URGENT
July 3rd 2000

Dear Dr Umanoff and colleagues,

This letter is to congratulate you ­ the Institute for Social Inventions has judged your scheme of a national association for addicts to be the Best Social Innovation for the year 2000 in the Welfare Category. (The draft of the book entry about you is given below.)
No money or ceremony attaches to the Award, only publicity, but you will be sent the certificate shortly and your Award is described in detail in our annual 350-page book The Book of Inspirations ­ A Directory of Social Inventions which will be posted to you at the end of July or early in August. Please let us know whether all the contact details we have for you are correct (see the very end of this e-mail). From September the book will also feature in the Institute¹s Global Ideas Bank on the web (at www.globalideasbank.org) which receives some 3 million accesses a year at present.
The media will be informed that the official date for the announcement of these Awards is September 1st 2000, but you may, if you wish, publicise your receipt of this Award before then and you are indeed encouraged to make contact with your local media. The certificate and other material being sent to you shortly may help with this.
The Institute is an educational charity founded in 1985 and based in London, with as patrons, inter alia, Brain Eno, Anita Roddick, Sir Peter Parker and Fay Weldon. Schemes around the world are drawn to the Institute¹s attention by its international correspondents and are judged by the directors of the Institute.
We would be grateful for e-mail or other acknowledgement of safe receipt of this notification.

With best wishes and congratulations,

Nicholas Albery
Chairman
The Institute for Social Inventions | Tel +44 [0]20 8208 2853 | Fax +44 [0]20 8452 6434
20 Heber Road, London NW2 6AA, UK

Global Ideas Bank: http://www.globalideasbank.org

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Social Innovations
Awards 2000

15 Awards for the Institute¹s 15th birthday

The UK-based Institute for Social Inventions, whose patrons and consultants include Brian Eno, Anita Roddick, Professor Charles Handy and Fay Weldon, was born in 1985 as an international suggestion box for social improvements. For its 15th birthday on September 1st 2000, the Institute announces the following 15 Awards for the best and most imaginative ideas and projects from around the world.

Institute for Social Inventions, 20 Heber Road, London NW2 6AA, UK (tel 020 8208 2853; fax 020 8452 6434; e-mail: rhino@dial.pipex.com; web: www.globalideasbank.org).

Self-taught computer literacy for kids in Delhi slum.

The £1,000 Social Innovations Award for 2000 goes to Sugata Mitra of the NIIT software company in Delhi for his hole-in-the-wall experiment where he plugged a video-supervised, web-connected Pentium PC into a wall which separates his company from waste land. Within days, slum children between the ages of six and 12 had taught themselves to surf the web, to use Microsoft Paint and to download MP3 Hindi film songs. Having thus demonstrated that curious children, working together as a group, can attain basic computer literacy without help, Mitra has now designed a scheme with a budget of $2 billion whereby within five years 500 million Indian children, using 100,000 computer kiosks, would make themselves computer literate.

Meet the mayor on the park bench

The Local Authorities Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to Kolbjørn Kvaerum, Mayor of Ringerike, a municipality of 28,000 in Norway, for his sitting on the same red bench in the centre of Hønefoss every Wednesday at noon, whatever the weather. This was his idea for opening up dialogue with his community. Sometimes people have to queue up to chat with him. Some want to talk about council matters, others about their own concerns. See page XXX for further details. Could Ken Livingstone, London¹s new mayor, copy this, perhaps doing his weekly sitting in one borough after another, in rotation?

Network of Hippocratic drop-in groups for doctors

The Medical Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to Dr Rachel Remen for having launched a network of drop-in groups for doctors in the States where they can explore Hippocratic values and find deeper meaning in their work. To start a group, a doctor simply invites several like-minded colleagues to meet one evening a month for two to three hours. Topics in these groups have included suffering, listening, mistakes and loneliness, and the Œprice of admission¹ is the willingness to share a story with the group. Dr Remen believes that a sense of compassion and meaning, which are often lacking in medical training and practice, can help doctors to recover from the Œdisease¹ of objectivity. ³More mistakes², she says, ³are made by objectivity than were ever made by intimacy.²

Tribal Indian women in afforestation scheme.

The International Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to Chami Murmu, a young tribal woman in an impoverished district of Bihar, India, and her group, Sahyogi Mahila for their planting of nearly two million trees. They encourage each participating village to form a committee for the protection of the new woods. Money from fines for cutting trees is used to provide soft loans for marriages, medical treatment, etc. Sahyogi Mahila now also run 24 schools, a poultry farm and a dairy.

Subtitling TV songs for mass literacy

The Education Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to a scheme for Same Language Subtitling of Gujurati film songs on Indian TV so that semi-literate viewers are motivated to practise their reading on a regular basis. The subtitling helps them to know the lyrics or to sing along with the song. The promoters calculate that Same Language Subtitling could be extended to 120 million neo-literates at a lowly cost of 0.0001 US$ per person per annum.

A council¹s incentives for compost toilets.

The Ecology Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to the municipal council of Tanum (population 12,000) in Sweden which uses a range of incentives to encourage the take-up of composting toilets. Permission to instal a non-composting toilet in a new building is hard to obtain and hooking up to the sewers is charged at over £3,000. As a result less than 8 per cent of new houses being built each year now come with WCs. Annual service fees are halved for existing houses that convert to composting toilets. See page XXX for further details.

Eco-Lighthouse ­ free eco-audits for firms that spread the word

The Business Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to the Eco-Lighthouse project in Norway, started by the Kristiansand municipality. The city authorities paid for an eco-audit for nine local businesses, ranging from a hotel to an ice-cream factory, so as to help them draw up three-year plans for reducing their resource consumption and environmental impact and for improving their work environment. In return for receiving these audits, which enabled them to cut costs, the firms had to undertake to disseminate their experience of the process to other firms in the same line of business as themselves ­ so that the scheme became virtually self-disseminating.

Proper energy behaviour ­ a social skill learnt in kindergarten

The Education Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to Per Hilmo for his belief that ³proper energy behaviour is a social skill which has to be developed in the early years of life². He involves children in Norwegian kindergartens and schools as energy caretakers, reading meters each week at school and keeping an Energy Diary on home energy consumption. Children confront their parents about conservation measures at home and at school they learn how meter readings can be reduced by closing doors and windows, heating the school only when in use, running the dishwasher only when full and so on.

Extending the living room into the street

The Neighbourhood Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to Trond Sigvaldsen and his neighbours in Vikesdalsgata Street in Stavanger, Norway. It all started one day when Sigvaldsen took his father¹s garden bench out in the street to give it a polish, taking his newspaper and coffee flask with him. Soon people were gathering round his bench for a chat. So, they thought, why not make the whole street into an open air living room? Since then, they have furnished it with benches, tables, a pergola, potted plants, a notice-board, a flagpole and even wiring for those who want to be outdoors as they surf the net.

Noise-pollution-free reserves for sea mammals

The Campaigning Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to the Natural Resources Defence Council in Washington which has advocated the creation of marine reserves where noise pollution would be forbidden. At close range, powerful underwater sounds can cause a sea mammal¹s ears and lungs to rupture or can lead to the desertion of habitats. The Council has forced the US Navy to abandon its plans for ocean tests of its disruptive new sonar system. See XXX for further details.

Free UN anti-virus web software

The Software Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to Matti Nummelin in Finland for his suggestion that an international body such as the UN Development Programme co-ordinate the creation of anti-virus software that anybody in the developing world could download for free from the web. Users in the developing world cannot afford to buy such software and its updates, with the result that many of their systems are crippled by rogue viruses, which they in turn spread to the developed world.

A politician¹s suit covered with sponsors¹ logos

The Wild Card Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to Patrick Therien in the States for his suggestion that at least once a year politicians should be obliged to wear a ceremonial suit covered with their sponsors¹ logos, with the patches sized according to the percentage the sponsor contributed to the campaign fund. The politicians would look like racing car drivers with their sporting chevrons, and at a glance the voters could all see who really pays for influence.

Web archives of scientists¹ transcendent experiences

The Science Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to Professor Tart in California for The Archives of Scientists¹ Transcendent Experiences (TASTE) on the web (at www.issc-taste.org). Professor Tart believes that the materialistic and reductionist psychosocial climate of contemporary science has rejected and suppressed both the having and the sharing of transcendent, transpersonal, spiritual or psychic states and experiences. The website is a safe and anonymous, quality-controlled space that scientists can contribute to and that the general public can have access to. It will lead, he hopes, to ³a more receptive climate within the scientific profession to the full range of our humanity².

Improving PR: Single Party Government Guarantee

The Politics Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to Dr David Chapman of the Democracy Design Forum for his design of a Single-Party-Government AV electoral system. The Labour Government in the UK is looking for just such a reform of the electoral system, one that lacks the drawbacks of coalition politics associated with PR. This new system not only virtually guarantees single-party government but also provides single-member constituencies and gives seats to minor parties with no representation threshold. It would tend to create a situation where two main parties alternate in office, each with an incentive to adopt moderate and responsive policies.

A national association for addicts

The Welfare Social Innovations Award 2000 goes to Dr Dan Umanoff in the States for his National Association for the Advancement and Advocacy of Addicts, which he has formed to fight the discrimination of addicts. The Association seeks to change the laws that criminalise being an addict and to put discrimination against addicts on a par with sexual and racial discrimination or discrimination against those with physical or mental disabilities.
Dr Umanoff believes that some people are as liable to the disease of addiction as others are to diabetes or leukaemia; and that the focus needs to be not on removing the addictions but on recovering from the underlying disease. The aim is also to provide free legal and other advocacy for those addicts attempting to confront discrimination.

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FULL ARTICLE FOLLOWS:

A national association for addicts Dan F. Umanoff, MD Adapted from the Association website (at www.hypoism.com). The National Association for the Advancement and Advocacy of Addicts is a non-profit organisation formed to fight discrimination against addicts and to promote the Hypoism paradigm of addictions and its principles.
Purposes of the Association
The purposes of the Association are:
* To provide a rational context, that of the Hypoism paradigm (see the note on Hypoism at the end of this item), into which all addicts are perceived and placed by themselves and society.
* To provide advocacy free of charge on all levels (social, legal, political, medical, financial, occupational, licensure, criminal justice and various local, state and federal administrative boards) in order to legally confront discrimination of addicts in these areas.
* To educate the public, including addicts, on the true nature of addictions, based on the Hypoism paradigm, to end stigmatisation and denial and to improve recovery.
* To prevent and punish the discrimination and abuse of addicts.
* To oversee and peer review all scientific research (governmental, academic and private) and research proposals in order to end the current psychologically-biased pseudoscience of addiction.
* To remove addiction from the auspices of psychiatry and psychology and place it into the correct realm of human biological diversity based on Hypoism.
* To distinguish being an addict from the doing of actual harm to other people (assumptions and accusations of harm need to substantiated by proven harm).
* To make suggestions to, but not interfere with, existing 12-Step programmes so that they may be more inclusive and effective.
* To provide a prototype 12-Step programme, Hypoics Non-anonymous, which utilises all Hypoism concepts.
* To change laws that criminalise being an addict, instead of focusing on specific interpersonal behaviors.
* To end the discrimination against addicts, just as there is an ending of discrimination against other diversity based groups ­ racial, sexual, religious, ethnic, ideological or concerned with physical and mental disabilities.

The Association's beliefs:

The National Association for the Advancement and Advocacy of Addicts does not advocate the use of addictions, but we are realistic about non-recovering addicts using addictions. We make no judgements about the use of addictions, but we do support addicts, using or not. We know that addicts will always use their addictions until and unless they are in recovery. As such, we support recovery and we support all means to allow addicts to enter recovery, including destigmatisation, decriminalisation, and preventing the abuse and de facto punishment of active addicts. We do not support or condone hurtful interpersonal actions or crime by addicts, but we do believe that the rational and realistic attitude we have about addictions and addicts will lead to significant reduction of addiction-based crime. An example of the catch 22 laws that all drug addicts face are those that criminalise the purchase, possession, and use of illegal drugs. How is it possible to be a drug addict and not to purchase, possess and use illegal drugs? Thus merely being a drug addict is to be a felon, ipso facto. The Association¹s realistic attitude about addiction is the only attitude that promotes self-diagnosis and hence, quick and easy access to recovery; the only means of preventing the damaging effects of addictions. We do not justify the "but I have a disease" excuse concerning getting off the hook or getting out of taking responsibility and being accountable for proven, hurtful, interpersonal crimes. We do believe, though, that our approach to the cause and etiology of addictions and our destigmatisation campaign will drastically reduce interpersonal crimes by allowing addicts to come out of the closet into the fresh air of honestly admitting their Hypoism and addictions. The social atmosphere must be enlightened, accepting and conducive for this to occur. Judgmentalism, stigmatisation, and punishment for merely being an addict perpetuates all the negative aspects of addiction inside the closet of shame and personal denial. The present psychological and religious paradigm of addictions ensures the perpetuation of the current social attitudes which maintain and magnify these damaging aspects many times more than do the addictions themselves.

We believe that unless the public is educated about the true nature of the disease that causes inevitable addictions in certain people (just as diabetes and leukaemia occur in certain people) then addiction bias and discrimination will continue to flourish. We believe that the present superstitious views on addictions are comparable to the views of most people concerning epilepsy 150 years ago. If the facts are known and the stigma removed then intelligent and effective intervention and recovery can be implemented for all addicts and their families.

Our legal and political system has, in far too many ways, punished addicts because of the presence of a disease. Criminal and civil legal discrimination and bias are rampant and these issues must be addressed on a case-by-case basis by committed Association legal professionals. The Association provides advocacy for fair and impartial treatment of addicts and for the changing of unrealistic and counterproductive legislation. Our goal is to ensure that addicts get fair and equal treatment under the law and that unconstitutional and prohibitionist-type statutes are repealed and replaced with realistic laws which will benefit society and put an end to the war on drugs and addicts. Addicts need to perceive themselves as a discriminated-against minority, and to take responsibility for confronting and resolving their own legal, political, medical, and social issues. The present situation is an untenable one in which we basically agree with non-addicts about our deferential status and beg them to please forgive us, accept us and to let us be normal if we act according to their dictates and whims. We need to realise that they are not going to take care of us the way we need to be taken care of. Only we can do that. This can only happen if we do the leg work and demand our rights and equal status under the law. This does not mean we are not held responsible for interpersonal harm. It does, however, mean that we are held to the same standards of the law as others and not to special standards for addicts only. We only demand equal rights and protection under the law. It also means that some biased laws that specifically discriminate against addicts must be changed.