The 2050 Association
2050 was founded in February 2011 in Bologna by a group of people active in various fields who found themselves reflecting and discovering how to better understand and positively influence the changes that are transforming our society, with an eye on how each of us can contribute to it by feeling an active part of it, with a wide-ranging and far-sighted perspective.
After a few years of activity that saw the structure of 2050 change, become richer and go down different paths, in 2050 the association's headquarters moved to the Veneto region, where 2050 has operated one of its offices since its inception, in Portogruaro.
Since 2023, the association has been registered with RUNTS as a third sector entity, and is now called 2050 ETS.
Our vision
We can certainly define 2050 as an association that works for social innovation, we work for a society that:
- Knows how to interpret, keep up with and optimistically manage the rapid changes taking place
- Looking to the future with positive realism, directing change in one's favour
- Fosters dialogue between cultures and works to create places where it is possible to design together
- It is increasingly able to harness traditions, resources and potential, including those of those who have come from other countries
- Promotes a culture of responsibility, enterprise and merit, rejecting all forms of discrimination
Our goals
We have set ourselves two broad objectives, which despite the transformations the association has undergone over time remain the two pillars of our being together and acting:
- Awareness-raising and training at various levels of citizens, including those in public roles, practitioners and communicators to be more aware of present and future processes of local and global change and prepared to face the social, economic and cultural challenges of contemporaneity and globalisation
- Implement concrete actions that accompany and enhance the resourcefulness and potential of each individual, translating the si 2050 vision into practice.
Areas of intervention and activities
Engaging in social innovation means not only being aware of the changes, but being able to provide keys and tools so as not to be overwhelmed by them. It means leveraging the potential of each of us to ride the wave and become active players, even when these changes pose challenges. It is necessary to look beyond.
And what are the most obvious changes taking place in our society? We have identified three that 2050 focuses on:
- Demographic changes make our society increasingly diverse, fluid, complex, multi-generational;
- The technological changes that accompany us, redefine time and space, but at the same time inundate us with information and force us to rethink everything, but if they are not governed, they can lead us to involutions and marginalisation;
- Climate change and the general discovery of resource scarcity are leading us to redefine sustainable lifestyles, attention to reuse, the environment and valuable concepts of community and regeneration.
Drawing on the experiences and talents of members and employees, we try to respond positively to the challenges these changes pose.
Areas of intervention
2050 sees itself as an open and critical interlocutor of public and private realities, and operates along three main lines:
- EDUCATION AND INCLUSION - working with young people, schools educators and communities.
- INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES - offering opportunities for growth and skills development through training and production of ICT-based communication tools and products.
- SUSTAINABLE LIFESTYLES - focusing on environmental and economic sustainability, care for food, the body and others, occupations and passions that rethink, regenerate, reuse the earth's scarce resources.
In short, we are facilitating and enhancing human and social capital in our communities - also internationally - to cope with today's major changes.
Activities
Specifically, we perform:
- Design and management of projects funded on European, national and local calls.
- Awareness-raising actions, innovative and participative educational and training activities, including through the conscious use of new technologies.
- Multimedia publishing initiatives and products.
- Dissemination of scientific, cultural, artistic and economic works and adaptation to different target groups to provide critical insights.
- Dissemination (storytelling) of people and examples that help to interpret reality critically and in a non-stereotypical manner.
- Initiatives that lead to the development, enhancement and activation of people, communities and places.
- Rigorous investigation and investigation in the areas of the association's aims.