It is a circle of reflection of a new kind which is launched this Wednesday, at the instigation of the SOS group.
The Impact Tank, an associative structure, matured for several months by the number one in the social and solidarity economy in Europe (21,500 people employed in 2019, present in 45 countries), appears as the first "
think-and-do -tank
”dedicated to promoting and scaling up social innovations with a positive impact.
While many think tanks study public policies, but rarely what happens in the field, the Impact Tank is original in that it relies on the opposite approach.
Clearly, the idea is to have researchers and academics work together with professionals, particularly working in Ephad, or in the early childhood sector, and members of associations working with vulnerable audiences.
The latter will have the task of detecting the most innovative experiments required by society, while researchers and academics will objectify the impact of these good practices, by evaluating the costs that they allow society to avoid.
The Impact Tank will then disseminate the results of these studies to decision-makers so that they inspire public debate.
“
The social sector is very organized, rich in initiatives and networking.
Our goal is to create content that is widely shared, by associating different actors at the municipal, departmental, regional level.
It will then be up to the state to adapt its own policies.
Our approach is intended to make relations between the academic world and the social world more fluid
, ”notes Agnès Audier, President of the Impact Tank, who also heads the SOS Senior group association.
The Impact Tank's steering committee includes among its members, Frédéric Mion, director of Sciences Po, Jean Chambaz, president of Sorbonne University, and Jean-Christophe Combe, director general of the French Red Cross.
The initiatives implemented to alleviate the feeling of ill-being in fragile rural and peri-urban areas, or even how to get fragile people to become experts in certain procedures, will be among the first topics studied.
“
Our approach is very open.
We are not trying to substitute for anything.
Interesting initiatives come from the economic world and are patented.
Social innovation, for its part, is not patented, but is spread,
”concludes Agnès Audier.
