Consolidating social innovation

This chapter addresses the consolidation processes of socially innovative initiatives. In particular, it aims at understanding which are the conditions favouring or constraining their (at least potential) survival and/or development. We consider social innovation as a relational process that is contextually embedded. It raises as a reaction to the inability of existing policies in meeting emerging or existing needs and its potential growth or consolidation may depend (also) on the governance systems’ capacity to identify, accept and share new ideas. It might challenge conventional policy balances, existing stakeholders’ relations and distribution of power and resources. It might also challenge the multi-level institutional arrangements with the aim of expanding and influencing broader contexts. The chapter focuses mainly on the relation and interaction of social innovation with the respective institutional contexts from the perspective of the consolidation of socially innovative initiatives. In particular, it analyses the conditions at the very basis of the consolidation process, trying to identify the main dimensions influencing it. The analyses addresses the conditions according to which they succeed or fail in developing, mainly highlighting the processes through which they try to integrate into mainstream policies and exert their influence on policies fighting poverty and social exclusion

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Sustainable Varieties of Capitalism? The Greening of Steel Work in Brazil and Germany

Relations industrielles ◽

10.7202/1034897ar ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 70 (4) ◽

pp. 621-644 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Heike Doering ◽

Claire Evans ◽

Dean Stroud

Keyword(s):

Multinational Corporations ◽

Market Economy ◽

Social Innovation ◽

Low Cost ◽

Varieties Of Capitalism ◽

Managerial Practices ◽

Corporate Strategies ◽

Institutional Contexts ◽

Comparative Capitalisms ◽

Distribution Of Power

The aim of this article is to investigate the sustainability agenda and its implications for employment and managerial practices within different institutional contexts. The article uses the comparative capitalisms literature and, in particular, the Varieties of Capitalism framework to examine how multinational corporations (MNCs) can exploit different institutional contexts to achieve competitive advantages. We explore one multinational steel company’s i.e. SteelCo.AG varied responses to the emerging constraints of the sustainability agenda in Germany, as an example of a Coordinated Market Economy, and Brazil, as an example of a Hierarchical Market Economy. In particular, we focus on evidence concerning training, environmental practices and policies in the different company sites. We demonstrate how different institutional contexts favour different corporate strategies from an approach that exploits negative institutional complementarities, such as the “low-skill/low-cost trap,” to one that benefits from strong institutional coherence facilitating skills formation and innovation in response to environ-mental legislation. Our analysis argues for the importance of incorporating the green agenda as a marker of difference into the existing VoC framework. This allows for nuanced readings of unstable institutional complementarities in terms of operational, managerial and social innovation in different institutional contexts – with such analyses essential for understanding workers’ experiences of employment and work. Our contribution to the extant literature on the employment relationship, within the context of VoC analysis, therefore offers empirical material on understandings of employment relations within the HME category, as a new type within the VoC framework, through our discussion of a multinational’s activities in Brazil. This also allows us to focus on the way companies and other actors’ impact upon institutional frameworks and the distribution of power between different actors within particular contexts, thereby addressing recent discussions of the stability and homogeneity of institutional arrangements.

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Implementing Regulatory Reform in Multi-Level Governance Systems: The Case of the Reform of the Water Sector in Italy (1994-2006)

SSRN Electronic Journal ◽

10.2139/ssrn.2235541 ◽

2008 ◽

Author(s):

Alberto Asquer

Keyword(s):

Regulatory Reform ◽

Water Sector ◽

Governance Systems ◽

Multi Level

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Social entrepreneurship and social enterprise phenomenon: toward a collective approach to social innovation in Tunisia

Journal of Innovation and Entrepreneurship ◽

10.1186/s13731-021-00148-6 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 10 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Bechir Fridhi

Keyword(s):

Social Entrepreneurship ◽

Social Innovation ◽

Participant Observation ◽

Social Entrepreneurs ◽

New Ideas ◽

Entrepreneurial Action ◽

Collective Construction ◽

Depth Interviews ◽

Real Challenge ◽

Collective Dimension

AbstractThis article aims to understand the extent to which social entrepreneurship (SE) contributes to the construction of a collective dimension linked to social innovation (SI). We aim to propose new ideas that can deliver insights into the SE phenomenon. This research is also distinct from entrepreneurial ecosystems as its development already requires some successful entrepreneurial action and to do it, the structuring and consolidation of an entrepreneurial ecosystem constitutes a real challenge for the development of SI.This work has been based on a participant observation of eight major events dedicated to social entrepreneurship or the shared economy. In-depth interviews with Tunisian social entrepreneurs were also conducted in order to enrich our corpus. The results show the necessary cooperation of social entrepreneurs for a sustainable and responsible social innovation. Indeed, the analysis emphasizes that the viability and sustainability of a social innovation rests essentially on a collective construction, beyond common social values.

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Economic structure, power and institutions: A conceptual framework for analysing the historical transformation of US industrial strategy

Competition & Change ◽

10.1177/10245294211015469 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 102452942110154

Author(s):

Mattia Tassinari

Keyword(s):

Structural Change ◽

Conceptual Framework ◽

Economic Structure ◽

Institutional Arrangements ◽

Illustrative Case ◽

Alexander Hamilton ◽

The Government ◽

Distribution Of Power ◽

Illustrative Case Study

An industrial strategy emerges from possibilities for structural change, that depend on material constraints and opportunities afforded by economic structure, the distribution of power in society and the institutional arrangements organized at the political level. Building on a structural political economy perspective, this article develops a structure–power–institutions conceptual framework to describe how economic structure, the distribution of power, and institutions interact through a ‘circular process,’ which is useful for analysing the historical transformation of industrial strategy. In this framework, an industrial strategy refers to the institutional arrangements through which the government manages emerging conflicts or agreements between different powers and influences structural change. As an illustrative case study, the structure–power–institutions framework is applied to analyse the historical transformation of US industrial strategy from the era of Alexander Hamilton to that of Donald Trump.

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DIGI-INNO Tech: Reinventing Innovations

International Journal for Research in Engineering Application & Management ◽

10.35291/2454-9150.2020.0420 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 356-360

Keyword(s):

High Speed ◽

Social Innovation ◽

Innovation Management ◽

Innovation Process ◽

Value Chains ◽

Technological Innovations ◽

Green Innovation ◽

Digital Innovation ◽

New Ideas ◽

Very High

Digital-Innovation Technology calls for reinvention of innovations that offers new opportunities and challenges to design new products and services in the era of hi-tech competition. Digitalization and innovations are pressing issues for business in almost each and every industry. The scope to create new digital value chains increases at a very high speed due to interconnection of people and systems . It is to be believed that wonderful new ideas can open up new ways of looking at various Social Problems because of Digi-Inno connection between people and software. However creating digitalized product and services often creates new problems and challenges to the firm that are trying to innovate. The concept of reinvention in innovation process is redesigning the innovations coupled with advances in science and technology. Technological innovations are only one of many kinds of innovation that develops variety of terms like social innovation, sustainable innovation, responsible and green innovation. In this paper, we tried to give special emphasis on issues of digital innovation management which helps to seek a better base for reinventing innovation management research in digital innovative world.

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Rational Irrationality Across Institutional Contexts

Journal des Économistes et des Études Humaines ◽

10.1515/jeeh-2015-0005 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 21 (1-2) ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Ryan H. Murphy

Keyword(s):

Demand Curve ◽

Institutional Arrangements ◽

Governance Structures ◽

Institutional Contexts ◽

Better Than

AbstractThis paper considers how Bryan Caplan’s concept of rational irrationality may manifest in various political institutional arrangements, building off the demand curve for irrationality. Mob democracy, anarchy, autocracy, and constitutionally constrained democracy are the governance structures addressed. While anarchy is strictly better than mob democracy, under certain conditions, democracy, anarchy, or constitutionally constrained democracy may yield the best outcomes depending on the circumstances.

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The China Model in the Global Economy

The Belt and Road Strategy in International Business and Administration - Advances in Business Strategy and Competitive Advantage ◽

10.4018/978-1-5225-8440-7.ch001 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 1-27

Author(s):

Bahar Baysal Kar ◽

Taha Eğri

Keyword(s):

Global Governance ◽

Global Economy ◽

Institutional Arrangements ◽

Development Model ◽

Governance Systems ◽

New Development ◽

China Model ◽

Development Initiatives ◽

Chinese Capitalism ◽

Trade And Investment

The purpose of this chapter is to stand against the claim that the same neo-liberal model emerges in all countries as a result of the competitive pressures arising from globalization. Countries can experience a globalization pattern that improves their growth performance and living standards with different policy preferences in the fields of finance, trade, and investment. The variety of Chinese capitalism is a case of this situation. In the first section, this Chinese development model with its illiberal policies first is examined. In the second section, the new development initiatives and institutional arrangements and their potential effects are discussed. In addition, the implications of these new development initiatives are argued in terms of global governance systems.

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How National Institutions Shape Skilled Immigrants’ Chances of Getting Hired: Evidence from Harmonised Factorial Surveys with Employers in Germany and England

KZfSS Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie ◽

10.1007/s11577-020-00682-3 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 72 (S1) ◽

pp. 351-373

Author(s):

Felix Stumpf ◽

Andreas Damelang ◽

Martin Abraham ◽

Sabine Ebensperger

Keyword(s):

Research Design ◽

Education System ◽

Survey Design ◽

Institutional Arrangements ◽

Education Systems ◽

Skilled Immigrants ◽

Institutional Conditions ◽

Institutional Settings ◽

Institutional Contexts ◽

Contexts Of Reception

Abstract This study provides novel insights into the institutional conditions under which skilled immigrants get hired for skilled jobs in different countries. We argue that immigrants’ hiring chances depend on the interplay between institutions in sending countries, which determine the type of education that immigrants bring, and institutions in receiving countries, which shape employers’ preferences for certain types of education. We develop a research design that considers this interplay and allows us to directly compare how education from sending countries with different institutional arrangements is rated by employers in two countries with widely divergent institutional contexts of reception, Germany and England. Using harmonised factorial surveys, we simulate hiring processes and evaluate the chances of German and English employers inviting foreign-educated immigrants to interviews for jobs commensurate with their education. The survey design makes it possible to experimentally vary the institutional settings in which immigrants acquired their education in the sending country, and isolate their effect on employers’ ratings. Our key finding is that immigrants from sending countries with highly standardised occupation-orientated education systems prevail in the hiring competition, irrespective of the education system in the receiving country.

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