Sustainable Economic Development: Scenarios for Promotion of Social Innovation in Latvia

Abstract

Promotion of social innovation has been identified as one of the EU priorities because it contributes to the improvement of the quality of life of citizens and national competitiveness. In Latvia, concrete ways to promote social innovation remain not defined yet, therefore the study focused on elaboration of alternative scenarios of social innovation development that would enhance the growth of the economy of Latvia: self-initiative scenario, enterprise initiated development scenario and public participation scenario. The authors defined the aim of the research to evaluate social innovation scenarios for the development of the economy of Latvia. The scenarios were evaluated based on the analytic hierarchy process, which led to the conclusion that the most appropriate scenario for the promotion of social innovation in Latvia is the development of public participation scenario. This scenario emphasizes the need to create an appropriate legislative framework for promoting social innovation and the development of financial and information support tools for social innovation promoters and implementers in Latvia.

Sustainable growth of EU economies and Baltic context: Characteristics and modelling

“…Previous proposals to improve methodologies (e.g., Donoso, The "Europe 2020 Strategy" stipulates to achieve the growth through development of "social market economy" that will reinforce the progress in education, employment, social cohesion too. Without any doubt, better life, higher standard of living is priority for everybody and therefore for all society and government in any country (e.g., Karnitis, & Kucinskis, 2015;Dirzytė et al 2016;Tunčikienė, & Drejeris 2015;Rezk et al 2015;Horváthová et al 2016;Dobele et al 2015).…”

Integration of social innovation creation in higher education for enhancing of economic development in Latvia

“…This can be achieved by target-oriented state policy aimed at supporting social innovation because the main initiator of social innovation promotion is government that ensures particular support instruments (financial, legal, informative etc.) for promoters and implementers of social innovation [1].…”

“…This is evidenced by the fact that social innovation is one of the "Europe 2020" strategy's seven flagship initiatives that the European Commission has drawn up to determine the national, European and international measures that would be implemented in the field of innovation in order to achieve the goals set by the "Europe 2020" strategy. Moreover, special attention to the social innovation is provided in scope of the European Union's initiative "Innovation Union", which emphasizes the need to incorporate social innovation support measures for the European Social Fund programmes in 2014-2020 [1]. Also at Latvia's level, in 2014 experienced and young scientists from the leading higher education institutions were involved in a national research project "Involvement of the Society in Social Innovation for Providing Sustainable Development of Latvia (EKOSOC-LV)" aimed to work out the methodology and basis for conducting the empirical research in order to reveal the character of social innovation processes in the Latvian society for elaborating a model of active involvement of different stakeholders in social innovation.…”

Energy Security and Energy Efficiency Issues: Household Perspective in European Countries

“…This assumption is based on economic law of universal converging. Besides we assume that energy efficiency would gradually increase, and respectively energy intensity would diminish due to technological progress and energy stewardship behavior (Tvaronavičienė 2012; Dudzevičiūtė et al 2014;Laužikas et al 2015, Grubicka, Matuska 2015Ala-Juusela et al 2014;Dobele et al 2015;Olaniyi, Reidolf 2015;Oganisjana, Surikova 2015;Tvaronavičienė, Černevičiūtė 2015;Leonavičius et al 2015;Baublys et al 2015;Ignatavičius et al 2015).…”