Year: 2023
Type: book-chapter
Abstract: Since its burst in early 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic has deeply affected every aspect of daily life, from international trade and travelling to restrictions on an individual level, becoming a complex multi-level and highly multi-faceted problem. Due to its overarching influence and deep impact, it can be seen as one of the most disruptive Grand Challenges of our time. Different from most other lasting Grand Challenges, such as Climate Change, the pandemic exerted its influence with little ramp-up, rapidly transforming health and health systems, human lives, goods and economic flows, decision-making mechanisms, research and innovation, and many other aspects of life in a very short span of time. Grand Challenges require extraordinary efforts from society as a whole since they need holistic, effective, collaborative endeavours to solve them. One such unique orchestrated effort can be observed in the subsequent series of virtual massive EUvsVirus ( https://www.euvsvirus.org/ ) events and committed collaborations (‘hackathon’, ‘matchathon’, ‘launchathon’, ‘community’, ‘EIC Covid platform’, and the unparalleled ‘Academia Diffusion Experiment’ [ADE], analysed in chapter “Academia Diffusion Experiment: Trailblazing the Emergence from Co-Creation” of this book). While this chapter explains ‘what’ has been produced with the ADE, inspired by the EUvsVirus phenomenon, the ADE chapter describes ‘how’ it has been done. Both are extremely unique in terms of content, procedure, motivation, collaboration, effects—and they attempt to trailblaze at highest level co-creation, co-evolution, and co-dreaming. Hence, situated as the last chapters of this book. This chapter will shed light on the EUvsVirus events, where over 30,000 individuals from 40 countries came together and addressed the complexity of this massive challenge in a pioneering and groundbreaking way. The chapter is focused on analysing the EUvsVirus hackathon (alongside its mentioned unique spillovers) as a tool, method, and process capable of channelling and activating individuals’ and institutions’ concerns, wills, and commitments into a unique orchestrated open, collaborative response to an urgent Grand Challenge, the pandemic. We are producing a multi-vortex tornado model, resembling the EUvsVirus phenomenon, its components, mechanisms, behaviour and how to replicate it to achieve such disruptive, global organisational effort of co-creation. Especially, the emergence of such collaboration in the face of such urgency leads to the assumption that there are crucial lessons to be learned from this endeavour, quite fittingly encapsulated by these words: ‘We are learning That though we weren't ready for this, We have been readied by it’. Amanda Gorman’s New Year poem ( https://amandagormanbooks.com/#the-hill-we-climb-and-other-poems or https://edition.cnn.com/videos/tv/2022/01/06/exp-amanda-gorman-nye-poem.cnn )
Authors: Renata Petrevska Nechkoska, Antonia Caro Gonzalez, Alberto Bertello, Simona Grande, Marc Schmüser, Nataliia Rzhevska, Yulia Matskevich, Milen Baltov, Urska Jez, Eugenio Clavijo, Ekaterina Tsaranok, Montserrat Daban Marín, Raouf Hajji, Rui Couto, Karolina Bolesta, Sara Abou Ibrahim, Elena Poughia, Man Yang, Paola De Bernardi, Geert Poels, Gordon Müller-Seitz, Marcel Bogers
Institutions: Ghent University, Valencian International University, i2CAT, University of Turin, University of Kaiserslautern, Brunel University of London, Burgas Free University, Biocat, University of Sousse, SGH Warsaw School of Economics, Modern University for Business and Science, Hanken School of Economics, University of Copenhagen, Eindhoven University of Technology, University of California, Berkeley
Language: English
Subfield: Management of Technology and Innovation
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
Funder: Universiteit Gent
OpenAlex ID: W4313839698