About the prize

The objective of SozialMarie is to make innovative social ideas and their realisation known to a broad public. By means of these prizes, Unruhe Private Foundation encourages networking amongst projects. These projects can then serve as examples or models for other interested parties.

For the ninth time already, the SozialMarie awards put social innovation before a broad public. About 1700 socially innovative projects have been submitted since the first SozialMarie edition in 2005 and 120 of these have won awards. Every year, outstanding socially innovative projects that strike by their innovative force and creativity compete for the prizes endowed with 42,000 Euro. Eligible for submission are projects from anywhere in Austria, Hungary and the Czech Republic. In Slovakia, Poland, Croatia, Slovenia and Germany for practical reasons projects must not be more than 300km (as the crow flies) away from Vienna.

The public award ceremony takes place on the 1st of May in the Large Auditorium of ORF Radio Kulturhaus, Argentinierstraße 30a, 1040 Vienna.