Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation

President Obama has said that this is an “all-hands-on-deck” moment - government cannot solve our nation’s problems alone. It is critical for government to partner with citizens, nonprofits, social entrepreneurs, foundations and corporations to make progress on our nation’s great challenges.

To this end, President Obama created the Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation (SICP) within the White House Domestic Policy Council. This office’s mandate is to figure out how government can help catalyze innovation, service, and cross-sector partnerships to produce larger-scale change in communities across the country. The office is focused on three main goals:

• Investing in what works and creating the environment for innovative solutions to thrive.

• Bringing together partners from all sectors of our society – corporations, non-profits, educational institutions, government and more to solve pressing challenges;

• Inspiring all Americans to serve their communities and investing in the next generation of community leaders.

Investing in What Works

The Office of Social Innovation is creating a policy climate to catalyze innovation while searching cities and towns for the smartest, most effective solutions to our nation’s problems. We can then invest federal funds in the programs that work – programs that are making a real difference on the local level that could be replicated in communities all across the country. We’re not looking to make marginal or incremental progress here. We recognize that limited taxpayer dollars need to be directed at efforts that have evidence that they work. We’re looking for programs that are nothing short of transformative. Over the long term, we will replicate high-impact, results-oriented solutions broadly across Federal Agencies.

Public-Private Partnerships

Recognizing that no one sector of our society has all the answers, the Office of Social Innovation is working to create new partnerships between government, philanthropy, and the private sector. We do not intend to create a new bureaucracy, which would run counter to the culture of social innovation. Instead, we are focused on filling gaps and catalyzing funding and action by foundations, the private sector and individuals. We will to partner and build on the extraordinary things that are happening in these sectors.

Inspiring Americans to Serve

The third goal of our Social Innovation and Civic Participation office is to inspire Americans to serve their communities by supporting the President’s call to service, United We Serve. National and community service doesn’t just change lives and lift up communities—it can change history. To help meet growing social needs resulting from the economic downturn, United We Serve aims to engage new volunteers in expanding the impact of existing organizations and to encourage “do-it-yourself” projects. We are working to amplify the President’s message, by providing organizations with the networks they need to build capacity, helping expand Americorps, and finding ways to utilize information technology to facilitate impactful service.