Celebrating Social Mobility Chair Role

Stephen Curran – Founder of Catalysis Hubs | Chair of pro-manchester’s Social Mobility Committee

In a recent essay directed at the Labour Party, Tony Blair posed the question: “Are we really prioritising economic growth, essential not just for prosperity but for social justice?” The Labour Party Is Playing With Fire Over Its Future and the Future of the Country

I’ll leave others to debate whether his proposed policies achieve that balance. But the central idea itself, that economic prosperity and social justice should reinforce one another rather than compete, has fascinated me throughout my career, and is one of the main reasons I’m excited to take on the role of Chair of pro-manchester’s Social Mobility Committee.

That fascination probably began before I realised it.

I grew up listening to stories about why my parents left school at 14, what it felt like moving from the slums of Manchester to the “futuristic” Langley estate with its indoor toilets and smell of the countryside, and why my dad, encouraged by Margaret Thatcher, eventually left the council to set up his own painting and decorating business.

Later came my own experience as the first in the family to attend university, followed by leadership roles across the public, private, and third sectors, organisations that, in very different ways, were all trying to contribute to both economic prosperity and social justice.

Across all of those experiences, two questions kept resurfacing:

How do systems, organisations, and individuals create economic growth that genuinely expands opportunity and improves lives? And why does the collaboration that seems to hold so much promise in delivering these solutions often prove so difficult to sustain?

That journey eventually led me to the work of thinkers such as Elinor Ostrom, David Sloan Wilson, and Dennis Snower, and their associated networks and institutions, such as, ProSocial World, Global Solutions Initiative, and Institute for Global Prosperity.

What connects much of this work is the growing recognition that economies perform best when participation, trust, cooperation, and opportunity are broadly distributed, not concentrated.

David Sloan Wilson often describes this process through three connected stages:

shared purpose and narrative, collective agency, and functional organisation.

People first need a common story about what they are trying to achieve together, then the ability to coordinate collective action, and finally practical structures capable of delivering meaningful outcomes.

That idea sits at the heart of my business venture, Catalysis Hubs, which develops collaborative business services bringing together commercial and third sector organisations operating at the meso, or intermediate, level of a regional economy.

Why this level?

Because this is where people actually experience economic life:

communities, SMEs, anchor institutions, educators, charities, employers, and civic organisations.

It is also the level where disconnected systems can either fragment opportunity, or where collaboration can reconnect it.

One of the most powerful insights from my recent presentation at Pro Manchester was that Greater Manchester is already full of organisations doing brilliant work of this nature. The challenge is often not capability or intent. It is coordination.

Simply by collaborating more effectively across sectors, we could create significantly greater impact for residents and businesses alike while supporting Greater Manchester’s Industrial Strategy and Good Growth ambitions.

That is why I’m so excited by the opportunity this role presents.

The Social Mobility Committee sits within Pro Manchester, what I believe is one of the most progressive and influential business networks in Greater Manchester. I’m particularly excited by the opportunity to collaborate with other Pro Manchester committees, including EDI and REG, as well as wider regional networks dedicated to combining economic prosperity with social justice, such as the Greater Manchester Social Value Network chaired by Nina Howells.

At a recent event, Nina and I explored how pathways into employment can strengthen both economic growth and social mobility. It is clear to me that organisations already are aligned around the idea that inclusive growth is not simply morally desirable, it is economically necessary.

This is particularly important because social mobility is not only about young people.

Veterans, care leavers, people with experience of the criminal justice system, and many others who have faced adversity often develop exceptional resilience, insight, and capability. Too often, systems fail to connect those strengths to meaningful economic opportunity.

When that happens, everybody loses.

More recently, I had the opportunity to take part in a lecture series led by David Sloan Wilson and Dennis Snower exploring the future of economic systems in an increasingly complex and interconnected world.

What inspired me most was not just the theory, but the number of active initiatives already experimenting with practical alternatives rooted in cooperation, participation, behavioural science, and new technology.

One memorable person was Jon Ramer, founder of the Compassion Games (https://www.compassiongames.org/), a global initiative where cities and regions compete to become more compassionate communities through collaborative action.

I genuinely think Greater Manchester is in the perfect position to make a real splash in a competition like this.

Many of the most successful examples involve cross-sector partnerships that simultaneously strengthen wellbeing, participation, local resilience, and economic vitality.

At a time when political debate often feels increasingly driven by grievance, anger, and a sense of exclusion, I find myself wondering:

What if we are equally ambitious about harnessing the emotion of compassion to build practical, collaborative systems that deliver both economic growth and social justice?

Not compassion as sentiment, but compassion built into infrastructure, participation and economic economic strategy.

Perhaps the most sustainable economies are not simply the most productive.

Perhaps they are the ones where the greatest number of people genuinely feel they have a stake in the future?