social and economic drama lies precisely in the value of the innovative and generative cooperation which territories and associations have shown, and which awaits us now in the test of politics.
Stephanie Capogna - Associate Professor and Director of the Research Center Digital Technologies, Education & Society, Link Campus University and Head of AIDR Digital Education Observatory