I’m here to talk to you
Europe you might have heard this phrase
before in a couple of days and I’ll
start with my European story because
stories it what makes us perceive the
world even more than facts and it
actually started in 1995 this on the far
left is my father he was a Bulgarian
Member of Parliament together with
members of the European Parliament
negotiating on Bulgaria’s association
agreement this was really in the
beginning of our relations with the EU
fast forward 11 years later 2006 this is
me as part of this wonderful program at
CFA in a meeting room in the European
Council we were still not members but we
had these delegations from Bulgaria
coming so I managed to sneak a photo
with you know Bulgaria written on on the
badge this is close to January 1st 2007
I was in Brussels with my wife and we
were attending a small ceremony on a
small square near Grand Plaza where
there were commissioners officials from
Bulgaria and Romania to kind of
celebrate our accession symbolically to
put both of our countries in the EU
puzzle and this is our key again in
Brussels celebrating with us you might
probably think that the next chapter in
my European story which is Bulgaria
assuming the presidency of the Council
of the EU in 2018 would be as exciting
as that although I’m a bit sceptic on
that so we’ll see how it turns out and
we all have our European stories and
there are basically hundreds of
thousands millions of them some are
stories of progress of development of
unity some of them are stories of
division stories of decline stories of
loss of identity some of them are about
Europe as a great place to experience
culture and history some
of them are about Europe as a place that
can save your life or can kill you in
the process some of them are about
Europe being close to you every day
because you travel on a borderless
motorway doing business but some might
feel very distant this is a picture of
the billboard that I snapped before
coming here and it’s about the EU
financing an extension of a new metro
line in Sofia and it kind of feels like
that EU is this big financial
institution or or a long or a banking
institution that is really far away and
just simply providing money for a
project in Sofia but is there a grand
narrative to Europe is there a bigger
story than all of these million
individual stories of course there is
and it’s still discussed and brought
about by people even today and this is
the story about peace about being able
to overcome one of the worst conflicts
in our history as people and what do you
did was it became a new kind of power a
normative power and it managed to create
interdependence between nation-states
and actually do things that no single
member state can the next big story was
about economic integration and monetary
integration and it gave us the four
freedoms gave us the single market
freedom of people movement goods
services capital and it created a lot of
development in our for our quality of
life economic integration was followed
by attempts at political integration and
in this particular case some wise men
gathered together to create the ultimate
expression of political integration and
of normative power a constitution they
kind of failed and where we are now
sixty years later
obviously back in the same room
as sixty years ago with some things have
changed some haven’t and of course this
year is a year of discussions
deliberations what would be Europe’s
next story the next big plan but there
is one big problem with those
deliberations and the problem is that
most of them happen in a bubble where
more wise men and women think about how
to tinker with the machine but outside
of the bubble this notion that nobody
questions of interdependence and
constantly increasing interdependence is
actually put into question so how can we
move forward how can we resolve this
well one might say that innovation might
be Europe next story right because this
is the buzzword of the times we often
hear it in so many contexts even in the
context of the U so this might provide a
good step forward and actually there is
a flagship initiative of the European
Union called innovation Union and it’s
about a strategy to create an innovation
funding environment that makes it easier
for great ideas to be turned into
products and services that will bring
our economy growth and jobs there are
three things that you should note here
first an innovation friendly environment
second makes it easier for great ideas
to be turned into products and services
and third it will bring our economic
growth and jobs and it really sounds
good on paper but it kind of misses the
point it’s it’s it’s good it’s fine but
it misses the point because innovation
ultimately is about people it’s about us
it’s not about technology it’s not about
doing things new things because they’re
simply new it’s about people and that’s
why innovation should be about first of
all improving the quality of our
interaction the way we do things
together and unfortunately in a new
context innovation is often about highly
specialized people in labs doing some
highly
technological things that will hopefully
improve humanity in the years ahead
innovation is also about improving our
ability to shape the world around us
empowering us this is how we create
change together and this is not the way
we create change with referenda like
brexit or in Catalonia right now because
this is in fact a process in which the
political sphere puts our ability to
influence our world and our way of life
further and further away from us while
at some point in life they just come to
your door knock you open up and they say
look you’re able now to make the most
important decision in your life and for
your generation and for yourself by
answering a single predefined question
and a couple of predefined answers this
is what we’re doing and this is not
empowering us in any way innovation is
also about breaking silos and seeking
problems in holistic way being able to
see them in their entirety what you see
on this forum are migrants and it’s easy
to say that you know looking at it
depending on your story you will see a
security issue you might see a human
rights issue but there’s so much to the
story than that this is only scratching
the surface this is about human
development social systems
entrepreneurship childcare anything you
can imagine it’s it’s a holistic thing
it’s in the end it’s ultimately about
quality of life same with this picture
you can say yeah it’s about unemployment
it’s about growth and jobs but it’s much
more than that it’s about the ability of
companies to cope in a changing
environment it’s about again
entrepreneurship it’s about
overqualified and under qualified people
so these photos still only half of the
story and they tell a story in which we
don’t look at problems in holistic ways
and I believe that
most radical threat to the EU is the
refusal of European and national leaders
and institutions to solve problems in
different way because these problems
demand being solved in a different way
okay so what do we do how can we make
the new story happen so how can we
create a new innovation union that is
really working for us well it’s not
about a single European Act
it’s not about for example getting
million people from a couple of Member
States to vote on a single issue this is
not how we should do it we should do it
by encouraging a repeatable continuous
process of engaging people to in issues
that matter to them and co-creating
solutions with them it’s not also about
holding debates in all of the Member
States it’s really good to talk but we
need to get the ball rolling we need to
do something about it so it’s also about
a mindset of curiosity experimentation
trying out new things not just sitting
and discussing what you see on this
slide is the new hall where European
leaders meet and there is kind of a
sense of order in it but there is also
color the colorful parts though are part
of the decoration and what you see here
is a different kind of setting and
probably the first thing that comes to
mind is that color is not really part of
the decoration it’s part of the process
this is how people use human centered
design to create solutions for other
people this is how they search for unmet
needs try to devise ways to approach
problems brainstorm for new ideas select
the best ones test them out iterate and
try again and again and again until they
have reached a good conclusion
this is a human centered way of solving
problems where color is part of the
actual work it’s not simply a decoration
and this is actually working right now
right now thousands of companies social
organizations and some governments
around the world are using this to
actually solve problems in new ways and
this is not about geopolitics this is
not about playing power games together
this is actually about solving problems
that matter and this is what we need to
do we need to get really better at
solving problems together this is our
main task if you want to have a real
innovation union and the EU can help
then this is why we should create the
new chapter the new story of Europe
which is human centered Europe because
Europe before was institution centered
state centered and now it’s time to get
to us to become human centered and this
is how I quickly imagined an innovation
union Europe and a new human center
Europe would look like these are not
concentric circles of member states some
of which are in the euro zone some are
not and will never be although we have
to these are not coalition’s between
governments power brokers these are
constellations of people organizations
companies working together to solve
difficult interesting problems and this
is the EU serving yeah it looks a bit
messy but that’s how it is it’s not
perfect order its chaos but we create
something from that chaos creative chaos
and it’s the EU serving as a platform
for these ideas and scaling them on a
continental level the Americans led the
world with ways to empower us as
individuals we all have some of these
empowering things in our pockets right
now what I think the Europeans are good
at is creating new ways to empower
people
communities and societies this is what
he was about
actually the whole time and you should
keep doing it but in a new way in a new
way suited to the 21st century and I
think you should be the best place in
the world not because it’s people its
nature the wonderful things you can do
but because we work together to make it
happen every day this is how we’ll make
it really better this is how we will
have a truly innovative union that we
can call innovation unit and this is how
we will have a union of the people by
the people for the people thank you
[Applause]
Europe you might have heard this phrase
before in a couple of days and I’ll
start with my European story because
stories it what makes us perceive the
world even more than facts and it
actually started in 1995 this on the far
left is my father he was a Bulgarian
Member of Parliament together with
members of the European Parliament
negotiating on Bulgaria’s association
agreement this was really in the
beginning of our relations with the EU
fast forward 11 years later 2006 this is
me as part of this wonderful program at
CFA in a meeting room in the European
Council we were still not members but we
had these delegations from Bulgaria
coming so I managed to sneak a photo
with you know Bulgaria written on on the
badge this is close to January 1st 2007
I was in Brussels with my wife and we
were attending a small ceremony on a
small square near Grand Plaza where
there were commissioners officials from
Bulgaria and Romania to kind of
celebrate our accession symbolically to
put both of our countries in the EU
puzzle and this is our key again in
Brussels celebrating with us you might
probably think that the next chapter in
my European story which is Bulgaria
assuming the presidency of the Council
of the EU in 2018 would be as exciting
as that although I’m a bit sceptic on
that so we’ll see how it turns out and
we all have our European stories and
there are basically hundreds of
thousands millions of them some are
stories of progress of development of
unity some of them are stories of
division stories of decline stories of
loss of identity some of them are about
Europe as a great place to experience
culture and history some
of them are about Europe as a place that
can save your life or can kill you in
the process some of them are about
Europe being close to you every day
because you travel on a borderless
motorway doing business but some might
feel very distant this is a picture of
the billboard that I snapped before
coming here and it’s about the EU
financing an extension of a new metro
line in Sofia and it kind of feels like
that EU is this big financial
institution or or a long or a banking
institution that is really far away and
just simply providing money for a
project in Sofia but is there a grand
narrative to Europe is there a bigger
story than all of these million
individual stories of course there is
and it’s still discussed and brought
about by people even today and this is
the story about peace about being able
to overcome one of the worst conflicts
in our history as people and what do you
did was it became a new kind of power a
normative power and it managed to create
interdependence between nation-states
and actually do things that no single
member state can the next big story was
about economic integration and monetary
integration and it gave us the four
freedoms gave us the single market
freedom of people movement goods
services capital and it created a lot of
development in our for our quality of
life economic integration was followed
by attempts at political integration and
in this particular case some wise men
gathered together to create the ultimate
expression of political integration and
of normative power a constitution they
kind of failed and where we are now
sixty years later
obviously back in the same room
as sixty years ago with some things have
changed some haven’t and of course this
year is a year of discussions
deliberations what would be Europe’s
next story the next big plan but there
is one big problem with those
deliberations and the problem is that
most of them happen in a bubble where
more wise men and women think about how
to tinker with the machine but outside
of the bubble this notion that nobody
questions of interdependence and
constantly increasing interdependence is
actually put into question so how can we
move forward how can we resolve this
well one might say that innovation might
be Europe next story right because this
is the buzzword of the times we often
hear it in so many contexts even in the
context of the U so this might provide a
good step forward and actually there is
a flagship initiative of the European
Union called innovation Union and it’s
about a strategy to create an innovation
funding environment that makes it easier
for great ideas to be turned into
products and services that will bring
our economy growth and jobs there are
three things that you should note here
first an innovation friendly environment
second makes it easier for great ideas
to be turned into products and services
and third it will bring our economic
growth and jobs and it really sounds
good on paper but it kind of misses the
point it’s it’s it’s good it’s fine but
it misses the point because innovation
ultimately is about people it’s about us
it’s not about technology it’s not about
doing things new things because they’re
simply new it’s about people and that’s
why innovation should be about first of
all improving the quality of our
interaction the way we do things
together and unfortunately in a new
context innovation is often about highly
specialized people in labs doing some
highly
technological things that will hopefully
improve humanity in the years ahead
innovation is also about improving our
ability to shape the world around us
empowering us this is how we create
change together and this is not the way
we create change with referenda like
brexit or in Catalonia right now because
this is in fact a process in which the
political sphere puts our ability to
influence our world and our way of life
further and further away from us while
at some point in life they just come to
your door knock you open up and they say
look you’re able now to make the most
important decision in your life and for
your generation and for yourself by
answering a single predefined question
and a couple of predefined answers this
is what we’re doing and this is not
empowering us in any way innovation is
also about breaking silos and seeking
problems in holistic way being able to
see them in their entirety what you see
on this forum are migrants and it’s easy
to say that you know looking at it
depending on your story you will see a
security issue you might see a human
rights issue but there’s so much to the
story than that this is only scratching
the surface this is about human
development social systems
entrepreneurship childcare anything you
can imagine it’s it’s a holistic thing
it’s in the end it’s ultimately about
quality of life same with this picture
you can say yeah it’s about unemployment
it’s about growth and jobs but it’s much
more than that it’s about the ability of
companies to cope in a changing
environment it’s about again
entrepreneurship it’s about
overqualified and under qualified people
so these photos still only half of the
story and they tell a story in which we
don’t look at problems in holistic ways
and I believe that
most radical threat to the EU is the
refusal of European and national leaders
and institutions to solve problems in
different way because these problems
demand being solved in a different way
okay so what do we do how can we make
the new story happen so how can we
create a new innovation union that is
really working for us well it’s not
about a single European Act
it’s not about for example getting
million people from a couple of Member
States to vote on a single issue this is
not how we should do it we should do it
by encouraging a repeatable continuous
process of engaging people to in issues
that matter to them and co-creating
solutions with them it’s not also about
holding debates in all of the Member
States it’s really good to talk but we
need to get the ball rolling we need to
do something about it so it’s also about
a mindset of curiosity experimentation
trying out new things not just sitting
and discussing what you see on this
slide is the new hall where European
leaders meet and there is kind of a
sense of order in it but there is also
color the colorful parts though are part
of the decoration and what you see here
is a different kind of setting and
probably the first thing that comes to
mind is that color is not really part of
the decoration it’s part of the process
this is how people use human centered
design to create solutions for other
people this is how they search for unmet
needs try to devise ways to approach
problems brainstorm for new ideas select
the best ones test them out iterate and
try again and again and again until they
have reached a good conclusion
this is a human centered way of solving
problems where color is part of the
actual work it’s not simply a decoration
and this is actually working right now
right now thousands of companies social
organizations and some governments
around the world are using this to
actually solve problems in new ways and
this is not about geopolitics this is
not about playing power games together
this is actually about solving problems
that matter and this is what we need to
do we need to get really better at
solving problems together this is our
main task if you want to have a real
innovation union and the EU can help
then this is why we should create the
new chapter the new story of Europe
which is human centered Europe because
Europe before was institution centered
state centered and now it’s time to get
to us to become human centered and this
is how I quickly imagined an innovation
union Europe and a new human center
Europe would look like these are not
concentric circles of member states some
of which are in the euro zone some are
not and will never be although we have
to these are not coalition’s between
governments power brokers these are
constellations of people organizations
companies working together to solve
difficult interesting problems and this
is the EU serving yeah it looks a bit
messy but that’s how it is it’s not
perfect order its chaos but we create
something from that chaos creative chaos
and it’s the EU serving as a platform
for these ideas and scaling them on a
continental level the Americans led the
world with ways to empower us as
individuals we all have some of these
empowering things in our pockets right
now what I think the Europeans are good
at is creating new ways to empower
people
communities and societies this is what
he was about
actually the whole time and you should
keep doing it but in a new way in a new
way suited to the 21st century and I
think you should be the best place in
the world not because it’s people its
nature the wonderful things you can do
but because we work together to make it
happen every day this is how we’ll make
it really better this is how we will
have a truly innovative union that we
can call innovation unit and this is how
we will have a union of the people by
the people for the people thank you
[Applause]
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