December 2016

 

The United Kingdom voted to voluntarily leave the Nobel Peace Prize winning European Union.

 

The United States elected the most under qualified president in their history with Mr. Trump being the first president who has never previously served in government or the military in any form.

 

Closer to home, there was an election too - the longest federal election in half a century.

 

In South Australia we had the largest citizens jury ever. One of its findings was a lack of confidence in government's ability to deliver any large projects - a concerning conclusion given the important role for government in addressing community needs.

 

At a time when trust in government's ability to deliver the change we need is at record lows and it seems cynicism is at record highs, the need for strong progressive voices that seek to turn these things around is as important now as it has ever been.

 

Here at the Don Dunstan Foundation we aim to be one of those voices and we're aiming to help you be one too. We have a packed agenda for 2017 - with two key projects. The first is a new thinker in residence focused on how we grow jobs in the the social economy and second is a new campaign to end rough sleeping homelessness in the inner city.

 

Our final newsletter for the year highlights these initiatives, the events we have planned and how you can get involved. We hope you will consider joining, donating, partnering, volunteering or attending our events aimed at inspiring action for a fairer world in 2017.

 

Have a great festive season and I look forward to seeing you in the New Year!

David Pearson 

Executive Director 

Don Dunstan Foundation
David.Pearson@adelaide.edu.au 

The first new residency as part of a revived Thinkers program is planned for 2017 and will focus on growing jobs in the social economy - in the health, education, care and creative sectors. The social economy is the fastest growing part of the South Australian economy but it has not traditionally been seen as an industry itself.

This new Social Capital Thinker in Residency will look at how using different business models, such as social enterprises, cooperatives, mutuals, and for-benefit-corporations or BCorps can not only create new jobs but do good at the same time. The residency will be a change making process focused on helping use different business models to support not-for-profit and 'for purpose' organisations to attract the private sector, philanthropic and government investment needed to address social needs. These include things like new types of services to support South Australian's to age well, or assist others with a disability to utilise the funds available though the National Disability Insurance Scheme to live better lives.

The aim of the residency is to build on South Australia's founding purpose, to be a better society, while addressing our most contemporary need - job creation. The ultimate purpose, and hence the name, is for South Australia to be as well known for social innovation as Geneva is for diplomacy or Tamworth is for country music. We want Adelaide to truly be the Social Capital of Australia.

 

The residency is being supported by wide range of organisations in the community and private sectores including The Australian Centre for Social Innovation (TACSI), itself a creation of the Geoff Mulgan residency on social innovation (2008).

Sign up to the Social Capital mailing list to keep informed or get in touch to discuss how you or your organisation can partner on this exciting new project. 

In November we were proud to publish the first in our new series of the Dunstan Papers.

 

The Dunstan Papers seek to contribute to progressive policy debate and the exchange of information between researchers, policy makers and the public on social issues locally, nationally and internationally.

 

You can subscribe to the Dunstan Papers  and read past papers on our website,  or become an annual subscriber to the Foundation and we'll post you a copy.

 

If you are interest in publishing your work in a future Dunstan Paper or sponsoring a paper please get in touch with our Executive Director, David Pearson . 

  

Professor John Spoehr is Director of the Australian Industrial Transformation Institute (AITI) and presented at this year's Adelaide Festival of Ideas, where he argued that it's time we viewed social and economic hardship as a collective responsibility. We have reproduced Prof. Spoehr's speech in full in this Dunstan Paper.     

Two University of Adelaide undergraduate students have completed their internship with the Don Dunstan Foundation, as part of their studies.

 

Sasha Forbath, is a 3rd year student, pursuing a Bachelor of Arts degree in Organisational Studies and Sociology at Pitzer College in the U.S. She completed this semester at the University of Adelaide as an exchange student. As a research intern for the Foundation, she examined holistic approaches used in healing center's for Australian Indigenous peoples with psychosocial conditions.

 

Dani-Elle McManus is in her second year, studying a Bachelor of Social Sciences and Diploma of Languages (Indonesian). This semester she participated in the Arts Internship program, conducting research for the Don Dunstan Foundation focused on the impacts of a temporary visa status for refugees and asylum seekers in South Australia.

 

The Don Dunstan Foundation's Len King Scholarship supports promising law students, passionate about social justice.

 

Awarded by a panel of respected legal professionals, the generous award of up to $15,000 a year for up to four years helps students on a low income or facing financial hardship, to meet living expenses throughout their Bachelor of Law degree at the University of Adelaide or Flinders University.

 

The Len King Scholarship was established in 2014 by the Don Dunstan Foundation on behalf of the King family, in memory of the Hon Len King AC QC and his lifetime of dedication to social justice. A man of dedication and vision, Len King made significant contributions to the community in South Australia throughout his career as South Australian Attorney General, Minister for Community Welfare, Consumer Affairs, and Aboriginal Affairs and as 7th Chief Justice of South Australia.

 

Applications Close: 20 January 2017.

 

Application forms and enquiries: Jess Sutherland at the Wyatt Trust jsutherland@wyatt.org.au - (08) 8224 0074

 

 

As a not-for-profit organisation we are grateful for the generosity of individuals who volunteer their time and enthusiasm to assist at events, and professionals who provide pro bono advice and assistance on specific projects.

If you would like to volunteer some of your time to DDF activities please email our Executive Director, David Pearson. 

  

Josephine is from the Matutjara and Mirning groups at Ceduna and received her $5,000 prize at the Adelaide Festival Centre, from Tony Burke MP, Shadow Minister for the Arts and David Pearson, Executive Director, Don Dunstan Foundation.

The Don Dunstan Foundation offers the prize every year to help an emerging aboriginal artist with the development of their career.

 

 

Tim Dunlop

	Left to right: David Pearson, the Hon. Dr Lynn Arnold, Chair, Don Dunstan Foundation Board of Management and Tim Dunlop, w riter, academic and author.

The first of these new dialogues was with Tim Dunlop who spoke authoritatively on the future of work, and in particular about his new book Why the future is workless.  The book seeks to understand the relationship between the technologies that are reshaping our connections with each other and the natural world, and importantly our ability to control them.   As the title suggests it focuses on the issue of work and what it means to live in a world where technology is increasingly automating many jobs.   Tim argues that the era of full time work is coming to an end and that we need to stop holding onto the false premise that at some magical moment the jobs are going to reappear.  

 

Enspiral
With the support of Green Industries SA, last week we hosted Joshua Vial, the founder of a cooperative of social entrepreneurs from New Zealand called Enspiral. If what we spend our time on is the most important asset we have, then Enspiral's mission is to help more people spend more time on work that matters.

	Joshua Vial presents at the most recent Dunstan Dialogue event.

They use, create and share open source technology to do this. You can listen to the InDaily podcast with Enspiral entrepreneurs Joshua Vial and Damian Sligo-Green here  and there is a great  video about what they do here.

 

If you know of any progressive thinkers visiting South Australia next year and think they would make a good speaker at a Dunstan Dialogue, we'd love to hear from you.

We held a number of events during Open State and the Festival of Ideas. If you couldn't make it or want to re-live the experience you can find videos at these links:

This forum at the RIAus focused on blockchain technology and how it is transforming our economy, society and the internet itself. View here 

 

Future of Enterprise

We thought we would share with you articles that we've been reading recently.

 

The way ahead

President Obama writes for The Economist about four crucial areas of unfinished business in economic policy that his successor will have to tackle. Read the full article here. 

Supportive housing is cheaper than chronic homelessness

Researcher Cameron Parsell proves that it costs state governments more to keep a person chronically homeless than it costs to provide permanent supportive housing to end homelessness. Read the full article here.  

 

It's time to focus on the redistribution of wealth to poorer workers

Greg Jericho reports that the former World Bank chief economist says protectionism against globalisation is not the answer to the labour crisis - inclusive growth is. Read the full article here.

Read any recent articles that we can share with Dunstan Foundation members? We'd love to hear from you!