I think, just to reiterate, that there are a number of different tools, and no tool is a silver bullet. So I think it's important to start with the problem and then identify the tools that are appropriate to solve it, rather than starting with the hammer and looking for a nail to hit. Depending on the type of challenge and the types of interventions that are available to address it, I think a social impact bond is certainly an interesting tool to facilitate the kinds of partnerships and the sort of holistic approach that I think you are speaking to.
An example might help, and I'm sure you've heard about the Peterborough social impact bond, designed to reduce recidivism in the U.K. I think one of the most interesting things about that model, and something that was commented on in the RAND report earlier this year, was that having Social Finance in the U.K. act in that intermediary-style position allowed it to bring together between five and 10 different service provider organizations that had different mandates. Some of them did mental health related work. Some were “meet you at the gate” programs. Some were organizations designed to help connect ex-offenders with jobs. Some were focused on housing. None of them formerly had shared data or been able to say that they were working with the same client, or the same person.
So under the social impact bond model you had Social Finance helping to create information-sharing and data-sharing agreements and platforms between all of these organizations, identifying where there were gaps in service delivery that nobody had formerly known about and allowing them to focus on the key interventions that were required for each client. So it became a client-focused intervention. They would see a prisoner while he or she was still in prison, meet at the gate, and they would know that person was talking to this service provider about housing, talking to that service provider about jobs, and so on. The service provisions and the outcomes were much improved as a result.
So that kind of holistic approach with a variety of partners and a community, I think, is something that is facilitated, or can be, through a social impact bond model.