PHASE 1. GATHERING KEY ORGANISATIONS Insights from the case study
Suggested actions
Self-assessment questions
MAIN ACTORS The Consortium finds its origins from a single local B-type social cooperative which was founded in 1996 by a group of labour union members, social operators and psychologists 9 employing people suffering from mental issues, namely the patients of the local Mental Health Department (some of whom soon became members of the cooperatives along with some of their relatives).
Map your local context to identify, if any, social enterprise or similar organizations already active in employing people experiencing social exclusion and/or in delivering social/welfare programs and/or in valorising the local territory (i.e., sustainable agriculture)
Are there local social enterprises or similar organizations already active in employing people experiencing social exclusion and/or in delivering social/welfare programs and/or in valorising the local territory in your context?
Who are those people experiencing or at risk of social exclusion in your context?
Map your local context to identify who are those people experiencing or at risk of social exclusion.
The social cooperative soon started to engage with a local association of a volunteers linked to a catholic order devoted to a “social Catholicism” idea and carrying out charitable activities.
Map your local context to identify if there are other actors working for the same social purpose and vocation.
What are their main barriers to social inclusion? (i.e., resources, institutions, asymmetric power relation, conflictual relations, low participation, lack of cooperatives or community associations, …)
Are there local third sector actors working for the same social purpose and vocation?
Can local public bodies support the servicedemand for these work-integration social enterprises (or similar organization), i.e., by subcontracting public services? If not, is there a local demand for specific services/goods which the work integration social enterprises can satisfy?
Patients of the local public Mental Health Department.
The local municipality which subcontracted the provision of public welfare services and the management of the Centre for Disabilities (see section Activities below) to the social cooperative.
Investigate if local public bodies offer tendering processes to subcontract public service delivery in order to secure a source of revenue. If absent, carry out a market analysis in order to identify potential clients for the offered services/products.
MAIN RESOURCES During the planning stage, the main resources were not economic, rather human resources. In fact, a key ingredient was the willingness of these first actors to join forces and act together for a common purpose.
Make sure these local actors and organizations have a strong common understanding of the social inclusion and local development strategy as well as shared core values and mission. Most importantly,
Are these actors sharing a common social purpose willing to cooperate and to join forces and strategies?
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This group of people followed the mission and vocation of the so-called “Democratic Psychiatry”. The latter is an Italian society which triggered a historical national psychiatric reform contrasting the social and economic exclusion of people suffering from mental issues and forced to internment in mental institutions, now illegal in the Italian legislation.
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