Davos, Switzerland — Some of the biggest problems in the world today are systemic problems, which cannot be resolved with individual interventions or by working in silos, says Fredrik Galtung, Co-Chief Facilitator Catalyst Now. He shared his insights on the Social Innovation House at Davos 2025 and other collaborative efforts in an exclusive interview with TRENDS on the sidelines of the annual summit.
What is the significance of the first-ever Social Innovation House at Davos, and what does it signify for future efforts in addressing global challenges?
It’s for the first time that there’s a Social Innovation House in Davos. It won’t be the last. We already have a commitment to do it again next year. But the core idea is that the biggest shift we need to be making is the innovation of how we do change, and especially how we do cross-sectoral change so that we have much larger collaborations to engender the change we need to see in the world. You can say that there’s been a very significant paradigm around scaling very clever, brilliant innovations. But if you do it in silos, you can’t affect the systemic change. Every big problem in the world today is a systemic problem. Therefore, an individual intervention and investing in silos actually cannot solve, by definition, a systemic problem. When you have good governance in a place, you gradually improve all conditions. But where you don’t have strong leadership, where you don’t have all the elements together, we’re not able to solve systemic problems.
How are you serving as a catalyst to that collective thought leadership for any change in that state of the world?
Our organization is actually called Catalyst Now. We were launched in Davos in 2020. Out of this very simple idea of significant cross-sectoral collaboration, we were, then in 2020, 200 organizations. And now we’re 3,800 organizations working in 140 countries. So it’s moved very fast. So there’s actually a very positive will to work together. The proof is that we were able to put up this social innovation house within very little time because there is such goodwill to try to work together much more efficiently and effectively.
What’s the objective of having that platform at Davos for the exchange of ideas?
The whole theme of Davos is collaboration in an age of intelligence. This is what we are doing here. One is to showcase some large collaborations that are happening, with the view that social entrepreneurs and social innovators often deal with challenges in the first mile and last mile. Corporations need to be our partners in this, but they are often weak on the first mile and last mile. How can we work together much, much more effectively to make the change that needs to happen?
What are some of the key takeaways from the platforms and discussions that you’ve hosted here?
Obviously, some people were very nice, but there is an extraordinary initiative Europe-based, dealing with climate, and they are supporting 112 European cities that are committed to being carbon-neutral by 2030. Very soon, 2030 is around the corner. The most important innovation is social innovation, because it’s about, again, how you make that change happen. It’s not about the individual interventions. We know so many of the solutions, but we’re not able to execute them effectively. Partnership, and collaboration, are words that are used. But how do you do that at a really large scale is the question. How do you make it so that the change is happening at the speed we need to see the change happen? There is one measure of the speed of change: it needs to be faster than the rate of the problems. If we’re moving slower than the rate at which the problems are arising, we’re not changing anything. I was at a meeting yesterday where, to make the point, a leader of one of the biggest refugee agencies said five years ago, there were 60 million displaced people, refugees. They’re now 300 million.
So clearly, we’re not doing the job. And again, climate change, forced migration, conflicts, et cetera. If we’re not moving at that rate, we’re not solving anything. A movement that has gone from 200 to 3,800 so fast is a signal that there’s a lot of will. I’ll share one little thing with you, we are introducing a new way of financing this change by actually making the large collaborations investable. Don’t invest in the individual; invest in the totality. We had 25 funders in a meeting yesterday. All of them want to work with us. Most of them were not familiar with us before, and they all said, ‘yes’. If we had 50 people in the room, I think we would have had 50 people saying ‘yes’, because there is such an appetite to see change happen much faster.
Do you have a presence in the Middle East, in the Gulf?
We have chapters in many countries in the Gulf and the Middle East. So, in terms of chapters, we’re very well covered. In terms of deep work, this is now starting. The lead sponsor of the house is a Singaporean company that believes every business should be a social innovator. One thing that I think will resonate with some of your readers is the view that family-owned businesses can be the biggest source of transformation. You know that 70 percent of the private sector is family-owned businesses, 70 percent! The world functions on the basis of family-owned businesses, not actually the big, listed companies. Now, in a family-owned business, you have more freedom to decide where does it go. And this fourth-generation Singaporean company is very clear. They’re taking this leadership, but they’re making money doing this. They’re growing, they’re thriving. It’s not that one has to cut back, and they’re not doing it for charity. They’re doing it with a very clear vision of the society they want to see.
What is that? How do you define that? How do you communicate that it’s pretty powerful?
It’s a society of well-being and human flourishing. Who doesn’t want that? To have a society of well-being and human flourishing, we need to be connected to nature. We need to be connected to each other. We need to have communities that are well. We had a whole day yesterday dedicated to mental health and well-being. We can’t have these things if we have many people suffering. We have to elevate the discussion. It’s not about GDP growth. It’s not about just accumulating wealth. Are people happier when they have their second billion, their third billion? Does it really increase their happiness? Not necessarily. Does it increase the happiness of their children? Very rarely. If we’re serious about a vision of well-being and human flourishing, it has to connect us in a completely new way. That’s what we are trying to facilitate here. It’s actually reframing the discussion around sustainability. Let’s be honest about it. We care about nature because we care about humans first. We’re not doing it for nature. Nature will be fine. Nature will survive if we mess it up after we’re no longer here. Nature will reinvent itself. We need nature. Nature doesn’t need us. But if we understand that we’re doing it because we love humanity and for humanity to thrive, nature has to function. That’s what we’re trying to do here with our partners.
Do you have different initiatives with your partners?
We have over 100 chapters and we have over 140 collaborations. By the way, in our membership, which is two-thirds from the global south, we have many media companies. What does it take to become a member? There’s no fee. What it takes is the will to co-create and collaborate. Actually, if people are not participating and collaborating, we invite them to leave.