The Social Manager as driver of social innovation and of inclusive growth in the regeneration of built environment

In the last decade, social housing entered the real estate market and became a real estate product able to offer affordable housing and services on the market. The realization of social housing involves private and non-profit organizations - in support of public welfare – in order to achieve a housing policy of public interest. The researches by Housing Europe show that the most effective way to reach this objective is represented by Social Management, which is the capacity to join management of real estate and social aspects, promoted by independent private subjects with a mission of public or philanthropic interest. Social Management consists in the provision of social promotion and asset management services and is distinguished from a traditional management for the central role of inhabitants and community receiving the services. In addition to Building and Facility Management activities (and partly Property Management) aimed at preserving real estate value, the Social Manager carries out all activities addressed service beneficiaries attributable to Community Management area, characterizing them with the centrality of the ommunity through an integrated management model. When the role of the Social Manager is carried out by Cooperatives Enterprises, the instance of defining collaborative communities is intrinsically fulfilled through the skills deriving from the cooperative tradition who by their nature represent an important asset for structuring this type of management. In the Social Housing sector, the Social Manager, the more Cooperative, with its significant track record in implementing the practices of conjunction between owner and inhabitants, represents a potential for carrying out the important guarantee function referred to at the beginning. It is in the management of the community of beneficiaries of social housing that the guarantee element for the achievement of the general interest in housing policies realized in the forms of private public partnership. The Social Manager can in fact constitute the guarantor of the service of general interest contained in the general definition of "social housing" introduced by the D.M. April 22, 2008. The paper presents the results of the research “How to create and regenerate social value through social housing” promoted by Politecnico di Milano and Legacoop Abitanti; it’ll describe how the social housing management enterprises could represent the driver of social innovation and of inclusive growth in the regeneration of built environment.