Testing a Framework to Co-Construct Social Innovation Actions: Insights from Seven Marginalized Rural Areas

Abstract

Innovation actions within European Horizon 2020 (H2020) projects aim at testing research results in practice. When supporting social innovations in rural areas, such testing requires the alignment of several rural actors in order to entail behavioral changes beyond the individual level. Recently, social innovation has been recognized as an important tool for rural areas, developing new solutions to respond to wicked problems for improving local living conditions at the grassroots level. In this study, we analyzed the use of an operational framework to support the early governance of social innovation actions. This framework was applied to co-construct seven innovation actions across Europe and the Mediterranean basin applied to forestry, agriculture, and rural development. Our results showed that supporting social innovators and local actors at the early stage of social innovation processes is key for efficiently addressing and tackling challenges and opportunities. Additionally, we showed that the process of defining a social innovation is complex and requires recursive engagement, which might lead to evolution through time, especially in the first phases of the process. Lastly, conducting the feasibility assessment enabled strategic thinking on crucial dimensions for designing a promising social innovation action, such as social networks management, financial sustainability, and know-how. Such findings helped us to draw general lessons for the development and governance of social innovation actions in rural areas, potentially applicable to any rural sector.

Reconstructive Social Innovation Cycles in Women-Led Initiatives in Rural Areas

“…Key phases of the analytical abductive process applied are summarized in Supplementary Materials. [32,46,51]). Workshop for discussing of results from previous empirical work.…”

Can Social Innovation Make a Change in European and Mediterranean Marginalized Areas? Social Innovation Impact Assessment in Agriculture, Fisheries, Forestry, and Rural Development

“…Since SI is increasingly considered by governments, civil society, the private sector, and academia to offer solutions to complex problems, it becomes important to analytically understand, assess, and compare the various impacts of SI. A systematic assessment is important to assist policy makers and practitioners in designing, implementing, and supporting appropriate investment decisions, funding schemes, programs, projects, and policy design [29][30][31].…”

What Are the Impacts of Social Innovation? A Synthetic Review and Case Study of Community Forestry in the Scottish Highlands

“…In line with the definition of Polman et al [9], SI leads to the emergence of new networks, building trusting environments and partnership, and the creation of new values, rules, and governance arrangements [42]. It leads to changes in values, behaviours, and identities through social learning processes [43][44][45] that are complex but essential to capture. They are collective actions, nurtured or constrained by the socio-economic (including institutional) and environmental contexts that may substantially influence the well-being of local community [46].…”