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In a context of economic crisis, the situations of unemployment and social exclusion are more and more common. To face this phenomenon, the solutions that are needed cannot be only based on economic resources but should also take into account the citizens themselves for job creation through social links, the pooling of efforts and the seeking for innovative solutions based on local needs. So to say, the search for solutions to the crisis should be better shared between public authorities, economic stakeholders, etc...

Considering this, a certain number of European cities have developed in the past years, impelled by the Council of Europe, the idea of promoting the co-responsibility of actors (public authorities, companies, associations, citizens, etc.) to provide the well-being of all and to avoid situations of exclusion. They use for this a methodology of building indicators of well-being with the citizens themselves, the methodology SPIRAL (https://spiral.cws.coe.int). This methodology enables to define ways of progress towards the well-being of all, to identify the situations of exclusion not only based on material criteria, but also immaterial ones. The goal is to enlarge the impact of public and private actions considering these criteria and to develop pilot actions of social inclusion around the idea of co-responsibility of the actors themselves. The coordination of these activities is provided by a steering committee regrouping the representatives of all local stakeholders (municipality, public services, companies, associations, citizens, etc.).

This approach has allowed to launch innovative pilot actions of social inclusion for overextended people, long-term unemployed people, basic guaranteed income beneficiaries, children and young people of disadvantaged neighborhoods or districts, children failing at school (approach applied in high schools) and on specific themes such as access to housing.
It has also allowed to enlarge the concept of social inclusion over the economic exclusion to take into account the ill-being in its different dimensions, such as ill-being at work (using the approach in companies), at school or in the neighborhood’s life. It has finally allowed to work on co-responsibility considering the well-being of future generations (environmental challenge), particularly with concerted pilot action of sustainable consumption according to the local climate plan and agenda 21.

TOGETHER for Territories of Coresponsibility

Challenges

Today 8 cities have already partly implemented the approach (and 25 new cities expressed their interest for also implementing it), which gives a well-tried method to build indicators about the improvement of well-being, to evaluate the situation and to analyze the impacts, with the support of the Council of Europe (see the website: https://spiral.cws.coe.int). The challenge is now to go deeper by increasing the method accuracy for conception, implementation and monitoring of pilot actions and action plans.

Key point of focus

The approach of co-responsibility makes sense to reach the objective of social inclusion :

- by focusing on the well-being of all thanks to indicators developed with the citizens, the proposed approach deals with the problem of social exclusion in all its aspects; that is to say economy, social links, social and personal balance, citizenship, etc. In such a way, the approach makes it possible to identify situations of exclusion at large and to design actions which take all these aspects into account.
 

- the principle of co-responsibility means to design actions that link the interventions of different actors who often work on specific topics, which are not enough coordinated with each other. Considering example of the Multipartite Social Contract which was developed in Mulhouse, it enables to associate different types of actors for social inclusion, giving a much stronger result to the inclusion process.

A word from the lead partner

What motivates you to be part of the URBACT adventure ?

The main objective of this project is to lead to best-practice exchanges between cities implementing the approach of co-responsibility for social inclusion and the well-being of all. The aim is to deepen and to share the methods – particularly concerning the setting up of strategies and local action plans for social inclusion based on indicators and pilot actions, as well as taking into account the future generations – to disseminate and transfer them to other European cities. It would also lead to the creation of links with other URBACT thematic networks, by promoting the integrative character of the proposed approach for municipal and urban policies.

Who would you like to benefit from the work achieved in your project?

This project is meant to enable any city or territory to join more easily the territories of coresponsibility's approach. It is also a way to explain more precisely the methodology of this approach and to make people benefit from the solutions we have already proposed through the implementation of the methodology.
That's why this project is firstly meant to benefit to our programme's partners, but afterwards, to any city interested in implementing the territories of coresponsibility's approach.