at a faster rate than most were able to foresee.  From just under 1,000 tech companies at the height of the last boom, to 3,200 and counting in 2021 (though these numbers may be overinflated).  Exciting initiatives like Platform Calgary and philanthropist David Bissett’s transformative investment in SAIT’s School for Advanced Digital Technology are helping strengthen this still nascent but promise-filled ecosystem.Calgary is in the early stages of a profound transition, from a resource-driven 9-5 culture, where economic and urban growth trumped all other values, to a diverse, knowledge-driven city, where purpose-driven companies thrive, and where quality of life and human well-being take centre stage.  Seizing the opportunities of this very different future will require innovation.  Technological and commercial innovation, but also social innovation.

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While it may be many years before Calgary is able to ‘catch up’ to other tech innovation nodes in Canada, there is at least one sub-sector that appears to be emerging as an area where the city might well have a competitive edge:  ‘Tech for good’, or ‘social technology’.  Calgary is already home to some remarkable social businesses with global or national reach, such as Benevity and Helpseeker, both certified B-Corporations, as well as many smaller companies and a burgeoning number of startups.  Students, as well, are increasingly interested in social technology, whether through an entrepreneurial lens or by way of public policy or direct social impact work.

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The Fourth Industrial Revolution is upon us.  Digital technologies are transforming civil society, community interaction and democracy itself in ways that are both liberating and disturbing. The social impact sector, not just in Calgary but throughout the Anglo-American world, is a by-product of past industrial revolutions, but its role has been more about cleaning up the broken pieces rather than influencing social and economic policy and generating new futures. This can, and must, change, as the safe, fair, inclusive, accessible development and application of tech is critical to the maintenance and growth of human dignity, collective action, and the future of our communities.  As we point out in our publication In Search of the Altruithm: AI and the Future of Social Good (2019), the worlds of tech innovation and social innovation need to comingle far more than they currently do.  And the social impact sector must become much more directly engaged in technology development, which, as we’ve observed in the aforementioned report, “can be made to be generative, beautiful, and not merely ethical, but rationally compassionate and just, enriching our lives beyond what we can currently imagine. But it will only do so if civil society — including citizens living at the margins, and people involved in social good pursuits, from artists and teachers to health professionals and social workers — become much more interested and involved.”  We further observe that, while there are many organizations applying tech solutions in the service of ‘good’ generically, it tends to be focused on simply facilitating status quo ways of doing charitable or philanthropic work.  Similarly, there are many companies, researchers and practitioners focused on the ‘responsible’ use of data or the ‘ethical’ design of AI and other tech.  What we collectively now need to do is take this ‘tech for good’ and ‘responsible/ethical’ work to the next level, to design and apply tech for social impact.  

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There is also a convergence of interest in 21st century skills, work-integrated learning, and micro-credential learning opportunities in priority sectors and high-demand or emerging industries.  We need cross-disciplinary, cross-sectoral initiatives that can animate many of the skills and experiences that our economic and social transitions require, and that employers across sectors are looking for.  This is why the integration of social and tech must also integrate undergraduate learning and new work experience opportunities.