New challenges require new solutions

Whilst people rely on, or complains the government for not making better solutions for the population which end up in the gap in the system of welfare, I like to look at the possibilities for people like me to design and establish social innovations which aims at filling the gap or changing a negative trend. The Norwegian governement does not see all the potential that lies in the social entrepreneurs, who are driven by "making the world a better place".

The government depends on social entrepreneurs who persue this interest in people, in finding new solutions, where the government lacks the creativity or the possibility to think differently.

New problems require new solutions. We have to rethink the means and tools we use to fix problems. I will list a couple of examples to illustrate:

• The financial crisis: Greenspan took over as chairman of Fed in 1987, and the stock market crash was the first time he could show his skills in handling financial crisis. The medicine was to dicrease the interests and to provide the market with liquidity. Greenspan solved the problem masterly. The same medicine was used ten years later in the wake of the Asian Financial Crisis. And again in the crisis which were concequences of Russias payment stop, the competition to LTCM and in the crisis in Latin America. The same means has been used to "stop fires". Every time a problem comes up the Fed has answered with lower interests and increased money supplies. When the market gets used to the solutions which the government/Fed uses, the market gets more and more innovative in how to take advantage of the governments ways of reacting. The government needs to be more innovative than the people taking advantage of solutions. - The financial acrobates, the ones who takes avantage of this are the bad guys in this story. They are innovative and greedy in the ways they see new possibilities emerge. And in this story, the finncial acrobates got their prey served on a silver plattern. The new financial products and systems like the subprime loans. Without these, their would not have been an american financial crisis.
• The Teacher Crisis in Norway: The results of the PISA and PIRLS tests sent shock waves over Norway. Norwegian pupils scored worst in reading of all OECD countries. The quality of education depends on the teachers. We are in lack of teachers in Norway. It is not attractive to be a teacher in Norway now caused by the low salary and the negative focus in media and from politicians etc. This has made the School for Teachers one of the less attractive educations, moreover the level of admission is very low. The level of competence and knowledge of the next generation of teachers are not expected to be very high.. The government looks at traditional solutions to get the vocation more attractive. One of the solutions was to increase the salary (a bit). New problems require new solutions! This is not one of them.

I want to conclude this by listing up what I feel needs to be done to arrange for new and innovative solutions in a new reality. With a pace of change quicker than ever before we cannot sit back and wait for solutions to be served. But what the government can do is:
- Be more innovative in the ways they use means to solve a problem.
- Invite social entrepreneurs and other socially engaged people to design new solutions.
- Arrange for social entrepreneurs to succeed in "serving the country". Making it possible to live and work as a social entrepreneur.
- See and calculate social value as "profit" in new ways