Social Innovation: What it is, why it matters and how it can be accelerated

The results of social innovation are all around us. Self-help health groups and self-build housing; telephone help lines and telethon fundraising; neighbourhood nurseries and neighbourhood wardens; Wikipedia and the Open University; complementary medicine, holistic health and hospices; microcredit and consumer cooperatives; charity shops and the fair trade movement; zero carbon housing schemes and community wind farms; restorative justice and community courts. All are examples of social innovation – new ideas that work to meet pressing unmet needs and improve peoples’ lives. This report is about how we can improve societies’ capacities to solve their problems. It is about old and new methods for mobilising the ubiquitous intelligence that exists within any society

Easy councils, green shoots and radical budgets:top 5 blogs you might have missed this week

Warren Morgan is concerned about Barnet’s ‘EasyCouncil’ model and recent claims that it should be emulated elsewhere. Alex Massie suggests that economic circumstances in the UK are healthier than is generally claimed. Rushanara Ali argues that the UK needs a method of tackling tax avoidance that does not rely on corporate goodwill. Tim Montgomerie observes that George Osborne is under intense pressure to deliver a budget the right of his party deem sufficiently radical. Robbie De Santos welcomes the attention that renting is receiving as a political issue, though cautions that the government must still take action