Culture and the SDGs
enhancing creative cross-sectoral collaborations
CROSS-SECTORAL COLLABORATION PROPOSALS
International Collective of Community-Activator Incubators
Team members
Ayerra, Magdalena (Argentina)
Linares Figueruelo, Alejandra (Spain)
Miyazaki, Aya (Japan)
Bhattacharyya, Sneha (India)
Jmal, Nadia (Tunisia)
Salvarita, Razcel Janl (Philippines)
Gao, Liyuan (China)
Partners
Culture and Sustainability Lab / Cultural Relations Platform
Context
We are living in a time of chaos, conflict, and uncertainties. How does one face climate change, violence, inequalities, mental health issues? We need to strengthen ties in order to build more resilient communities. The ones who make decisions (state actors and non-state actors) should design and implement better solutions with the communities involved in that process. By empowering facilitators, activators, and changemakers (FACs) we can create a more sustainable and prosperous future for everyone and we believe art and culture play a central role.
Description
We aim to enhance community connections by establishing, nurturing and facilitating creative conversations between local and vulnerable communities and organisations, policymakers and technical experts. Our aim is to work with clients and partners to boost their participatory decision-making abilities, bringing a culture approach to challenges they are encountering or questions they need answers to in order to identify and create the next-level community leaders.
- Enhance community connections.
- Boost their participatory decision-making abilities.
- Identify and create the next-level community leaders.
What are the different sectors that are coming together to realize this collaboration?
We’re a group of highly experienced professionals and policymakers, working across sectors and different disciplines, connected through a belief that culture can be transformative; we work in diverse fields, from human rights to heritage protection. We are interested in the next generation of thinking and practice linking creative approaches to current social issues. We have an extensive combined experience in designing and delivering diverse projects and programmes locally and internationally and share a powerful toolkit of skills, knowledge and experience. We’re interested in exploring how culture can help navigate change and believe that today’s social issues require a collaborative approach across sectors and through a variety of multi-disciplinary forms.
What would be the internal governance structure of this collaboration?
We are going to work as a collective, as shown in the image below:
Collective structure: The collective structure is devoid of the project manager. This model persuades to co-operate and it makes communication easier. Decisions will not taken by one person, but collectively.
Expert structure: For specific projects, each with unique characteristics in terms of nature, geographical location, scope, etc., one or more core team members will be selected to act as project manager according to their specialisation area, skills and other particularities, with the rest of the team supporting them in tasks as required. The work in this kind of team structure depends on the fact that all members of the team are involved in different actions and, at the same time cooperate as a core team.
Theory of change
We’re using an interdisciplinary approach to everything that we do, gathering insights as we go. We’re interested in bringing diverse perspectives together and understanding more about the systems we’re part of in order to deepen our understanding of how change really happens. We look closely at the theory behind what we do, trying to understand more about good practice and learning from each other. We take all this out into our respective fields of work, and then come back again with renewed insights and ideas. Through this ongoing process we aim to create richer, more robust methodologies, to support the work we do and the people we meet on our journey.
Expected deliverables
- Workshops/Knowledge-sharing platforms
- Research and development
- Community mapping
- Focus Group Discussions
- Training/Capacity bridging
- Policy recommendations
- Data governance and analysis
How does culture play a role in solving the problem you have identified?
The goal is to empower the communities by actively working with the cultural and creative sectors. The following are some of our tools that we propose:
Technological tools: Technology for good, Gaming industry, Virtual tourism
Educational tools: Mobile labs, Pop-ups
Artistic tools: Exhibitions, Art programmes, music, plays
Add Your Heading Text Here
Goal 4: Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all.
Goal 5: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls.
Goal 8: Promote inclusive and sustainable economic growth, employment and decent work for all.
Goal 11: Sustainable cities and communities.
Goal 12: Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns.
Goal 13: Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts.
Goal 16: Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels.
Goal 17: Revitalise the global partnership for sustainable development
Risks and mitigation of risks
The main risk is not being able to create a sustainable model, where the impact brought by us will not continue to be resilient even after we have exited the field. In this regard, arranging financial incentives for FACs becomes crucial so that they remain motivated to invest their time, energy, and resources to benefit the community concerned.
Target audience and beneficiaries (include primary and secondary target audience/beneficiaries)
The primary target audience is the potential leaders of local communities (FACs) that will benefit from developing and bridging capacity. The ultimate beneficiaries are the local communities as a whole.
Expected reach
Identify and train at least ten community activators of a specific local community – in West Bengal, in and around Calcutta, India- that could initiate change bottom up. Those ten will, at the same time, train another 100 community volunteers.
Sustainability of collaboration results
The goal is to develop a platform for people’s experiences to shape decision-making, and potentially, to activate community members to advocate for changes in their communities.
SHANASI ENTERTAINMENT: Culture and mental health
Team members
Sifiso Skenjana (South Africa)
Shatha El Sherif (Egypt)
Nadia Pérez (México)
Partners
- National Ministries, Global
- Development Agencies,
- Civic Groups
- Pediatricians, Hospitals
- UNICEF
- EA Sports
- Blizzard Entertainment
- ESA Foundation (Global Game Jam)
- IDB Bank
- CREA
- LEGO Foundation
- UK Game Foundation
Context
MENTAL HEALTH IMPACTS DEVELOPMENT IN MULTIPLE SECTORS
Low levels of mental health impacts multiple sectors in the economy: Nutrition, Economic Development, Productivity, Inequality etc
MENTAL HEALTH UNDER RESEARCHED
There is little available research on the state of mental health across the globe and the driver of low levels of mental that can inform intervention
EMPHASIS IS TREATMENT NOT PREVENTION
The world currently focuses on the treatment of mental health after the diagnosis has been done and there is little work towards more prevention of mental illness.
WEAK AVAILABILITY OF INFORMATION
While mental health education and awareness is growing, there are still existing challenges of weak availability of mental health information and location of resources.
Needs addressed
Lack of proper information to deal with mental health issues
Lack of Awareness and Formal Training on Mental Health (police, educators, parents etc)
Lack of funding and investment – not a priority, however, all problems come as a result of the mental health
Mental health issues are viewed as a taboo topic, rarely present in daily conversations and education programs
Low youth perceptions of available help
Description
Description: Digital Mental Health Game, multi player online, available in peer-to-peer format
Projects’ scope: Reach all children aged 7-12 globally (as direct beneficiaries) and all the related community members (parents, caregivers, teachers, etc) – (indirect beneficiaries)
Project’s goal: Spread the knowledge of the importance of mental health, reduce the number of the children who are suffering in silence, and raise the awareness of how to deal with related diseases. Mainly the project is aiming to prevent
What are the different sectors that are coming together to realize this collaboration?
Health Sector (Mental health institutions, psychologists/psychiatrists organizations, public health bodies of government)
Education sector
Creative industries sector (gaming industry, digital marketing, etc.)
What would be the internal governance structure of this collaboration?
An internal governance structure will be developed based on the following:
- Develop a matrix of groups’ roles and responsibilities with a timeframe to be able to assign the accountability levels to each one of them.
- Draft a collaborative governance framework to recognize the cross cutting issues, level of efforts, risk management, etc.
- create a library of all documents, datasets, reports, etc to be locked and archived in a safe place to be accessed with only the authorized persons.
Theory of change
If the information on mental health issues is available in an easy language and visualization to children aged 7 to 12, the children will feel safe in expressing their feelings, fears and thoughts, enhanced awareness and knowledge to teachers, parents and caregivers, etc on mental health issues, then they will be able to understand their feelings, deal with the daily life obstacles, stop the exploitation and abuse and enjoys a healthy and productive life.
Expected deliverables
Short term: Pilot for digital mental health game, to eventually develop the full game in all its dimensions.
Long term: Global Mental Health Wellness Spectrum – Country StudyBaseline Research (Global Country Study) Mental Wellness Program Office
How does culture play a role in solving the problem you have identified?
First and foremost, this video game is a scientific and social tool. Through culture and the creative industries, we can develop a quality product in terms of design, programming and technology, but whose methodology, information gathering and narrative has a psychological and social approach that allows us to disseminate information for the prevention of mental illnesses, as well as the analysis of user behaviour so that in the long term, this information has an impact on the design of 3 programmes in the health, education and economic sectors. The game development involves many artistic and creative fields: music composing, graphic design, programming, etc. The game envisages narrative ramifications that can be developed in other media, such as graphic novels, comics, cartoons, character development, bringing the game concepts to offline experiences.
What SDGs, if any, would you be addressing through this initiative?
Goal 3: Good health and well-being
Goal 4: Quality education
Goal 5: Gender quality
Goal 8: Decent work and economic growth
Goal 10: Reduced inequalities
Goal 17: Partnerships for the goals
Risks and mitigations of risks
Risk: Negative effects of games on childrens’ activities and interacting with their peers Mitigation: Psychologists and psychiatrists will be part of the planning and implementation phases of the games to gain their advice to develop games that do not affect the children in a bad way and also that work on building their mental resilience and developing their knowledge. Risk: Acceptance of the communities to talk about the mental health issues
Mitigation: Awareness sessions and community talks will be held in social clubs, schools, kids areas, workplaces for parents, etc – to talk about the importance of the mental health issues and how it affects the person on different aspects which make a priority in human development and not a shame to talk about it
Risk: The difference of implementation in different countries and the need to understand the culture contexts for improvement
Mitigation: A country program plan will be developed to understand the different contexts and monitor the implementation based on the needs and gaps
Target audience and beneficiaries
PRIMARY TARGET: Children and children with disabilities, female and male, ages 7- 12 years old
SECONDARY TARGET AUDIENCE: Parents, tutors, teachers
PRINCIPAL STAKEHOLDERS Gaming Psychologist Game Tech Developers Youth for Co-development Parents and Schools
Expected reach
70% of the children who have access to online/ offline games worldwide
Sustainability of collaboration results
A sustainability model to be developed to ensure that the countries (at the local level) will be able to implement through their national capacities, provide a national fund with collaboration with stakeholders, advocate with partners, .. etc to ensure the sustainability of the results
Sustainable residency as enablers for corporate innovation – V Associates
Team members
Marta Szadowiak (Poland)
Virginia Sanfelice (Italy)
Matic Gajšek (Slovenia)
Context
Our cross-cultural project idea emerged from the lack of residency programs, focused on the needs of the corporate sector in enabling the creative potential for innovation. Translating the experiences of cultural sector, we focus on bridging the gap in the sphere of cultural management that normally has a sole focus on the artistic community and does not recognize and embrace the potential of cross-collaborations with the corporate sphere.
Needs addressed
Our business model is therefore addressing the key needs: firstly, mapping corporate needs before bridging the interface with the local artistic communities. With underling mission and values strongly rooted in: value, vision, critical point of view, giving voice to marginalized communities, and variety multicultural inclusion, we are empowering future agents of change to promote sustainable and innovative solutions. With themed focused on the 4 elements of nature: water, air, soil, energy, V. Associates creates synergic dimension of 5th element, bridging the artistic mindset to corporate standards, addressing environmental issues from local to global communities. The versatility of business model enables holistic integration of SDGs within and beyond the organizational structure, empowering corporate entities and their stakeholders.
Description
Customized residency programme for corporate entities with 3 objectives:
- R&D
- Reputation management
- HR /talent development
- Address the environmental issues connected with the 4 Elements of the Nature:
- Water
- Air
- Earth/soil
- Fire / energy
What are the different sectors that are coming together to realize this collaboration?
- Corporate: (R&D; marketing, engineering, etc…)
- Cultural Managers
- Artists/ Artist studios
What would be the internal governance structure of this collaboration?
Revenue Streams: Corporate (projects)
- Start up (independent funding)
- Laudes Foundation
- Ikea Foundation
- World Fund
Validators: ELIA /Climate KIC
Theory of change
The theory of change is applicable to the business case. You can see the details of the project Business canvas Model in att.
Expected deliverables
- Residency programme:
- Online onboarding corporate sector
- Call for interest (cultural managers);
- Online onboarding (corporate and cultural managers)
- Capacity bridging
- mapping corporate needs before bridging the interface with the local artistic communities
- we are empowering future agents of change to promote sustainable and innovative solutions
- Ready to implement solution/launch
- Artist collaboration;
- Creative solution
- Executive decision
How does culture play a role in solving the problem you have identified?
The anticipation of the business model cycle to be implementable within a 6-weeks (maximum) time spam. Aligned with the speed of the corporate sector yet respecting the creative community processes and momentum of the project built. Guided through the process enabling creative potential for environmental and social sustainability, the output would create easy-to-implement solutions that are ready for market launch.
What SDGs, if any, would you be addressing through this initiative?
SDGs
Goal 8: Decent Work & Economic Growth
Goal 9: Industry, Innovation & Infrastructure
Goal 10: Reduced Inequalities
Goal 11: Sustainable cities & Communities
Goal 17: Partnership for the goals
Project specifics:
Goal 6: Clean water & Sanitation
Goal 7: Affordable & clean energy
Goal 12: Responsible consumption & Production
Goal 13: Climate Action
Goal 14: Life below Water
Goal 15: Life on land
Risks and mitigation of risks
Lower risk since the programme aims the interface between corporate sector bridging the interface with the local artistic communities. With underling mission and values strongly rooted in: value, vision, critical point of view, giving voice to marginalized communities, and variety multicultural inclusion, we are empowering future agents of change to promote sustainable and innovative solutions.
The programme will be sponsored by the corporate sector with partners (depending on each case), and the deliverable – easy to implement solution will be subject of executive/risk owner’s approval.
However, we should to highlight that the gains of this cross-sectorial programme and enriches of experiences will be always present, specially for R&D, Reputation management and talent development will be always present.
To mitigate the risk different tools are in place:
- Root Cause Analysis
- SWOT
- Risk Assessment Template
- Probability and Impact matrix
Target audience and beneficiaries
- Corporate: (R&D; marketing, engineering, etc…)
- Cultural Managers
- Artists/ Artist studios
Sustainability of collaboration results
- Social Sustainability (indigenous communities/ empowering communities/ heritage preservation
- Environmental Sustainability
