The summer break in the Co-District was experienced differently. Although, in fact, the work of facilitation and incubation conducted and supported by LabGov and ENEA was interrupted in the summer months, for the Community for the Public Park of Centocelle were important months during which he was able to demonstrate his ability to continue independently along the path taken together. At the heart of the summer phase, however, was organized a mid-term review, a co-planning session held to assess the progress of the reflections carried out individually by the facilitators. The research of design of the processes of experimentation of an approach to the human-centered smart city [1] has highlighted, among the characteristics
that the design of the process should have, the insertion into a structured design of moments and spaces for the re-reading, re-consideration and learning[2]of what has been done so far. The mid-term review has been positioned within the reflection phase downstream of the intense cycle of laboratories as a ‘governance niche [3]It creates the space and time needed for a genuine process of transition to occur within a field-based urban experiment.
The group of facilitators met at the Fusolab on July 19, 2018 together with the team of experts LabGov – ENEA to resume the ranks of the incubation process that aims at the establishment of a community business capable of generating and providing services. The work done so far has meant that the community has all the tools and skills to be able to do this. It was therefore a time for discussion and dialogue on the next steps to be taken together and on which direction to take: for example, culture and the circular economy have confirmed to be the possible strands of work of the future cooperative community, as already emerged in previous co-design laboratories.
The meeting opened with the sharing of the work plan for the following months. In September 2018 the end of this first phase of the Centoc Lab project is scheduled. The direction of the work done so far seems to be the creation of an enabling and fully qualified community. To date in fact have been provided the tools and skills to make the community able to generate services. This work is part of a roadmap whose optimal evolution culminates in a community organization that allows the inhabitants of the co-district to move in a more structured and autonomous way in the realization of their ideas. The participants of the meeting then responded and shared their impressions of the path taken and the arrival point of the group. Until now for some participants, the route was a beautiful opportunities for the awareness reached and the tools received. Among the negatively perceived aspects, the progressive reduction of the participants in the laboratory; the dispersion and disorganization that are sometimes perceived. The low number of participants who have reached the end of the course is a factor to be evaluated concretely. Researchers reacted to these comments by specifying that the process was designed not as a participatory process but as a process of co-governance experimentation. Consequently it is participatory in its opening but it is a collaborative process from the structural point of view and aims to select participants with medium and long-term motivations and availability to
engage in the project and exploit together with the group its entrepreneurial potential. The numerical capacity of the group is less relevant in this start-up phase to verify the research hypothesis of the project.
For this reason the idea of the collaborative enterprise has been developed as an output of the next evolution of the project. The collaborative enterprise relies on a group of people who equip themselves with a mission based on values and social impacts (for example, the care and reuse of cultural heritage; energy saving and the production of energy from alternative sources; the reuse of waste and the recovery of objects to create circular economy circuits and contribute to reducing the environmental impact in the area where you live and the efficiency in the use of material resources also through the generation of economies of scale among the participants to the enterprise) but at the same time willing to assume the risk associated with such an operation (which in the case of social enterprises, given the need to maintain a balance between social objectives and economic sustainability, is usually a moderate risk [4]). The importance that an evolution of civic collaboration processes towards a transformation into entrepreneurial and self-sustainable realities emerges from the participants. Those who have a background characterized by experiences of active citizenship express the fatigue and heaviness that volunteering can entail both for the organizational complexity and the lack of resources, while those who already have experience of social enterprise or cooperation signal that a sustainability direction is the factor that can increase the desire to continue to engage. Finally, a topic that emerged was also that of the skills and professionalism present in the group. Training courses could also be provided according to the skills that the project will require.
This phase has, therefore, served to mature and make the community more cohesive and to demonstrate how, if the right conditions are set and if equipped with the appropriate tools, the inhabitants of the city can reveal resources and strategic actors for the resolution of problematic situations or characterized by deep absences. And, in this framework, urban commons confirm that they are not only resources, but a real process from which they can regenerate or generate services.
