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Social innovation (SI) research tends to understand rural SI processes as collective initiatives of equally engaged, supportive, and like-minded people. However, recent research has indicated that SI projects often benefit from dedicated key players who find support in their communities but also must deal with resistance and barriers. Against this backdrop, this article explores the figure of the key player in SI research and exposes the patterns of rural SI processes with the empirical cases of two small communities in Germany that jointly created rural infrastructure systems, thus seeking emancipation from remote political and economic control and marginalization. Using the empirical cases, we tested and specified a heuristic framework of key players that combines analytical dimensions at the micro-, meso-, and macro-levels. According to our findings, the heuristic framework is appropriate for analyzing key players in rural SI processes. Notably, we show that SI processes benefit from assertive key players and strong communities capable of joint action. Both are crucial for dealing with internal opposition and overcoming external hurdles that appear when novel approaches irritate familiar solutions and routines.

Purpose The Aakash tablet was developed as a social innovation (SI) to transform India’s higher education sector. This paper aims to explain the failure of the Aakash tablet beyond the typical explanations of deficiencies in the device’s technical capabilities. This paper argues that an SI lens provides a stronger explanation for its failure than the standard analyses built primarily on the technological viability of the device. Design/methodology/approach The Aakash project ran from 2010 to 2015. During this period, a number of government and policy reports as well as mainstream media articles were published on the device. Since 2015, a number of academic articles have been published on the Aakash emphasizing its failure as a technological solution. The authors draw on these sources to frame an understanding of the Aakash’s failure informed by SI theory. Findings Through a complexity-informed analysis, the authors show that the failure of the Aakash stemmed from flawed assumptions and a failure of the initiative to engage with both the particular and constantly changing features of the broader landscape of needs and opportunities. Originality/value This study draws attention to failure as a legitimate aspect of the study of SI. In presenting a “counter-case” to the usual success stories, it shows that the SI lens can also explain why an SI does not take off. It thereby adds to the literature on SI and complexity theory through an exploration of the complex interactions among public policy goals, technological advancements and entrepreneurship.

Este artigo busca refletir sobre a importância das pesquisas em design voltadas para sustentabilidade e inovação social, tendo como objetivo a ênfase no estudo de materiais, especificamente no reaproveitamento de resíduos, a partir de pesquisas realizadas no Programa de Pós-Graduação em Design (PPGDg) da Universidade Federal do Maranhão (UFMA) na Linha de Materiais, Processos e Tecnologia. A metodologia utilizada aciona a revisão de literatura e o estudo de caso que explanará 3 dissertações desenvolvidas no PPGDg (UFMA), visando um maior embasamento teórico sobre o reapro- veitamento de resíduos no setor da construção civil. Nas considerações finais houve a elaboração de uma tabela que contém os autores e títulos das pesquisas desenvolvidas no PPGDg (UFMA) ao longo dos últimos anos com foco em materiais, visando auxiliar novos pesquisadores e/ou entusiastas do assunto.

Funders, policy-makers and public service managers should be aware that inputs can be designed into the innovation process in order to build capacity among staff engaged in innovation in public ser...

Complexity concepts help to open the black box of social innovation for public sector managers and policy-makers and to understand why social innovation can simultaneously be both a solution and pr...

The new turn to Mass Innovation and Mass Entrepreneurship (MIME) initiatives in China mark a concrete step to reconfiguring and appropriating the western maker movement rhetoric to fit China’s context. In this paper, we explore the nascent China’s maker movement under the guidance of the state’s MIME initiative to identify the key issues, actions, rationales, and logics of appropriation linked to this public policy agenda. Empirically, we employ a semantic network analysis to identify policy frames of the two principal documents of the MIME issued in 2015 and 2018. Providing insight into the heterogeneous nature of MIME discourses and innovation policy in China, our study Sheds light on how social innovation derives from activism and connect with emerging creative cities discourse, entrepreneurship, and local economic development. Implication for the theory and practice of innovation policy are outlined.

Over the last 20 years, social entrepreneurship has attracted the attention of researchers from a wide variety of disciplines which, in turn, has generated a large variety of understandings of the meaning of social entrepreneurship. This paper maps the existing definitions, using a citation map and cluster analysis methods. Studying 307 documents that contain social entrepreneurship definitions, the analysis reveals that - contrary to what has been commonly believed -there does, in fact, exist widespread consensus within the academic community on the definition and meaning of the term social entrepreneurship and it is primarily centred on the combination of social and financial goals, community ideals and innovation.

Organizations play a fundamental role in mitigating social inequality, with emphasis on social enterprises. Thus, the objective is to analyze how a social enterprise acts as an intermediator to promote social innovations in companies. A case study was held in a local social enterprise located in the city of Porto Alegre, Brazil, and which develops projects of social impact for other organizations. The data stems from participant observation, interviews and access to secondary data. The results indicate that social innovation is generated from the interaction between client companies and the final benefited public, through the intermediation promoted by the analyzed company, when conducting the process of creating and implementing social projects. As organizações têm papel fundamental na mitigação da desigualdade social, com destaque para empresas sociais. Assim, o objetivo foi analisar de que maneira um empreendimento social pode atuar como um agente intermediário ao desenvolver projetos para empresas convencionais que desejam promover a inovação social. Foi realizado um estudo de caso em um empreendimento social localizado na cidade de Porto Alegre/RS, que desenvolve projetos de impacto social para outras organizações. Os dados foram provenientes de observação participante, entrevistas, sites e vídeos. Os resultados indicam que a inovação social é gerada a partir da interação entre as empresas clientes e o público beneficiado, por meio da intermediação promovida pela empresa analisada, ao conduzir o processo de criação e implementação dos projetos sociais. Las empresas sociales juegan un papel fundamental en la mitigación de la desigualdad social. Así, el objetivo fue analizar cómo una empresa social puede actuar como intermediaria en el desarrollo de proyectos para empresas convencionales que deseen impulsar la innovación social. Se realizó un estudio de caso en una empresa social ubicada en Porto Alegre/RS, Brasil, que desarrolla proyectos con impacto social para otras organizaciones. Los datos provienen de la observación participante, entrevistas, sitios web y videos. La innovación social se genera a partir de la interacción entre las empresas clientes y el público final beneficiado, a través de la intermediación promovida por la empresa analizada, a la hora de realizar el proceso de creación e implementación de proyectos sociales.

It is generally well-accepted in innovation research that consumer/user adoption of an invention is key to its diffusion. Despite general awareness about the importance of the adopter perspective i...

PurposeToday’s pressing global societal challenges are urgent and require substantial solutions and innovations that tackle the roots of a problem. These challenges call for new forms of leadership, stakeholder engagement and innovation. This paper aims to examine whether, why and how business leaders engage in social innovation. The authors argue that leadership perspective and motivation are important drivers for developing substantial social innovations suited to resolving societal challenges at their roots. More specifically, the authors propose that intra-personal factors (degree of care and compassion), an inter-relational perspective of leadership (shareholder versus stakeholder) and the corresponding leadership motivation (personalized versus socialized) may unveil what quality of social innovation (first-order versus second-order solutions) is pursued by a business leader. Implications for future research and practice are provided.Design/methodology/approachThe authors revisit the concept of social innovation and explore its connection with care and compassion. They suggest a series of propositions pertaining to the relationship between different configurations of leadership and different forms of social innovation.FindingsResponsible business leaders with an integrative leader trait configuration (stakeholder perspective, socialized motivation, high degree of care and compassion) are more likely to foster substantial second-order social innovations for uprooting societal problems than business leader with an instrumental leader trait configuration (shareholder perspective, personalized motivation, low degree of care and compassion). An organization’s stakeholder culture plays a moderating role in the relation between leadership and social innovation.Social implicationsThis paper reveals a path for conceptualizing leadership in social innovation from a stakeholder perspective. Future research should investigate the role of business leaders, their mindsets, styles and relational competencies in co-creation processes of social innovation empirically. If the development of substantial second-order social innovations requires leaders with a stakeholder perspective and socialized approach, then this has implications for leader selection and development.Originality/valueThis paper advocates for new kinds of leaders in facilitating and sustaining social innovations to tackle global societal challenges.

This article aims to understand the extent to which social entrepreneurship contributes to the construction of a collective dimension linked to social innovation. Since 2013, this work has been based on a participant observation of eight major events dedicated to social entrepreneurship or the Shared Economy. In-depth interviews with Tunisian social entrepreneurs were also conducted in order to enrich our corpus. The results show the necessary cooperation of social entrepreneurs for a sustainable and responsible social innovation. Indeed, the analysis emphasizes that the viability and sustainability of a social innovation is based essentially on a collective construction, beyond common social values.JEL CODES: O30, O35

The intensifying poverty and poorer living conditions, the need for greater social welfare along with ongoing damages to the natural environment in several contexts of the world have proved the increasing importance of social innovation for creating positive social and environmental change. This special issue addresses to the limitations in social innovation literature by providing insights into the role of inter-organizational collaborations in the process, practice and outcome of social innovation. Thus, the papers published in this special issue advance current knowledge and scholarship on different aspects of the social innovation phenomena occurring in inter-organizational contexts. The current paper reviews existing perspectives and studies on social innovation undertaken inter-organizational contexts, develops the future agenda for improving scholarship on social innovation occurring through inter-organizational collaborations, and provides the development of new theoretical ideas by focusing on some key studies in the literature and papers published in this special issue. With a focus on subsistence contexts that are characterized by limiting institutional environments, this paper identifies the types of partnerships that are being formed by social enterprises and individual social entrepreneurs, and how they may facilitate and foster social innovation practice and performance through social value creation.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the applicability of the complexity-based temporary innovation system (TIS) framework to social innovation and examine the extent to which “nature-based solution” (NBS) projects may be understood through a TIS lens. It is proposed that TIS provides a framework to facilitate multi-actor engagement in social innovation responses to the complexity of wicked problems? The goal is to explore if TIS provides a useful framework for understanding the evolution of social innovation projects and enabling more consciously designed and facilitated social innovation with the potential for large-scale, long-term impact. Design/methodology/approach The research uses a case study methodology in which 10 NBS projects in 3 European cities are examined and compared to the expected features of a TIS as proposed by anonymised for the review process (2018; 2019) Findings Of the 10 NBS projects, only 3 were “TIS-like”, each of which was targeting wicked problems in the city/community. As only one of the remaining 7 projects was aimed at a wicked problem, the authors concluded that the TIS framework may be best suited to those social innovations that address one or more wicked problems and that NBS projects may not display this feature. Research limitations/implications The authors conclude with a reflection on theoretical insights arising from applying the TIS framework to NBS in particular, and social innovation generally – and proposes the next steps in developing the TIS framework in relation to social innovation. Originality/value This paper applies a new complexity framework to empirical data that have not been examined previously. This analysis contributes to the development of a new framework for designing and analysing complex social innovation initiatives and challenges existing theories presenting NBSs as addressing complex “wicked” problems.

Purpose The purpose of this study is to highlight the benefits and challenges of immersive, design thinking and community-engaged pedagogies for supporting social innovation within higher education; assess the impact of such approaches across stakeholder groups through long-term retrospective analysis of transdisciplinary and cross-stakeholder work; offer an approach to ecosystems design and analysis that accounts for complex system dynamics in higher education partnerships. Design/methodology/approach This study uses constructivist grounded theory (Charmaz and Belgrave, 2012) to create a long-term systemic analysis of university innovation efforts. Researchers analysed 37 semi-structured interviews across key stakeholders involved in the design and implementation of the Design Thinking Studio in Social Innovation. Interview subjects include alumni (students), faculty, community partners and administrators. Interviews were coded using constant comparative coding (Mills et al., 2006) to develop and analyse themes. This study includes situated perspectives from the authors who offer their subjective relationship to the Studio’s development. Findings This paper assesses the outcomes and design of a transdisciplinary cross-stakeholder social innovation program and extends prior research on the potential and challenges of design thinking and immersive pedagogies for supporting service-learning and community engagement (SLCE) practices within higher education. Qualitative interview results reveal how time, resources and other structural and systemic factors operate across stakeholder groups. The findings address a gap in SLCE and social innovation literature by situating community learning within pedagogical interventions constructed not only for the benefit of students but for community members. The authors conclude that the research on social innovation in higher education could benefit from a more intentional examination of longitudinal effects of innovative pedagogical environments across a broad range of stakeholder perspectives and contexts. Social implications This paper identifies how innovative higher education programs are forced to navigate structural, epistemological and ethical quandaries when engaging in community-involved work. Sustainable innovation requires such programs to work within institutional structures while simultaneously disrupting entrenched structures, practices, and processes within the system. Originality/value Social innovation in higher education could benefit from harnessing lessons from collective impact and ecosystem design frameworks. In addition, the authors argue higher education institutions should commit to studying longitudinal effects of innovative pedagogical environments across multiple stakeholder perspectives and contexts. This study closes these gaps by advancing an ecosystems model for long-term and longitudinal assessment that captures the impact of such approaches across stakeholder groups and developing an approach to designing and assessing community-involved collaborative learning ecosystems (CiCLE).

The co-creation method highlighted in this article provides public sector managers with the knowledge and tools to help them design and plan innovative solutions for local services. The article ana...

The existing research on classifying innovations by libraries does not treat social innovation as a separate category. As a result, library practitioners interested in implementing social i...

Social innovation is becoming increasingly recognised as a solution for social challenges which the conventional government policy approach or market are unable to address. Social innovation is defined as a new solution that simultaneously meets social needs more effectively than the existing solutions, and leads new and improved capabilities and relationships. It also allows assets and resources to be improved in a better manner. In other words, it has a positive impact on society, as it enhances the capacity to act. Despite the fact that it is an emerging field in Malaysia, making the term ‘social innovation’ a recent articulation in public policies, several existing initiatives have been carried out by various government ministries and agencies as well as the third sector entities that successfully adopted the social innovation approach in addressing society’s needs. Thus, this paper aims to review the implementation of socially innovative initiatives in Malaysia that promote the socio-economic well-being of the society, particularly low-income and marginalised groups. The findings demonstrate that there are four main forms of social innovation initiatives for socio-economic well-being in Malaysia, namely, i) microfinancing; ii) social entrepreneurship; iii) public service delivery and; iv) grassroots innovation (science and technology-based). This paper concludes that several social innovation initiatives in Malaysia have shown substantial improvement in uplifting the socio-economic well-being of the people, and have had considerable support from the government as well as the third sectors. Nonetheless, to ensure a greater impact by the initiatives, extra attention should be offered to provide a sufficient and comprehensive enabling environment with equal supply and demand side measures, as there exists a lack of a clear and coordinated social innovation framework in Malaysia. Furthermore, there is a need to conduct further research on grassroots social innovation in supporting the national STI Policy, as there is a lack of government reports and studies that have been done to analyse the socio-economic impact of the initiatives.

PurposeIn recent decades, higher education institutes (HEIs) have come under pressure to cooperate with society as a whole. This shift towards an increased focus on third mission and social innovation activities implies a substantial organizational change process for many HEIs, as they need to initiate both structural and cultural changes. This paper provides guidance for such change processes by examining the views and attitudes of academic and administrative staff, as well as students within the HEIs over a period in which the HEIs increase their focus on social innovation.Design/methodology/approachThe study uses a longitudinal quantitative approach consisting of a survey of administrative and academic staff, as well as students at two German HEIs. The authors studied members’ attitudes towards third mission and social innovation activities (N= 3470).FindingsResults suggest that the university members’ attitudes towards third mission and social innovation are positive but change to some extent over time. Different aspects shape the attitudes within the three groups (administrative staff, academic staff and students). Furthermore, attitudes vary among academic employees who are involved in the process and those who are not.Practical implicationsThe findings provide useful information for university managers and anyone aiming to promote social innovation at HEIs.Originality/valueThe study examines how attitudes of university members change whenever social innovation takes place at HEIs. This study includes data on the participation and empowerment of all HEI members in view of the important role that HEIs can play as supporters of social innovation.

INTRODUCTION: Today, organizations live in changing environmental conditions and various factors affect their performance strategies. Therefore, organizations should consider critical situations or crises and identify organizational strategies for crisis prevention and effective and efficient crisis management. To deal with the crisis, organizational learning plays an effective role in strategic preparation for crisis management; moreover, altruistic behavior and social innovation can play a facilitating and effective role in critical situations. Accordingly, the present study aimed to investigates the relationship of organizational learning and strategic preparation for crisis management with the mediating role of social innovation and altruism in the Red Crescent Society, Gilan, Iran. METHODS: This descriptive-correlation study was conducted based on an applied research method. The statistical population includes the staff of the branches of the Red Crescent Society, Gilan, Iran. The participants were selected using the stratified sampling method, and Cochran's formula was used to determine the sample size (n=208). The data were collected through standard questionnaires. FINDINGS: According to the results, organizational learning has a significant and direct effect on altruism, social innovation, and strategic preparation for crisis management. Moreover, social innovation and altruism play a mediating and effective role in the relationship between organizational learning and strategic preparation for crisis management. CONCLUSION: The results revealed that organizational learning has a positive effect on strategic preparation for crisis management, social innovation, and altruism. In addition, an increase in learning improves social innovation, altruism, and strategic preparation for crisis management.

Purpose: To test an empirical model of the effects of a trauma-informed organizational environment on service user outcomes in the context of concurrent disorder treatment. Methods: Service users ( n = 172) were surveyed while in treatment to determine the effects of trauma-informed organizational dynamics (i.e., safety, trust, choice, collaboration, and empowerment) on service user intrapersonal development outcomes (i.e., self-awareness, outlook, coping ability, self-worth, and self-determination) and improvements with concurrent disorder behaviors. After testing for validity and reliability of latent factors, data were analyzed using multivariate analysis. Results: As a concise analytical model, the trauma-informed organizational environment was found to significantly positively predict all service user intrapersonal outcomes as well as a reduction in concurrent disorder behaviors. Conclusions: This study informs developments in the design and implementation of trauma-informed practice frameworks for concurrent disorder treatment and emphasizes the importance of adapting organizational environments to support improved client outcomes.

One of the most discussed issues on the contemporary scene, when it comes to territory, cities and citizens is that of the revitalization of urban spaces through social innovation activities. These...

Purpose This paper aims to illustrate how dispersed institutes of social innovation operating as intermediary actors within higher education institutions (HEIs) may help overcome many of the institutional bureaucracies and structures that inhibit social innovation in higher education. Design/methodology/approach This paper reviews core conditions for social innovation, along with the opportunities, challenges and tensions that emerge as HEIs work to apply these conditions in practice. It then describes how dispersed institutes enact principles of decentralization, localization and collaboration in pursuit of social innovation. Findings Five main ways that dispersed institutes enable social innovation were identified in this review, including bridging academic–practice divides, enabling co-creation and co-production with users, facilitating experiential and co-curricular education, supporting interdisciplinary collaborations and generating customized and place-based solutions. Practical implications Findings suggest four strategies that HEIs can use to support dispersed institutes, including prioritizing social purpose organizations as institutional partners, incentivizing public engagement and collaboration, leveraging their convening power to strengthen global networks among dispersed institutes and using budgeting models that reflect the importance of creating both economic and social value. Originality/value Although innovation labs in HEIs have long been a feature of natural sciences and technology services, they are still comparatively new for the social sciences and humanities. This paper addresses a gap in the literature on the value contributed by dispersed institutes of social innovation operating within HEIs such as living labs, makerspaces, incubators and excubators, social innovation parks, cooperation accelerators and technology transfer offices.

Health innovations are generally oriented on a techno-economic vision. In this perspective, technologies are seen as an end in themselves, and there is no arrangement between the technical and the social values of innovation. This vision prevails in sanitary crises, in which management is carried out based on the search for punctual, reactive, and technical solutions to remedy a specific problem without a systemic/holistic, sustainable, or proactive approach. This paper attempts to contribute to the literature on the epistemological orientation of innovations in the field of public health. Taking the Covid-19 and Ebola crises as examples, the primary objective is to show how innovation in health is oriented towards a techno-economic paradigm. Second, we propose a repositioning of public health innovation towards a social paradigm that will put more emphasis on the interaction between social and health dimensions in the perspective of social change. We will conclude by highlighting the roles that public health could play in allowing innovations to have more social value, especially during sanitary crises.

PurposeThis paper reviews the development of knowledge creation theory in the last quarter-century and how it has contributed to innovation management and looks into social and human aspects of innovation in the era of “Society 5.0”.Design/methodology/approachThis research aims to relate basic theoretical concepts: knowledge creation and knowledge assets, purpose, leadership, and place (Ba) for innovation to drive innovation and its management as a whole ecosystem. It also discusses the application to innovation management systems open innovation, and social innovation.FindingsToday's innovation demands socio-economic fusion that goes beyond current corporate boundaries. By preparing the system (knowledge ecosystem) as the basis, we could build the bridge, and such fusion would be possible.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper shows the framework of the idea. Evidence-based research based on “knowledge assessment” will be discussed on another occasion.Originality/valueThis research is to explain knowledge management, innovation, and social innovation beyond the corporate framework.

Whereas the economic impact of universities is undisputed, the social impact of universities remains vague. The purpose of this paper is to examine whether and how universities influence firms’ soc...

This research combines the literature on social entrepreneurship and international corporate entrepreneurship to determine the relevance financial resources and information provided by different entities have for the innovation processes of international corporate entrepreneurs. We consider financing supplied by other companies, by national public sources, and by foreign sources; information might come from market and research sources. The study adopts an empirical approach, analyzing 4748 international entrepreneurial Spanish firms by employing the partial least squares technique. The results show the relevance of information and financing for international corporate entrepreneurs in developing strategic and social innovations. Social innovation is especially relevant because of its contribution to the creation of value in terms of employment enhancement and environmental protection. Finally, the results also suggest that the source that provides financial resources and information determines the type of innovation developed by these entrepreneurs.

Given the fact that China has become the top investor in Ghana’s economy, this paper sought to interrogate the forms and trends of Chinese capital mobility into Ghana’s agricultural sector and explain their attractiveness within neo-liberal and social innovation contexts. Primary and secondary data were drawn from purposively selected state institutions and other actors in the agricultural sector. Using descriptive and constant comparative analytic strategies, we found out that the capital mobility from China into Ghana’s agricultural sector has been very visible and more attractive in trade but not in landed investment. It was further discovered that the forms and trends of the Chinese capital mobility would not have to be understood within neo-liberal persuasions such as trade liberalization and privatization alone but it would also have to be understood within the social innovative contexts of technological advancement and the organizational novelties upon which it is promoted and spread. We argue that the increasing rate of importation of agricultural inputs from China is an opportunity for knowledge transfer and technological adoption to aid the development of appropriate technology, but its sustenance would require the application of social innovative practices.

Social innovation that has a sustained impact (i.e. is transformational) requires coordinated effort. This article provides the results of a scoping review of academic literature focused on relatio...

PurposeThis paper aims to share the experience of a collaborative platform for social innovation (SI) in urban governance in Brussels (Belgium) and to formulate recommendations for future initiatives.Design/methodology/approachThe publicly funded collaborative platform “Brussels by us”, which aimed to improve the quality of life in specific neighbourhoods in Brussels (Belgium), is presented as a case study for SI in urban governance. The case study is detailed according to four dimensions based on the SI and living lab literature.FindingsWhile the initiative appeared to be a successful exploration platform for collaborative urban governance, it did not evolve into concrete experimentation nor implementation of the solutions. Possible explanations and recommendations are formulated.Research limitations/implicationsThe findings of this paper are based on the experience of a one-year initiative. The results should be completed by similar case studies of longitudinal initiatives, and with other levels of implementation such as experimentation and concrete implementation of solutions.Originality/valueThis paper presents a concrete case study of a collaborative platform implemented in a specific neighbourhood in Brussels (Belgium). Its digital and offline approach can help other practitioners, scholars and public institutions to experiment with the living lab methodology for the co-ideation of solution in urban governance. The four-dimensional framework presented in the study can provide future initiatives with a structured reporting and analysis framework, unifying and strengthening know-how in the domain of SI.

PurposeThis study aims to analyze how corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives address sustainability challenges by focusing on the congruence between process and outcome variables of CSR.Design/methodology/approachFollowing a theory-driven model, a content analysis was conducted on 63 award-winning social responsibility projects.FindingsThe study reveals that the adoption of a proactive approach during environmental assessment, which manifests itself in a focus on emerging sustainability challenges with a deeper interest, affects the centrality of social responsibility initiative by increasing its learning and partnership potential and leads organizations to produce radical innovations.Practical implicationsThe findings provide a valuable understanding for practitioners on organizing the decision making process of CSR initiatives in order to unlock its learning potentials.Social implicationsRadically innovative projects with their higher levels of proactivity, centrality and generalizability are better than incremental ones at transferring and integrating company resources and capabilities to address emergent sustainability challenges.Originality/valueThe impact of CSR on society and nature has been a neglected area of literature. To reduce this gap, this study analyzes how the configuration of process variables shapes the outcomes of socially responsible initiatives on sustainability. It also provides a new typology on the relevance of CSR initiatives to company mission/model that can show how CSR can unlock organizational learning and innovation potentials.

Summarization: Social innovation is related to new products, services, and models aiming to improve human well-being and create social relationships and collaborations. The business model innovation (BMI) context can foster social innovation and can be applied in social innovation projects and initiatives. What is important for social BMI is the social mission, which needs to be defined in order to be able to move forward with the strategy, the value proposition, and the best practices of the business. Based on the existing social innovation literature and case studies, this paper proposes an “ecosystem” approach that can provide an integrated framework for social business models. This approach adopts the quadruple/quintuple helix innovation models which are able to promote social innovation, enabling a locus-centric and triple-bottom-line-centric entrepreneurial process of knowledge discovery and exploitation. Such a framework may help to study the role, nature, and dynamics of social co-opetitive fractal ecosystems, given emphasis on civil society, political structures, environment, and sustainability. In addition, the social innovation case studies presented in this paper highlight that targeted open innovation is a key element for social BMI. Presented on: IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management

Findings from a large and growing body of transdisciplinary research offer useful insights for a deeper understanding of the relationships between social innovation and governance. In this article,...

Inspired by the South American research tradition known as “social technology,” this article proposes an operational framework to advance the understanding of mechanisms that help to promote social transformation. To illustrate its theorizing potential, we apply the framework to a nonprofit organization–Parole d’excluEs–that was created in Montreal (Canada) in 2006 and that has been promoting citizen mobilization and commitment to social change (parole-dexclues.ca). To that end, we offer a theoretical paper with an empirical illustration as a first step in a reflection on employing a global South theoretical lens–drawing on the concept of social technology–to make sense of a global North social innovation experience and to advance existing knowledge on the mechanisms of social transformation. The results contribute to social innovation research and practice, particularly at the interface between the management and nonprofit literatures.

The impact of the global recession has served to increase the pressure on the management of nonprofit organizations (NPO). Executive leadership is an essential component of the success of these ins...

El presente artículo expone las principales dificultadas identificadas en la iniciativa Servicio Voluntario Europeo (SVE), un enfoque de innovación social como metodología de Aprendizaje Más Servicio (ApS) en contextos de educación no formal, cuyo objetivo es mejorar la inclusión social de los jóvenes e incrementar su compromiso transformador de la realidad. Frente a estas dificultades, se propone una serie de medidas de mejora para que sean consideradas por los agentes encargados de desarrollar dicha iniciativa. Tales medidas correctoras son resultado de un estudio de caso llevado a cabo, mediante metodologías participativas, en el contexto de la experiencia Jóvenes en Innov-Acción Social, en el que participaron 30 sujetos (profesionales del ámbito de la juventud, responsables de organizaciones y jóvenes participantes de la iniciativa SVE e investigadores sociales).

Desde hace unos años, la universidad argentina empezó a asumir la promoción cultural como una de sus funciones sustantivas, de modo que se hizo necesario pensar formas de relacionarla con la investigación y la formación. Este artículo expone una experiencia de vinculación social en torno a la formación de espectadores, llevada a cabo desde las materias Artes Escénicas I y II de la licenciatura en Cultura y Lenguajes Artísticos de la Universidad Nacional de General Sarmiento (UNGS). Se enfoca principalmente en cómo la innovación pedagógica se desplaza hacia una innovación social que involucra el trabajo de estudiantes, graduados, docentes y no docentes de la universidad. Analiza, además, conceptos alrededor de la formación de espectadores y de la relación entre educación superior y acceso a la(s) cultura(s).

The COVID-19 health emergency was a radical unplanned experiment into new ways of dwelling and caring for each other, unveiling the fragility of our professional and non-professional caring systems...

Abstract: Quebec and Canadian organizations, communities, and professionals working collectively to address complex social issues in dynamic contexts are enthusiastically embracing social innovation. Some limitations in evaluating this innovation have been revealed by formative and summative evaluation approaches. Developmental evaluation (DE) could be a potential solution. This article combines scientific literature with the experience of experienced DE practitioners in Quebec. Balancing project management and evaluation, knowledge production and transformation of practices, continuous iterations and setting deadlines is at the very core of an effective DE approach.