The big picture

Transformative Social Innovation
Insights from the TRANSIT-project
Flor Avelino | avelino@drift.eur.nl | @FlorAvelino
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development
and demonstration under grant agreement no 613169.
ESF Brussel 26 October 2015

www.drift.eur.nl
www.transitiepraktijk.nl
www.transitionsnetwork.org
www.ksinetwork.nl

RESEARCH PRACTICE
CONSULTANCY
POLICY ADVICE
EDUCATION
WWW.DRIFT.EUR.NL / @DRIFTEUR

www.transitsocialinnovation.nl / @TransitSI
• 2014-2017
• 12 partners, 35 researchers
• EU & Latin-America
• 20 social innovation networks

What is a ‘transition’?
Product/ Service Innovation
Process Innovation
System Innovation
Transition
“Innovation Cascade” (Rotmans 2005)
• socio-technical innovation
• long-term
• complex
• uncertainty

Transitions ≈
• long-term process (1-2 generations, 20-50 years)
• radical & structural change in culture, structure, practice
• high levels of complexity and uncertainty
Sustainability transition ≈
• “radical transformation towards a sustainable society”
• “response to persistent problems in modern societies”
(Grin, Rotmans and Schot 2010)
Definition (sustainability) transitions

Geels & Kemp 2000, Geels 2005, Schot & Geels 2010, De Haan & Rotmans 2011
Landscape
(macro-level)
Regimes
(meso-level)
Niches
(micro-level)
exogenous macro-
developments
dominant structures,
cultures & practices
spaces for
innovation
Multi-level perspective
societal systems

Landscape
Climate change, economic
crisis, resource scarcity, oil prices
Regime
Centralised fossil energy regime
incl. market, government, consumers
Niches
Solar energy, wind energy,
community energy, etc.
ENERGY
Example: MLP Energy System

Geels & Kemp 2000, Geels 2005, Schot & Geels 2010

• Strategic niche management: protecting, nurturing
and empowering niches
• Questioning & challenging regime elements
• Top-down & bottom-up pressure on regimes
• Playing in to landscape developments
• Up-scaling ≈ beyond replication and growth towards
institutional regime change
Multi-level strategy transition management

www.transitsocialinnovation.eu
Social Innovation?
Existing research & literature:
• new (combinations of) social practices (Howaldt & Kopp 2012)
• changing social relations (Moulaert et al. 2013)
• societal, systemic change (Westley 2013)
Our working definition of social innovation:
• change in social relations, involving
• new ways of doing, organizing, knowing and framing
• incl. renewal & reinvention

http://www.westmillsolar.coop
http://persoonlijkeruimte.nl/?portfolio=buurtenergie-blijstroom

‘Reinventing’ cooperatives

Local, complementary currencies

High Expectations of Social Innovation
Former EU president
José Manuel Barroso:
“If encouraged and valued,
social innovation can bring
immediate solutions to the
pressing social issues that
citizens are confronted with.”
Hubert 2012

High Expectations of Social Innovation
“At a time of major budgetary
constraints, social innovation
is an effective way of
responding to social
challenges, by mobilising
people’s creativity to develop
solutions and make better use
of scarce resources”.
2010: p7

Questioning the Assumption
Underlying Assumption:
social innovation contributes to wider transformative change and
empowers people to deal with societal challenges
Research questions TRANSIT-project:
• how, to what extent and under which condition does social
innovation contribute to transformative change?
• how are people empowered (or disempowered) to contribute
to transformative social innovation?
• how do we conceptualise and study transformative social
innovation?

Transformative social innovation
…challenges
…alters
…replaces
- Transition studies
- System innovation
- Co-evolution
- Institutional theory
- Relational theory
- Discourse analysis
- Political theory

Agency in transformative social innovation
…challenges
…alters
…replaces
AGENCY
(dis) empowerment
- Transition studies
- Social psychology
- Entrepreneurship
- Social movement
theory

Example
…challenges
…alters
…replaces
Time Banks
actors
TB UK

Empirical Case Studies
• Initiatives that work on social innovation
• (aim to) contribute to transformative change
• (towards more sustainable, resilient and/or just societies)
• Transnational (cross-continental) networks
• Translocal: locally rooted, globally connected
• Europe & Latin-America

Transnational Networks under study in TRANSIT project Local Case 1 Local Case 2
1 Ashoka: Network for supporting social entrepreneurs HU DE
2 Basic Income (BIEN) DE NL
3 Credit Unions: Network of different types of credit cooperatives ES UK
4 DESIS-network: Network for design for social innovation and sustainability ITA BRA
5 International Co-operative Alliance (Housing) ARG DE
6 FABLABS: Digital fabrication workshops open to local communities UK ARG
7 Global Ecovillage Network: network of eco-villages DE POR
8 Hackerspace: User driven digital fabrication workshops UK ARG
9 Int. Observatory for Participatory Democracy (Participatory budgeting) BRA NL
10 Impact Hub: Global network of local hubs for social entrepreneurs NL BRA
11 INFORSE: International network of sustainable energy NGOs DK BE
12 Living Knowledge Network: Network of community-based research entities/
science shops
DK RO
13 Living Labs (EnoLL) labs for co-creative research, development and innovation NL UK
14 RIPESS: Network for the promotion of social solidarity economy BE RO
15 Seed Freedom MovementNetwork bricolage (5 networks) HU UK
16 Shareable Network: Promoting and collecting sharing initiatives mainly in cities ES NL
17 Slow Food: Linking food to a commitment to community and environment ES DE
18 Time Banks: Networks facilitating reciprocal service exchange UK ES
19 Transition Towns: Grassroot communities working on ‘local resilience’ UK HU
20 Via Campesina: Network for family farming to promote social justice and dignity ARG HU

Transnational Networks under study in TRANSIT project Local Case 1 Local Case 2
1 Ashoka: Network for supporting social entrepreneurs HU DE
2 Basic Income (BIEN) DE NL
3 Credit Unions: Network of different types of credit cooperatives ES UK
4 DESIS-network: Network for design for social innovation and sustainability ITA BRA
5 International Co-operative Alliance (Housing) ARG DE
6 FABLABS: Digital fabrication workshops open to local communities UK ARG
7 Global Ecovillage Network: network of eco-villages DE POR
8 Hackerspace: User driven digital fabrication workshops UK ARG
9 Int. Observatory for Participatory Democracy (Participatory budgeting) BRA NL
10 Impact Hub: Global network of local hubs for social entrepreneurs NL BRA
11 INFORSE: International network of sustainable energy NGOs DK BE
12 Living Knowledge Network: Network of community-based research entities/
science shops
DK RO
13 Living Labs (EnoLL) labs for co-creative research, development and innovation NL UK
14 RIPESS: Network for the promotion of social solidarity economy BE RO
15 Seed Freedom MovementNetwork bricolage (5 networks) HU UK
16 Shareable Network: Promoting and collecting sharing initiatives mainly in cities ES NL
17 Slow Food: Linking food to a commitment to community and environment ES DE
18 Time Banks: Networks facilitating reciprocal service exchange UK ES
19 Transition Towns: Grassroot communities working on ‘local resilience’ UK HU
20 Via Campesina: Network for family farming to promote social justice and dignity ARG HU
• Embedded case-studies:
• 20 translocal networks
• 80-120 local manifestations
• Across EU/Latin-America
• In-depth case-studies
• Cross-comparative meta-analysis

Phase 1:
12 case-study reports
and summaries
+ synthesis report

Mid-term insights
1. Narratives of change & game-changers
2. Renewing social relations
3. Challenging institutions
(Dis)empowerment challenges for transformative
social innovation
> preliminary ‘policy insights’

Narratives & Game-changers
Narratives of change =
• Societal discourses on change and innovation, i.e. sets of ideas,
concepts, metaphors, and/or story-lines about change and innovation
Game-changers =
• Macro-developments that are framed as/ perceived to change the (rules,
field, players in the) ‘game’ of societal interaction
• e.g. ‘globalisation’, ‘climate change’, ‘economic crisis’
Narratives respond to game-changers, while also (re)framing
them. Social innovation initiatives play into that ‘discursive
dynamic’.

http://www.transitsocialinnovation.eu/working-papers

Narratives of change on ‘New Economy’
Diversity of (new) ways of framing the (new) economy:
1. Green economy through degrowth & localization
2. Collaborative economy (incl. ‘sharing economy’)
3. Social entrepreneurship & social economy
4. Solidarity economy

‘post-capitalism’, ‘social impact economy’, or ‘gift economy’
Strands of New
Economy
Social Innovation networks under study
Degrowth &
Localization
Global Ecovillage Networks, Transition Towns,
INFORSE, Time Banks
Collaborative
Economy
Ashoka, Impact Hub, Time Banks, Fablabs,
Hackerspaces, Science Shops, DESIS, Global
Ecovillage Network, Transition Towns
Solidarity
Economy
RIPESS, Global Ecovillage Network. Time Banks
Social Entrepreneurship
& Social Economy
Ashoka, Impact Hub, Time Banks, Credit Unions,
DESIS, INFORSE

“It is very common for the social
economy to be conflated with the
solidarity economy. They are not the
same thing and the implications of
equating them are rather profound. The
social economy is commonly understood
as part of a “third sector” of the
economy, complementing the “first
sector” (private/profit-oriented) and the
“second sector” (public/planned). (…)
The solidarity economy seeks to change
the whole social/economic system and
puts forth a different paradigm of
development that upholds solidarity
economy principles.”
“RIPESS Global Vision”, Manila 2013
– www.ripess.org

Renewing social relations
• Transforming societal as well as interpersonal relations
• Community building
• Relational values & principles
trust, reciprocity, equality, collectiveness, cooperation,
sharing, solidarity, inclusion, transparency,
openness, connectedness etc.

Renewing social relations (1)
“Economy is always a reflection of our
social behaviour. And so you need to look
at this if you want to change the
economy also. (…) If we build a new
currency, we need to anchor it in a new
social system, in a new social behaviour
of people, in order for it to work. Because
if I don’t trust people, also Gift Economy
doesn’t work at some point. […] I have
my doubts [about alternative economic
systems] if they are not based in
community work.”
(Interview TAM6)

Renewing social relations (2)
“It is about the quality of relationship
and the way we operate with each other.
(…). It is something around being part
of a certain type of society, which attracts
people here. Not just pure service
relationship or nice products and services.
That’s nice, but people come in for
something bigger. The way of being
together is why people come to our Hubs.
We pride ourselves in building another
kind of society.”
(Member global Impact Hub team)
“Trust, courage, collaboration”

public
private
STATE
(public agencies)
MARKET
(firms, business)
COMMUNITY
(households, families etc.)
Avelino & Wittmayer 2015, Based on Evers & Laville 2004, Pestoff 1992
NON-PROFIT
(NGOs, associations
foundations)
Challenging Institutional
Boundaries

Origin of social innovation?
Social innovation as
“innovative activities and
services that are motivated by
the goal of meeting a social
need and that are
predominantly developed
and diffused through
organisations whose
primary purpose is social”
2007: p8

Across institutional boundaries
Transformative social innovation ≈
• change in social relations, involving
• new ways of doing, organizing, knowing and framing
• challenging dominant institutions in the social context
Therefore, transformative social innovation:
• can originate in each sector, in each institutional logic
• changing relations between sectors & institutions
• initiatives lack an ‘institutional home’
• hybrid forms (instead of ‘stretch & conform’)
• they challenge institutional boundaries

social
entrepreneurship
Challenging institutional boundaries

time
exchange

science,
education,
knowledge,
innovation,
design

public
private
PPP
MARKET
(firms, business)COMMUNITY
STATE
(public agencies)
Avelino & Wittmayer 2015
NON-PROFIT
(NGOs, associations
foundations)
Shifting power relations

(Dis)empowerment challenges
4 cross-cutting themes
1. Governance
2. Social learning
3. Resourcing
4. Monitoring

Schizophrenic attitude of (local) governments:
“We have political parties that come here and want to film us and believe that we are
the future of social innovation in the city and then on the other side votes against us to
kick us out of this place because they want to build a luxury hotel.”
Impact Hub Amsterdam team member

Prelimenary Policy Insights
1. Acknowledge inherent nature of changing social
relations, values & narratives of change
2. Allow for institutional hybridity and ‘institutional
challenging’ (vs. stretch & conform)
3. Enable qualitative (self/peer)-monitoring of
transformative impact (vs. project targets), incl. attention for
unintended consequences
4. Involve & support translocal networks behind social
innovation initiatives > ensure their local ties and
encourage cross-network synergy & confrontation
5. Enable long-term and systemic support for social
innovation beyond temporary projects

www.transitsocialinnovation.eu/resource-hub/transit-brief-1

28-29-20-31 OCTOBER & 11 DECEMBER | AMSTERDAM
WWW.TRANSITIONACADEMY.NL/COURSE/SOTRA

Thank you. Questions?
Flor Avelino
DRIFT / Erasmus University Rotterdam
avelino@drift.eur.nl
@FlorAvelino

www.transitsocialinnovation.nl / @TransitSI

Science & Social Innovation
Not one discipline or
research area, but rather
an overlap in interests
in various (inter-)
disciplines
http://www.nesta.org.uk/event/social-frontiers

Research aim TRANSIT
To develop a theory of transformative social innovation,
building on & contributing to existing theories of change,
grounded and tested in empirical data,
useful to academics & practitioners.
Conceptual challenge
Empirical challenge

WWW.TRANSITIONACADEMY.NL / @TACDRIFT

Third Sector in the ‘Welfare Mix’
Pestoff 1992:25

Blurring, contested & shifting boundaries
?
?
?

planning
permissions

public
private
STATE
MARKETCOMMUNITY
employer /
employee
poor /
rich
benefactor/
beneficiary
large /
small
civil servant
/ citizen
man/
woman
national/
local
ethnicities
young/
old
expert/
lay
Power inequalities

Social Innovation ≈
changing social relations ≈
shifting power relations
≈ contestation
≈ struggle & conflict

public
private
STATE
(public agencies)
MARKET
(firms, business)
COMMUNITY
NON-PROFIT
(associations,
NGOs)
politician, policy-maker,
bureaucrat, citizen, voter
consumer, producer
employer, employee,
client, entrepreneur
activist, volunteer,
member, benefactor,
researcher
resident, neighbour,
family member,
friend
individual roles

transition management across Europe

87
Aberdeen
(United Kingdom)
Ghent
(Belgium)
Montreuil
(France)
Rotterdam
(The Netherlands)
Ludwigsburg
(Germany)
MUSIC project
www.themusicproject.eu

MUSIC – the movie
http://www.themusicproject.eu/film

DRIFT (Coordinator)
Erasmus University of Rotterdam,
the Netherlands
3S-group
University of East Anglia, United Kingdom
ICIS
University of Maastricht, the Netherlands
IHS
Erasmus University of Rotterdam,
the Netherlands
ULB-CEDD
Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium
AAU
Aalborg University, Denmark
SPRU
University of Sussex, United Kingdom
IEC-UNQ
Universidad Nacional de Quilmes, Argentina
COPPE
Rio de Janeiro Federal University, Brasil
People-Environment Research Group
Universidade da Coruna, Spain
BOKU
University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences
Vienna, Austria
ESSRG
research and development SME, Hungary
Contact: scientific coordinators
Flor Avelino & Julia Wittmayer (DRIFT)
Partners
https://www.facebook.com/transitsocialinnovation
@TransitSI
https://www.linkedin.com/transitsocialinnovation
transit@drift.eur.nl

transitsocialinnovation.eu | si-drive.eu
Social Innovation 2015: Pathways to Social Change
Research, policies and practices in European and
global perspectives
Vienna, 18-19 November 2015
TRANSIT and SI-DRIVE bring together practitioners,
policymakers and researchers from around the world to look
at how social innovation can lead to societal transformations.
The first day focuses on the state-of-the-art in research,
whereas the second centres on practice. Both feature a rich
offering of interactive sessions and opportunities for
networking.
Registration is open & free
These projects have received funding from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme for
research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement no 613169 & 612870

Transformative social innovation
1. Renewing social relations (to people, nature,
technology, economy)
2. Bringing narratives of change ‘to life’ (‘new
economy’, ‘sustainability’, ‘resilience’, ‘social impact’)
3. Challenging institutions (questioning paradigms,
regulations, dominant political ideologies)

Social Innovation Discourse
• ‘Social’ vs. ‘technological’ innovation
• More than social dimension of technological innovation
• The social as the object of innovation in itself
• “Immaterial and intangible” (Howaldt and Schwarz 2010)
• Beyond a technology focused innovation paradigm

Case-study Impact Hub
Global
Impact Hub
Network
Impact Hub
Amsterdam
Impact Hub
Rotterdam
Impact Hub
Sao Paolo
Netherlands
=
Impact Hub
Association
Impact Hub
Company
60+ Local Impact Hubs
20+ Impact Hubs ‘in the making’Transnational
Network
Local
Manifestations

The big picture

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