Seeking to support social innovators in their ambitions to develop solutions to challenges in East Asia and the UK, the British Council has fostered collaborations between policy makers, higher education institutions, and social entrepreneurs through a programme called Social Innovation in East Asia.
To illustrate the range of collaborations supported, we invited Pioneers Post to produce five case studies that are available for download below. They include:
- a partnership between Coca-Cola and the British Council in Viet Nam that has motivated thousands of schoolchildren, their families and other members of their communities to tackle the country’s mounting plastic waste problem – see Active Citizens for a world without waste
- a collaboration between the Malaysian government, United Nations ESCAP, and the British Council that produced a new national strategy to support social enterprises to thrive – see A blueprint for social enterprise in Malaysia
- joint efforts by universities in the UK and South East Asia to explore how they can push forward social innovation and collaborate to address some of the world’s most difficult problems – see How social innovation is making universities relevant again
- the roll out of the Active Citizens programme at a university in Bandung, Indonesia’s third largest city, that supports 6,000 first-year students to come up with social action plans in order to make a difference in their own communities – see Sharing values and visions for social change
- an in-depth mentoring scheme for 37 social enterprise leaders from five South East Asian countries and territories which was designed to help their organisations respond to the challenges posed by the pandemic – see Covid-19 responses - Adapting to rapid change.