Universities, united to open an international centre for research into social entrepreneurship
Together with six Catalan universities and business schools, the UOC has met with the management of the Yunus Centre, led by the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize winner, Muhammad Yunus, to create a Social Business Centre in Barcelona, an academic space that will foster social entrepreneurship and innovation to fight youth unemployment in the capital. The meeting was held on 26 January as part of the Social Business City Barcelona conference.
The 2006 Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus works towards a rethinking of the economic relationship between rich and poor for the total eradication of poverty in the world.
The presentation ceremony of the Social Business City Barcelona was attended by over 500 people at the Palau de la Música and has been a pioneering activity in bringing together the different benchmark agents in the city – young people, social companies, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, universities, journalists and politicians – with the aim of promoting and providing support to social companies and social entrepreneurs in Barcelona.
Representatives from seven Catalan universities are working together to create a knowledge generation space around the social company. Promoted by the Tandem Social consultancy, the university alliance will promote the Yunus Social Business Centre, a space for research and academic assessment that will develop a joint plan of action for the social transformation of the city of Barcelona.
The UOC, through the Faculty of Economics and Business and University Development Cooperation, the EADA Private University Foundation, Abat Oliba CEU University, the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), the University of Barcelona (UB), the Universitat Internacional de Catalunya (UIC), and Pompeu Fabra University (UPF) comprise the inter-university working group that will provide support to social entrepreneurship as part of the Social Business City project, which is working to establish a network of social cities around the world.
Àngels Fitó, director of the UOC Faculty of Economics and Business, took part in the presentation ceremony of Social Business City Barcelona to explain on behalf of all the universities involved the role of the higher education institutions in promoting social entrepreneurship and companies.
The project has the support of Barcelona City Council, the "la Caixa" Foundation, the FC Barcelona Foundation, the Apunts social company, Fundació Formació i Treball, Fundació Intermèdia, Fundació Gentis and Diplocat.
Muhammad Yunus
The 2006 Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus, also president of the Yunus Centre and founder of the Grameen Bank in Dhaka, Bangladesh, works towards a rethinking of the economic relationship between rich and poor for the total eradication of poverty in the world. His business focus is partly based on the right to credit, which, from his point of view, should be recognized as a basic human right.
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