A discussion on “The Democratization of Social Impact” took place at the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) on Thursday, Sept. 29. The event featured Suzy Sosa, the co-founder of Verb. Verb is a non-profit organization that helps entrepreneurs around the world connect with each other to cause positive social impact.
“Verb is democratizing social impact to find competitions to find solutions to the planet’s biggest problems,” Sosa said. “What I think we do really well is find solutions from all over the globe... so some people come from social work, anthropology, engineering, basic science, business.”
The discussion centered on how communities and individuals can positively impact the world around them, and how innovation and success can be stimulated in communities.
One of the issues that was discussed is how to ensure that resources go to those who need it.
Jill Harrison, a farmer’s market manager who has been involved in humanitarian work in Africa, thought that it was important to remove preventative structures.
“The first thing we do is remove some of the structures. We’ve made money into something that has a privileged position with its own rules and that’s preventing these resources from having a more ecologically stable distribution,” she said.
Another issue that Sosa brought forth was cultural barriers that inhibit cooperation between the humanitarians and those they are trying to help.
Lauren Hermanus, the strategic director of the Massive Small Collective, a UK non-profit that focuses on community-building around the world, thought that it is extremely important that humanitarians fully understand the situations they are entering.
“If you accept that things are complex, and you begin with a specific problem, you can get people to participate in clearing that problem,” Hermanus said. “You can identify the causal factors to that problem, and it empowers them in a way that moves them into collective action and coalescing around that problem.”
Hermanus also argued for the need to increase inclusivity in humanitarian work.
“I think it’s important to have a deep sensitivity and a willingness to be told you’re doing the wrong thing,” Hermanus said. “If there’s conflict... you should already know what you’re going to do before you go into the community.”
In discussing the timeliness of societal change, Sosa shared her opinion that there is no one single instigator. Rather, she proposed the notion of incremental change and the necessity of consistent efforts to bring about change.
“When do you get to the tipping point of something?” Sosa said. “It happens very incrementally along the way. I think about the caterpillar inside the chrysalis. When does it become a butterfly? It’s a mystery; it’s inside of the chrysalis, but all of a sudden it’s a butterfly. How do revolutions start? What is that one moment when all of a sudden everything changes? I think it happens slowly, but then quickly, all of a sudden.”
Hermanus stressed the importance of considering a diversity of opinions.
“Every person always brings their own little spin that makes you think about something in a different way,” Hermanus said. “For example: What does it mean to democratize something? An American context means something different than a West African context or a British context, where democracy carries baggage. It’s important to be open-minded.”
Jill Harrison agreed with her but did not think that the right questions were being asked.
“I feel like very often we’re not framing the right question when you think about democratizing our own sort of ecological or social ecology. We still look at it as how do we more effectively make each person...walk the walk that we think. I feel like we’re not allowing for the ecology to develop on its own. We’re trying to control it and I got that sense out of this meeting,” she said.
Sosa said that some of her opinions changed after hearing other people’s opinions.
“This talk made me realize there can be a downside to democratization. One person raised the question ‘if there’s more open access, will resources be spread less fairly?’ because people who already know how to play the game try to get all the resources for themselves. It made me think about what could be some of the unintended negative consequences of democratization and to be mindful of those,” Sosa said.
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