Social Platform is the largest network of civil society organisations in the EU and has been for many years an eager supporter for achieving a social Europe. Social Platform strives for uniting countries in the fight for social justice, equality between all people, inclusion, sustainability and participatory democracy in the EU and beyond. In order to achieve these aims, Social Platform intends to ensure that social justice shall be the compass guiding all political decisions and economic measures carried by the European leaders. The cornerstone to implement such changes were built into the democracies that need to be more participatory in order to ensure that the voices of people will be heard. Civil dialogue is a key issue in this regard which can strengthen the democratic systems in and throughout Europe.
In October this year Social Platform has launched its project to organize the 2020 exhibition, Made in Social Europe. The COVID-19 crisis has taught civil society organisations a lot, most notably to meet urgent need to reduce the existing socio-economic inequality and exclusion across Europe. In these turbulent times, civil organisations and their networks are working very hard to realize programs from professional integration to anti-discrimination, essential and social services which demonstrate at first hand the impact that their projects can have in empowering groups in vulnerable situations and communities. However, innovations, practices and impact made by the civil organisations often fail to be seen or recognised by the society and political decision-makers. This is the reason why the Made in Social Europe Exhibition will be held.
This online event will provide the wider public an interactive way to know more about projects of civil organisations that have already been completed and helped vulnerable groups of the society. Applicants who would like to present their projects at the exhibition should give details on how their inspirations for launching projects were set into practice, what are the best practices and the European added-value of their projects to educate others and what is the social impact made by their projects across the EU. At the same time, the organisators would like to have information on how the COVID-crisis has affected those projects and what kind of advices from the project owners can be sent to those who are running programs in the same environment. Furthermore, the organisators will make a 90-second audio clip with the project owners.
The required project information will be also presented at the on-line exhibition and circulated throughout the network of Social Platform which provides applicants the opportunity to disseminate their projects also among EU-institutions that are engaged in supporting civil initiatives. The deadline for submitting the projects is the 23th of October, 2020.
More information about the application procedure can be obtained from andrew.dickie@socialplatform.org