Overview of the Social and Economic Inclusion Initiative
The Social Planning Network of Ontario (SPNO) is partnering with the Population and Public Health Branch of Health Canada (Ontario and Nunavut Region) on the development of a Social and Economic Inclusion Initiative (SEII).
The SEII is a two-phase Project extending from October 2002 through March 2004 funded by PPHB through its Population Health Fund. The SEII contributes to the fulfillment of PPHB’s strategic goal and objectives:
“To demonstrate how communities can mobilize and develop healthy public policies and practices that foster social and economic inclusion, and thereby, improve the conditions needed for good health.” (PPHB Strategic Plan, 2000)
Working in partnership with the SPNO and its community networks, PPHB aims to:
- create communities of interest and generate Project proposals on community mobilization and healthy public policy development; and
- implement, document, and disseminate learning from the Projects.
Population health is grounded in the notion, confirmed by research, that many factors contribute to the health of individuals and communities, including income and social status, social support networks, employment and working conditions, education, gender, culture, physical and social environments and several other “determinants of health”.
Key principles in a population health approach are:
- promoting the direct participation of people in planning and decision-making on issues that affect their health and well-being;
- initiating and strengthening organizational partnerships and collaborative effort across sectors to address the broad determinants of health and to pursue positive health outcomes; and
- framing strategies for the development and implementation of healthy public policies, programs and practices.
The population health approach has contributed to the development of social and economic inclusion as a strategy for change at multiple levels in order to reduce the inequities that exist in society. Social and economic inclusion is based on the reality that a variety of conditions exist and interact to exclude, “leave out”, or “distance” people in many groups and sub-populations in our society. Economic inequality is frequently associated with conditions such as racism and vulnerability based on age, gender, sexual orientation, disability, and other life circumstances. Social and economic inclusion recognizes the multi-dimensionality of inequality that pushes the members of many groups to the margins of society.
Social and economic inclusion focuses on these inequities as an issue of “closing the distance” between sub-groups and the larger society, which has become an organizing focus for the SPNO and participating communities in the SEII.
Social Planning Network of Ontario
The Social Planning Network of Ontario (SPNO) is made up of more than 20 independent, community-based, social planning organizations across Ontario committed to working with their communities to improve social well-being and the quality of community life.
During Phase 1 of the SEII, the SPNO worked with social planning councils and community leadership in five regions across the province to initiate the development of community mobilization strategies around issues of local/regional concern related to the broad determinants of health. Proposals have been developed for the Phase II of SEII under the sponsorship of local social planning councils in each of these regions. SPNO has provided support to each social planning council and their community partners in the development of these proposals.
Each regional Project is submitting a proposal directly to PPHB for funding approval in Phase 2 of the SEII. For more information about each Project visit the Social and Economic Inclusion Initiative Regional Project Website www.closingthedistance.ca