2009 October | Taylor Davidson

October, 2009

The Festival: Building a pan-European social movement

A story about Florian Mueck and The Festival, an effort to build a pan-European social movement.

Full disclosure: I’ve known Florian since 2004 through mutual friends, I had the chance to hang with him again in Berlin a couple weeks ago and he’s bought me a couple beers over the years. Inherent biases aside, you’ve got to admit this is an audacious project.

Florian Mueck is the Co-Founder and CEO of The Festival (@thefestival2011), a bi-annual event in European metropolises to bring Europeans together and promote a pan-European social movement. The first Festival is slated for July 2011 in Berlin.

Conceived by Florian in 1997 in Barcelona and initiated in 2006, the vision behind the festival is that Europe grows together not by its linked economies, common currency or pan-national governmental institutions, but its people. The Festival aims to be the platform to link communities across Europe to help create a European identity.

How?
The Festival is built around six tracks of common social interests that define the pan-European competitions that will be the core “angles of attraction” and the method for bringing people together. Each competition will span a period before, during and after the event using online and offline mediums and methods to keep the interaction and interest alive.

The interesting part to me is how The Festival is built to be financially sustainable by using a mix of partners, sponsors and ambassadors to support and “host” the competitions. Some might shy away from the commercial involvement, but my key takeaways are how Florian is demonstrating a way to unify communities by:

Creating a social movement that operates outside of the numerous pan-European political, business and sporting interests,
Leveraging friendly competition and national pride to tap into shared interests and create sustainable interest and attention,
Emphasizing “I am European” togetherness rather than individual national interests,
Building a movement by using online tools and networks in parallel with offline events,
Making the movement financially sustainable by providing natural ways for sponsors and companies to be involved.

Considering the maze of political, commercial and social interests across Europe and the disparate feelings about a European identity”, it’s an audacious project; but then I like audacious projects.

What parallels to The Festival or other examples of cross-national community-building have you seen?

In addition to running the strategic and marketing sides of The Festival, Florian also writes theme songs for The Festival; check out his latest song, “I am European”.

Click here to read more stories from my recent trip through Japan and Europe.

Posted October 13th, 2009 in Perspective.

A TED talk by Bill Strickland

Andrew Gerrard (@andrewgerrard) asked me at TEDxTuttle to find him an uplifting TED video. Here’s my humble submission, a talk by Bill Strickland about his life and how he built Manchester Bidwell into a world-class institute in a tough part of Pittsburgh.

You’ll notice that this is an older TED speech, almost from a bygone era: a story rather than a grandiose argument, presented with a humility and quiet elegance that understates what Bill Strickland has achieved with Manchester Bidwell.

It’s also personally relevant: I saw Bill give a version of this speech in 2002 at Carnegie Mellon, the closing talk of a week of festivities to prepare that year’s entering class of MBAs, and found him to be one of the most humble, thoughtful and powerful people I’ve met (very briefly).

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About Bill Strickland, from his bio on TED:

Bill Strickland’s journey from at-risk youth to 1996 MacArthur “Genius” grant recipient would be remarkable in itself, if it were not overshadowed by the staggering breadth of his vision. While moonlighting as an airline pilot, Strickland founded Manchester Bidwell, a world-class institute in his native Pittsburgh devoted to vocational instruction in partnership with big business — and, almost incidentally, home to a Grammy-winning record label and a world-class jazz performance series. Yet its emphasis on the arts is no accident, as it embodies Strickland’s conviction that an atmosphere of high culture and respect will energize even the most troubled students.

Also about Bill Strickland, from Social Edge:

Bill Strickland, a three-time Harvard Business School case study and a MacArthur Genius Award winner, founded the Manchester Bidwell Corporation 40 years ago and changed the lives of thousands of disadvantaged urban teens and welfare mothers with his world-class arts centers and career training centers.

… His advice: “Don’t do it by yourself! This profession can very isolating, it can be very difficult and challenging, particularly because it’s a young field. Surround yourself with individuals of like-mind, of like-energy, to test out your ideas and the quality of your life, your mental health and your physical well-being.”

Posted October 12th, 2009 in Perspective.

October, 2009

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