The three governances in social innovation

This paper explores the relationship between governance and social innovation in the area of organizations. In order to understand that relationship, we offer a model that links the absorptive capacity of knowledge [Cohen and Levinthal 1990. “Absorptive Capacity: A new Perspective on Learning and Innovation.” Administrative Science Quarterly 35 (1): 128–152] with open innovation [Chesbrough and Di Minin 2014. “Open Social Innovation.” In New Frontiers in Open Innovation, edited by H. Chesbrough, W. Vanhaverbeke, and J. West, 169–187. Oxford: Oxford University Press]. On the basis of the pilot study Regional Social Innovation Index carried out in the Basque Country (Spain), we empirically explore three types of governance (social, inter-organizational, and sustainable) in social innovation projects propelled by four types of key agents at a regional level: profit and non-profit organizations, universities, and technology centers. The proposed governance Index in Social Innovation contributes to discussions about governance and social innovation at a micro level and, and to the debate about the production of indicators in social innovation.     

Social innovation and ICT in social services: European experiences compared

Innovation in social services and social policies in the European welfare systems is an evolving phenomenon stimulated by socio-demographic, cultural and economic changes. Many social service innovations are linked to disruptive technologies, especially the introduction of information and communication technology (ICT). To discuss the effects of disruptive technologies on health and social services, this article first proposes a framework consistent with the social innovation paradigm. Secondly, based on case-studies, it investigates different models of social and health service innovation driven by technology. The article shows advantages and disadvantages of service innovation driven by technology, and offers some final remarks about future challenges for ICT in health and social services. More evidences of effectiveness and efficiency are necessary to promote public and private investment to implement solutions on a wider scale. However, the impacts of technology-based solutions cannot be measured only in terms of economic aspects but also taking into account whether new technologies really provide the opportunity for citizens to have a better life and advocacy for their rights.     

Boundary dimensions of social innovation: negotiating conflicts and compatibilities when developing a national agenda

In order to add to the existing knowledge on the complex institutional dynamics of negotiating conflicts and compatibilities in innovation processes that address societal challenges and social needs, this article scrutinizes the scientific and societal debate on the theoretical and practical application of “social innovation” by means of the concept “boundary object” linked to institutional theory. A participatory case study of the development of an R&I agenda for social innovation in Sweden, formulated through dialog between stakeholders from the public, private and non-profit sectors, is presented. The results show that the unpredictable, emergent, evolving and adaptable character of needs, challenges and solutions in social innovation processes is made more theoretically and practically manageable by acknowledging social innovation as a boundary object. This is since this concept, despite its ambiguous character, helps balance complexity and usefulness in a way that serves to expand existing knowledge on institutional dynamics.     

The (social) innovation – subjective well-being nexus: subjective well-being impacts as an additional assessment metric of technological and social innovations

It cannot be assumed that technological innovations and social innovations are desirable per se. An innovation usually has positive as well as negative impacts on people, making its normative assessment a major research challenge. This has become increasingly recognized in the innovation literature. At the same time, subjective well-being (SWB) research has developed and matured largely independently of innovation studies. This paper puts forward a general conceptual framework of the (social) innovation – SWB nexus as a step towards the development of a unified normative “well-being theory of innovation” that applies to all types of innovation, e.g. social as well as technological innovation. Its main feature is the inclusion of multiple direct and indirect SWB impacts of processes as well as of outcomes. The framework can act as a focussing device that raises awareness of the many potential SWB impacts of innovation. SWB impacts should be used as an additional metric in the assessment of innovation, complementing other assessment approaches.     

Connecting entrepreneurship with policy experimentation? The EU framework for social innovation

This article investigates how “social innovation” made its way onto the European Union (EU) agenda and how this notion has been creatively used to advance distinct policy goals. It does so by analysing the resources the EU provided to promote social innovation over the period 2006–2014. Three main conclusions arise. First, between 2006 and 2010 the label social innovation was rarely used, although several EU instruments and processes supported it. Second, throughout 2009–2010, the European Commission’s Bureau of European Policy Advisers played a key agenda setting role in flagging social innovation on the eve of the Europe 2020 Strategy. Consequently, and third, since 2010 social innovation has been explicitly mainstreamed into the EUs new growth strategy. This phase is characterized by a stronger emphasis on “social entrepreneurship” and “social experimentation”. As a result, social innovation has become an important tool in the European Semester’s focus on the reform of the welfare state.     

Sociological contributions to the study of social innovation: A critical review

Sociology has long been interested in innovating solutions to social problems. However, this desire has also been a source of controversy as it can conflict with the discipline's ambition also to be recognized as a hard science. This paper critically reviews sociological contributions to the study of social innovation. It first contextualizes these contributions by discussing the origins of sociology's interest in transforming society, the growing tension between that interest and sociology's other aspiration to create objective knowledge about the social world, and how more sociologists have relocated to business schools where most research on social innovation is now being conducted. Next, it summarizes sociologists' contributions, which emphasize how social innovation is organized by institutions, networks, social movements, and organizations themselves. It then discusses criticisms of this work and responses to these critiques. It concludes by asking whether sociologists' research on social innovation has advanced their discipline's dual mission of reforming and explaining society and what additional studies are needed.     

The role of social entrepreneurship in leveraging exaptation in locked-in industrial districts: the case of Idrogenet in the industrial district of Lumezzane

The objective of this paper is to investigate the role of social entrepreneurship as driver of exaptation. Exaptation is defined as the redeployment of an existing body of knowledge into a new and previously unrelated domain of application and as major source of disruptive innovation and firms' dynamic capabilities. Exaptation takes place in two phases. In the first phase, the accumulation of knowledge takes place without any anticipation of its future use. In the second phase, the knowledge accumulated is explicitly and consciously leveraged and exploited to build up and take advantage of the opportunity in an emerging market niche. We contribute to extant literature by showing how social entrepreneurship may help firms to discover new potential and innovative field of application for their existing know-how and exploiting it into such a field. Our results are based on a case study of exaptation led by social entrepreneurship in the industrial district of Lumezzane.     

Why the social sciences won't become high-consensus,rapid-discovery science

A research front of rapid discovery, leaving a trail of cognitive consensus behind it, is characteristic of natural sciences since about the 17th century in Europe. The basis of this high-consensus, rapid-discovery science is not empiricism, since empirical research existed in the natural sciences before the 17th century. The key is appropriation of genealogies of research technologies, which are pragmatically manipulated and modified to produce new phenomena; high consensus results because there is higher social prestige in moving ahead to new research discoveries than by continuing to dispute the interpretation of older discoveries. The social sciences have not acquired this pattern of rapid discovery with high consensus behind the research front. Their fundamental disability is not lack of empirical research, nor failure to adhere to a scientific epistemology, nor the greater ideological controversy that surrounds social topics. What is fundamentally lacking in the social sciences is a genealogy of research technology, whose manipulation reliably produces new phenomena and a rapidly moving research front. Unless the social sciences invent new research hardware, they will likely never acquire much consensus or rapid discovery. Possibilities may exist for such development stemming from research technologies in microsociology and in artificial intelligence.     

The Structure of Scientific Fields and the Allocation of Editorships on Scientific Journals: Some Observations on the Politics of Knowledge*

This study examines editorial appointment patterns in journals representing seven scientific disciplines: physics, chemistry, biology, economics, psychology, political science, sociology. Social science editors-in-chief are more likely than physical and natural science editors-in-chief to employ “particularistic” criteria in the selection of editorial appointees. In the social sciences, Columbia and Harvard editors-in-chief are significantly more likely than editors-in-chief with other doctorates to select graduates from Columbia or Harvard when making editorial appointments. In the physical and natural sciences, editors-in-chief with doctorates from schools other than Columbia and Harvard are just as likely as Columbia and Harvard editors-in-chief to select editorial appointees with Columbia or Harvard doctorates. The findings suggest that since consensus on basic paradigms does not exist in the social sciences, positions of influence are awarded and achieved on much more “particularistic” criteria than those for the physical and natural sciences.     

Analysis of social innovation on social networking services

ABSTRACT

Social network services are allowing more social connectivity and making possible sharing information and knowledge of a different nature. This article analyses if social workers related to active social policies from Malaga province (Spain) are using social network services to share information and knowledge and if there is a mirror between online and offline relationships. Since it is an experimental model, through virtual ethnography and through social network analysis methodology, we observed the presence, connectivity and analysed the structure of relationships that keep 235 professionals from 52 organizations in Facebook®. Moreover, the model uses the statistical technique of modularity for detecting online communities, which are compared with distribution of professionals in their organizations. Results show how social network services applied to social intervention are massively and frequently used by professionals. On the other hand, the detected communities reflect existence of analogy between online and offline relationships. The online structure shows a high degree of cohesion and how certain professionals have higher capacity of influence and diffusion depending on position in the online structure. It argues about the opportunity to incorporate social network services towards social intervention as a manner of social innovation to improve cooperation and diffusion of information and knowledge.     

Towards more confidence: about the roles of social scientists in participatory policy making

From June 26 to 27, the workshop “Ironists, Reformers, or Rebels? The Role of the Social Sciences in Participatory Policy Making” took place at the Collegium Helveticum of the UZH/ETH in Zurich. The organisers’ motivation was the apparently missing involvement of social scientists in public engagement processes. This impression persists because, while social scientists often observe public debates or develop participatory methods for public policy-making, they rarely take part in those processes themselves. A closer look at ethics commissions, expert committees or public hearings concerned with science and technology issues shows natural scientists, physicians, lawyers and the occasional philosopher. Sociologists, anthropologists and other social scientists, on the other hand, are often not involved. Because of this imbalance, the organisers’ aim was to bring together scholars and researchers from different areas of the social sciences to consider the role of their disciplines in public policy making. This article will focus on some of the ideas about specific roles of social scientists in participatory policy-making, discussed at the workshop, and their implications and give a commentary on some future prospects of the social sciences.     

Should “open innovation” change innovation policy thinking in catching-up economies? Considerations for policy analyses

This paper provides a review of the current state of academic and policy-level debates on “open innovation” by elaborating on the relevance of the concept of open innovation for innovation policy-making in catching-up economies. The paper shows that paradoxes and contradictions exist between the “mainstream” innovation discourse and the development challenges of the catching-up countries that have lead to “de-contextualization” of the innovation policy discourse. The paper argues that applying the concept of open innovation in its ideal-type form to the catching-up context is likely to reinforce these de-contextualization tendencies. This problem can be remedied by more conscious attention to the basic contradictions and paradoxes, which requires a more comprehensive and systemic analytical focus on innovation and technological development at the levels of firm, industry and policy.     

An institutional approach to research on public procurement of innovation

The role of public procurement as a means to stimulate innovation has been increasingly emphasized during the last few years. The general argument is that, by applying intelligent demand, public agencies can stimulate private sector innovation that will eventually sustain competitive advantage in a global economy. The emphasis on public procurement used as an innovation policy instrument challenges current institutional practices and skills. The article is based on the assumption that the innovation research community could inform this policy discourse, in particular by drawing on institutional theory, but in order to fully utilize this potential, further revision of the research perspectives seen is needed. The article therefore discusses an institutional approach based on three modes: “multilevel institutional analysis”, “endogenous and exogenous institutions” and “institutions as rationalities”, arguing that such an approach would help to increase innovation research quality and policy relevance.     

The social shaping of digital research

The social shaping of technology (SST) has become a broad umbrella term to cover a variety of theoretical and methodological perspectives in the social sciences. It has also defined a set of funded projects in the UK focused on a particular technical initiative around e-social science – digital social research. It is increasingly understood that social science research and work on the SST, in particular, should be applied to the study of innovations in digital research and their implications for the sciences and humanities. This overview is designed to help introduce the diversity of perspectives that the social sciences can bring to bear, such as under the social shaping umbrella and explain why this set of perspectives is of value to policy and practice in this field. The continuing advance and diffusion of digital research make it ever more important to strengthen the role of the social sciences in this area of multi-disciplinary research, policy, and practice.     

Biodiversity conservation in the Brazilian social sciences: an analysis of epistemological paths and conditions of possibility

This article aims to present the analysis of a carefully chosen literature in social sciences on the subject of biodiversity conservation. The purpose was to recognize some of the methods and epistemological conceptions which underlie the arguments published in the main academic journals of Sociology, Anthropology and Political Sciences. The analysis is based on a confrontation of Foucault’s concept of “conditions of possibility” with the discursive practices present in the survey. This exercise enabled us to demonstrate that even though we specifically targeted the social sciences, it is possible to recognize the presence of different conditions possibility that are not necessarily compatible and can be critic of each other. These criticisms arise in a context in which the objectivist view was widely accessed in order to corroborate restrictive and punitive actions on biodiversity conservation. This mapping can thus contribute to problematize the dialogue between disciplines in a scenario where each science has a particular political weight.     

Social scientists as technicians,advisors and meaning producers

In this paper, we are addressing three issues that are at the core of scholarly reflections about the societal role of social science knowledge: (1) Social scientists tend to follow – although this is not always a deliberate choice – one of three models that describe their role as the producers of practical knowledge. For the sake of simplicity we have called the three models the “model of the technician”, the “model of the advisor” and the “model of the meaning producer”. (2) Due to the need for social inquiry to adopt a particular, restrictive perspective of its domain, useful knowledge is a complicated matter. Hence the need to put into question a widely supported notion at least among social scientists: When asked about the reasons for the limited “power” of social science knowledge the response frequently is that the adequacy and practical usefulness of social science knowledge is a function of its capturing the full complexity of what indeed are complex social phenomena. (3) Social scientists often tend to lament the marginal impact their intellectual efforts have on society, and they look with great envy across the divide of the so-called two cultures, wondering how and when they will be able to achieve the same kind of success and prestige the natural sciences and technology appear to enjoy in most societies. However, this unhappy view systematically understates the actual power of social science knowledge, in particular its role as a mind maker or meaning producer.     

The intellectual and scientific basis of science,technology and innovation research

There has been a considerable increase in the literature devoted to innovation in the past few decades. This research area is characterized by prolific interdisciplinary connections and no single domain is able to embrace all aspects of science, technology and innovation. By analyzing nearly 60,000 references included in the 1442 articles published between 1974 and 2007 in the area's seed journal, Research Policy (RP), we have uncovered the following patterns: (1) the most important sources of knowledge are associated with “core” economics (mostly mainstream) and management sources, even though the importance of innovation-related sources has been rising; (2) the degree of autonomy of science, technology and innovation research is still weak, revealing its incipience and lack of a unified theoretical framework; (3) the most influential authors and studies follow heterodox approaches, namely the evolutionary approach (e.g. Richard R. Nelson) and the European approach to innovation (e.g. Keith Pavitt and Chris Freeman), although it is rather surprising that one of the most widely recognized founding fathers of innovation-related studies, Joseph Schumpeter, is absent from the top-10 cited authors list; and (4) the ranking of the most influential studies highlights the relevance of the evolutionary paradigm, with its focus on the capabilities and routines of firms, and the policy-driven nature of topics, evidencing the pervasiveness of the literature on the National System of Innovation.     

Corporate social responsibility driven innovation

This study identifies the substantial relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and innovation activities of firms. Using the French Vigeo sustainability rating and the Thomson Reuters, we divided 619 firms into groups by their industry sectors, regions, and firm characteristics such as size and age. We premise that innovative investment is needed to prepare tomorrow's profits not only by considering investments in technology and in R&D, but also by dealing with sustainability to human, social, environmental, technical, and economic investments. Consequently, when the firm manipulates its short- and long-run business strategies, the consideration of the correlation between types of investment and CSR initiatives will lead to more cooperating effect on the outcome of investments. The findings provide a comprehensive understanding on the effect of sustainable management strategies on the innovation and sustainability of firms.