Social Innovation, Societal Change, and the Role of Policies

Robert Lukesch, Alice Ludvig, Bill Slee, Gerhard Weiss and Ivana Živojinović
Additional contact information
Robert Lukesch: ÖAR GmbH, Hirzenriegl 55, A-8350 Fehring, Austria
Alice Ludvig: Institute of Forest, Environmental and Natural Resource Policy, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna (BOKU) and European Forest Institute, Forest Policy Research Network, Feistmantelstrasse 4, A-1180 Vienna, Austria
Bill Slee: The Rural Development Company, 4 Manse Lane Tannadice, Forfar DD8 3TA, UK
Gerhard Weiss: Institute of Forest, Environmental and Natural Resource Policy, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna (BOKU) and European Forest Institute, Forest Policy Research Network, Feistmantelstrasse 4, A-1180 Vienna, Austria
Ivana Živojinović: Institute of Forest, Environmental and Natural Resource Policy, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna (BOKU) and European Forest Institute, Forest Policy Research Network, Feistmantelstrasse 4, A-1180 Vienna, Austria

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 18, 1-28

Abstract: Political frameworks and policies have a strong influence on the institutional ecosystem and on governance patterns, which in turn shape the operational space of civil society initiatives. This article aims to explore the social and institutional conditions and policy initiatives that foster or hinder social innovation and the pathways leading from social innovation to institutional change through to actual impacts on policies and political frameworks, in order to understand how policymakers can encourage and enable social innovation. The article builds on an extensive empirical background to develop a heuristic model to facilitate decision making for a policy environment propitious for the emergence of social innovation. The resulting model sets up a triadic configuration of (i) a committed core of key actors, (ii) the benevolent shadow of hierarchy represented by public actors, and (iii) multifunctional and malleable intermediary support structures for a successful development of social innovation initiatives. The model is discussed and validated by reference to three in-depth case studies from differing institutional settings. We conclude that policy should recognize that social innovation will achieve most when the triadic relationships between the state, intermediary organizations, and local actors are working together synergistically.

Keywords: civil society actors; governance; policy impact; rural areas; Europe (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/18/7407/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/18/7407/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:18:p:7407-:d:411130

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().