USING INNOVATION FOR IMMEDIATE BENEFIT
The coronavirus crisis poses major challenges for citizens, politicians and civil servants alike. Shortcomings of recent decades, as with the lack of digitalization in education, are quickly becoming apparent. Not yet visible are many new concepts people all over Europe are implementing right now to help us to cope with this situation.
The current situation creates a lot of confusion in a broad spectrum of policy areas. But confusion can also be the mother of innovation. What is happening now in terms of self-organization in one context has the potential to be implemented elsewhere. Despite all justified concerns, and the primacy of protecting the health of all, the implementation of innovative and useful best practice is therefore an important task for politics and society.
A whole host of new practices are currently emerging in many places – most of them simply out of creative necessity. Many will disappear again, but some have the potential to change the system. Estonia, for example, has quickly organized a public hackathon to generate ideas within a very short time – such as an app that guarantees people in quarantine quick and reliable access to help.
We from the Innovation in Politics Institute in cooperation with Act.Now are therefore launching this project to collect, document and provide innovative practices in dealing with the crisis across Europe and at all political levels. Here, we make the best practices available to politics and society.
Do you know such an innovative measure to cope with the crisis in your city or region?
Please let us know. We are looking forward to your contribution at https://innovationinpolitics.eu/coping-with-the-crisis/.
Please note: Time is of the essence! Good ideas and help should be distributed fast. We therefore are building and publishing this section currently in English only. However, you may send us your best practices in any European language!