Putting People First
Building strong community coalitions is the key to meaningful progress in the social economy sector says SETSI’s Victor Beausoleil
For Victor Beausoleil, community is at the heart of tackling the major challenges of our time.
“Whether we're talking about climate action, social innovation, social economy, or impact investing — we have to build remarkable interconnected coalitions because our weapon is our voice, our hearts and minds,” says Beausoleil, Founder and Executive Director of SETSI - Social Economy Through Social Inclusion.
“Unity is the only way that we're going to be able to challenge and transform some of the systems that have been built. These systems of exclusion, and in some instances oppression are so adaptive and resilient. That’s why coalition building is imperative for any form of sustainable progress to advance solutions to the challenging social issues of our times.”
Empowering and supporting communities is at the centre of SETSI’s work. Launched in 2019, the organization was born out of a community coalition, including activists, professionals, entrepreneurs, creatives and researchers, who saw persistent challenges with exclusion and inequity in the social innovation sector. Their work is focused on targeting those challenges with a goal of shifting mindsets, changing approaches, growing communities and ultimately creating a more inclusive social economy.
“Our work aims to advance a gender, racial and social equity lens in social innovation ecosystems. We steward relationships with key stakeholders and decision-makers around strategies to improve inclusion, diversity, equity and access to ultimately establish a sense of belonging for all Canadian constituents,” says Beausoleil.
“We did this work in multiple ecosystems across Canada and internationally to ensure that peoples of African descent and other historically excluded populations were not left out of important conversations and initiatives,” he adds. “Because there's an old adage — if you're not at the table, you're on the menu.”
Social inclusion strategies cannot be performative when advancing progress on Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) issues, he notes.
“Organizations understand the ‘E’—environment—and they understand the ‘G’—governance—but the ‘S’, the societal piece, is often what's missing. That’s because organizations are limited by their rolodexes, which are filled with the usual suspects, and mainstream organizations and networks that often practice exclusionary models of community engagement,” he says. “That leaves a lot of folks on the margins, and on the periphery of ecosystems.
To help organizations cast a wider net with their partnerships, SETSI focused a significant amount of effort on ecosystem mobilization, mapping and excavation. “There are a lot of social purpose organizations and nonprofits that are simply not on the radar of major stakeholders, the private sector, philanthropic foundations, and all three levels of government.”
To begin to incentivize and encourage meaningful action and progress around social innovation, governments need to do more to understand and empower work that is happening at a community level, says Beausoleil.
“The folks on the ground, social purpose organizations, non-profits, and grassroots activist groups have some remarkable approaches to community engagement and stewardship, and reframing and conceptualizing value and community economic development.”