Social Innovation towards Sustainability: Embracing Contemporary Challenges for Regional Development

Dear Colleagues,

Contemporary societies face structural challenges that lack effective and transformative responses. These problems can be seen not only as alarming issues but also as opportunities for the implementation of new forms and methods to answer existing needs. In this context, the issues of the need for a transition to more sustainable (social, economic. and environmental) models are becoming more prominent and increasing their space in academic and strategic discussions.

Social innovation starts from the willingness to transform ideas into action to respond to problems and contribute toward solutions where public policies are failing to provide effective answers. In the current context, social innovation has been discussed as an unavoidable mechanism for the goal of sustainability, especially in social sciences. Despite the fragmentation of the field, regional science has been an important catalyst for social innovation research by paying attention to territorial innovative responses to emerging social needs.

In this sense, we would like to invite you to submit your paper proposals to the Special Issue “Social Innovation toward Sustainability: Embracing Contemporary Challenges for Regional Development”. The Special Issue aims to discuss the state of the art in social innovation and the contemporary challenge of sustainability, and topics of discussion will regard, among others, social innovation, microscale innovation, transformative innovation, sustainability transitions, and community-based sustainability projects.

We are particularly interested in proposals related to these thematic fields:

• On innovation: studies, reflections, and examples about innovation(s) that, particularly, are concerned with emphasizing sustainability and regional development, such as social innovation, grassroots innovation, and transformative innovation, among others;
• On transformation: studies, reflections, and examples focused on sustainability transitions, multilevel perspectives, transferability and scaling up, and their relationships with innovation and regional development;
• Doing it: Examples of real-world applications in developing innovation practices and policies that address social and environmental needs, such as sustainable intentional communities (ecovillages), smart cities, eco-cities, cities in transition, transition movements, living laboratories, NGOs, territorial and local development agencies, responsible research and innovation, and smart specialization strategies, among others, which may instigate regional development.

This special issue benefits from the 25th APDR workshop Social Innovation Towards Sustainability: Embracing Contemporary Challenges for Regional Development to be held in Faro (Portugal) in 16th April 2020. More information: http://www.apdr.pt/evento_25/index.html

‘Reference Papers’ that are relevant for the SI topic:

• Avelino, F., J. M. Wittmayer, R. Kemp, and A. Haxeltine. 2017. Game-changers and transformative social innovation, Ecology and Society, 22(4):41. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-09897-220441
• Cooke, P. (2019). Responsible research and innovation? From FinTech’s ‘flash crash’ at Cermak to digitech’s Willow Campus and Quayside, European Planning Studies, 27:12, 2376-2393, https://doi.org/10.1080/09654313.2018.1556610
• Fitjar, R. D., Benneworth, P., & Asheim, B. T. (2019). Towards regional responsible research and innovation? Integrating RRI and RIS3 in European innovation policy. Science and Public Policy, 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1093/scipol/scz029
• Foray, D. (2016). On the policy space of smart specialization strategies. European Planning Studies, 24(8), 1428–1437. https://doi.org/10.1080/09654313.2016.1176126
• Köhler, J., Geels, F. W., Kern, F., Markard, J., Onsongo, E., Wieczorek, A., … Wells, P. (2019). An agenda for sustainability transitions research: State of the art and future directions. Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions, 31(December 2018), 1–32. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eist.2019.01.004
• Nicholls, A., Simon, J., & Gabriel, M. (2015). Introduction: Dimensions of Social Innovation. New Frontiers in Social Innovation Research. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-137-50680-1_1
• Nyseth, T., & Hamdouch, A. (2019). The Transformative Power of Social Innovation in Urban Planning and, 4(1), 1–6. https://doi.org/10.17645/up.v4i1.1950
• Pinto, H. (2018). Innovation Dynamics and Resilience: A Crucial Agenda for the Future of Regional Studies and Policy, RSA Regions e-Zine, 2, https://doi.org/10.1080/13673882.2018.00001012
• Truffer, B., & Coenen, L. (2012). Environmental innovation and sustainability transitions in regional studies. Regional Studies, 46(1), 1-23, https://doi.org/10.1080/00343404.2012.646164

Dr. Hugo Pinto
Ms. Carla Nogueira
Prof. Andrés Domínguez-Gómez
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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• Social innovation
• Transformative change
• Sustainability
• Transition
• Regional development