Democracy
Advancing Equity for Boston's Resilience
The Bertelsmann Foundation (BFNA), with generous support from the Open Society Foundations, has partnered with the 100 Resilient Cities initiative (pioneered by the Rockefeller Foundation) and the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF) to launch the Transatlantic Policy Lab. The lab is a unique forum to explore the agenda for advancing just and fair inclusion, or equity, in U.S. and European cities. Boston, Massachusetts, and Athens, Greece, provide the backdrops for interactive, week-long explorations into this issue by a team of trans-Atlantic experts from local governments, philanthropy, think tanks, nongovernmental organizations and the private sector. The lab is an organic, results-driven exercise, aimed not only at facilitating a trans-Atlantic dialogue, but also developing place-based policy recommendations that can advance an equity and resilience agenda in both cities.
This report summarizes the Boston lab, which took place from February 28 to March 4, 2016. Since its inception, the lab has worked in tandem with the City of Boston’s chief resilience officer, Dr. Atyia Martin. The lab is designed to build on the key findings of the City’s Preliminary Resilience Assessment, which used community engagement to rank and order the City’s resilience priorities.