London Riots and Youth Unemployment: Sinking or Swimming?

I wrote the following previously unpublished blog post last February, but in the wake of the riots in London last weekend this seems timely. Even though the behaviour of the rioters was undoubtedly criminal, that doesn't mean there isn't an underlying sense of grievance over socioeconomic exclusion motivating them.

Recently in the process of doing some research, I came across a book called Not Quite Adults which addresses the changing pathways to adulthood being taken by today’s young people. According to this book, what appears to be arrested development or “failure to launch” may actually be a sensible strategy for navigating the cultural and economic forces shaping our complex society. I’m not going to elaborate on the book’s main thesis here.

What struck me was the book’s metaphor of swimmers vs treaders. Swimmers have invested enough in themselves educationally and their careers in order to successfully obtain and hold on to well-paid, highly-skilled jobs. Whereas treaders have prematurely taken on the challenge of marriage, children and a job to pay the bills before they have reached a sufficient level of educational and professional attainment thus becoming trapped in poorly-paid, less secure jobs.

What this metaphor doesn’t address is the truly wealthy and the truly poor. Let’s call them flyers and sinkers respectively. In the UK, the term commonly used by institutions for sinkers is NEETs (Not in Employment, Education or Training).

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Loughborough (Junction) has Spoken!

Back in January and February, London Creative Labs did a couple of events in association with the Capital Community Foundation who are a grantmaking foundation in South London. They are currently working with donors in supporting work in the area surrounding Loughborough Junction in Lambeth, for the benefit of the community. This is a rundown, deprived area with lots of social and economic challenges. These events provided an opportunity for residents, businesses, local community groups and service providers to help identify ways in which any future investment could benefit the area and improve people’s lives. As ever, we posted the harvest from those events shortly afterwards, and are now linking to them from this blog.

Loughborough Speaks!

Nearly 50 local residents, community activists, public sector workers and councillors mapped assets, needs and opportunities of the Loughborough Junction neighbourhood using an enhanced version of the Bigger Picture mapping process from our Social Startup Labs toolkit. Then they discussed the underlying themes with a focus on coming up with solutions. Read more about Loughborough Speaks!

Loughborough Speaks Again!

Over 20 local people considered the solutions from the previous event, came up with their own solutions and explored those solutions in more detail. Read more about Loughborough Speaks Again!

December Open Space Roundup

Back in December, London Creative Labs did a couple of Open Space events in association with Lambeth First who are the Local Strategic Partnership for the London Borough of Lambeth. We posted the harvest from those events shortly afterwards, but we never got round to linking to them from this blog. So we're taking the time to remedy that now. We had a lot of learning which we'll share at some point here on the blog.

Stockwell Park Open Space

Over 40 people, local Residents, staff of Lambeth First and local agencies came together on 14th December at Stockwell Park Community Centre to address the following question: "How can we work together for the benefit of everyone in Lambeth?". You can find out what happened here.

Tulse Hill Open Space

Similarly over 25 people, local Residents, staff of Lambeth First and local agencies took part in an open space on 16th December at High Trees Community Centre in Tulse Hill with the question: "How can we work together for the benefit of our neighbourhood?". You can read all about it here.

Ingrid Munro tells the Jamii Bora story of mentoring people out of poverty

Ingrid Munro & the Jamii Bora story of mentoring people out of poverty from Mamading Ceesay on Vimeo.

Announcing Social Startup Labs Episode 1: What Election?

Will the General Election of May 2010 change anything that really matters? We don't know, London Creative Labs is not a political party and it doesn't have a manifesto. If it did have a manifesto, it would not contain policies, instead it would contain questions because unlike politicians we don't have an answer for everything! Those questions would be as follows:

• How can we create more jobs and other forms of work in London, especially Lambeth?

• How can businesses providing the work become sustainable in terms of profit, people and planet?

• How can we create and/or transform industries, markets and sectors through disruptive social innovation & business model innovation?

• How can we best harness the full potential of everyone to not only design and deliver the new products, services and enterprises that result but also to ensure sustained productivity growth?

• How can the third sector become radically more effective in bringing about real change and lose its dependency on donations and grants?

• How can we transform social issues into business opportunities and unhappy benefit recipients into happy productive citizens?

• How can we unleash the true power of collaboration in our workplaces, communties and homes to achieve truly great things together?

If you find one or more of the above questions, more intriguing, exciting, challenging or compelling than anything you've seen in a political manifesto, London Creative Labs would like to extend an invitation to you!

We don't want your vote, we want your mind and your body! Come join us at the Social Startup Labs, a transformative carnival of collaboration where we together will discover, share, invent and celebrate the answers to these questions and more!

WARNING: If you aren't open to exploring new ways of working, playing, thinking and living, this is not for you! We are also definitely not ideologically sound!

The first Social Startup Labs is on June the 15th in Vauxhall, South London. If you want to join us there please sign up.