Social Innovation Generation @ University of Waterloo
WORKING PAPER The Loop, the Lens, and the Lesson: Using Resilience Theory to Examine Public Policy and Social Innovation MicheleLee Moore Frances Westley Ola Tjornbo Carin Holroyd
Working Paper No. 003 January 2010
fostering social innovation in Canada through
research • education • advocacy • collaboration
To send comments to the authors please contact: MicheleLee Moore McConnell Fellow, SiG@Waterloo mlmoore@balsillieschool.ca Frances Westley J. W. McConnell Chair in Social Innovation Social Innovation Generation, University of Waterloo fwestley@uwaterloo.ca Ola Tjornbo McConnell Fellow Social Innovation Generation, University of Waterloo olatjornbo@btinternet.com Carin Holroyd Department of Political Science, Faculty of Arts Social Innovation Generation, University of Waterloo cholroyd@uwaterloo.ca ________ If you would like to be added to our mailing list or have questions regarding our Working Paper Series please contact info@sig.uwaterloo.ca Please visit www.sig.uwaterloo.ca to find out more information on Social Innovation Generation at the University of Waterloo (SiG@Waterloo).
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Social Innovation Generation @ University of Waterloo WORKING PAPER The Loop, the Lens, and the Lesson: Using Resilience Theory to Examine Public Policy and Social Innovation *
MicheleLee Moore Frances Westley Ola Tjornbo Carin Holroyd Working Paper No. 003 January 2010 _____________________________ *DRAFT for DISCUSSION – Please do not quote without authors’ permission
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Abstract Social innovation is an important component of being resilient – new ideas will keep a society adaptable, flexible and learning. Therefore, the better the understanding of the conditions that enable innovations not only to emerge, but to take hold, become routinized within our broader social structures, and then to face disruption or disturbance, the greater the capacity humans will have to be resilient. One of these conditions provides space for the role of the state and public policy. At the broadest level, certain political philosophies privilege emergence and innovation more than others. Within all regimes, however, numerous options exist for policy tools that could, and in many cases, have been used to foster social innovation. The important question for a policy maker is which policy lever and when? This paper will use resilience theory and the adaptive cycle to argue that different policies have greater impact at specific points of time in the cycle of social innovation. Therefore, recognizing the distinct phases of social innovation is central to understanding which policy will be most suitable.
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Introduction to Social Innovation Social innovation is defined here as any new program, product, idea or initiative that profoundly changes the basic routines, resource and authority flows or beliefs of any social system. Successful social innovations have durability and broad impact. Social entrepreneurship on the other hand, refers to individuals with a value‐based, social mission who pursue opportunities within the market context, whether their own organization is considered non‐profit, charity, or for profit (Nicholls, 2006). The market orientation is one of the clear distinctions between the work in the social entrepreneurship field and that of social innovation, as social innovation does not require the market context and quite often may challenge existing economic models and ideologies. Additionally, social innovation is focused on systemic change. While a successful social entrepreneur may be recognized once a market demand has been created and the innovation diffuses from one to many people, a social innovation disrupts a larger institutional context (Westley, 2008). Thus, the innovation may occur depending on political, cultural or economic opportunities and therefore, does not rely on a specific, incremental volume of adoption to be considered a success (Westley, 2008). The relationship between the two as areas of study and practice is that some social innovations will occur as a result of the work of social entrepreneurs. Likewise, the lessons and knowledge that has been advanced about successful social entrepreneurs (e.g. Leadbeater, 1997; Dees, 1998; Nicholls, 2006; Bornstein, 2007) is useful for understanding and comparing the entrepreneurs disrupting entire systems. A growing body of work focuses on the role of entrepreneurs, partnerships with private actors and non‐profits, the role of foundations, and the support of social networks in creating the conditions that enable the generation and sustainability of social innovations. But in practice, the role of public policy and governments has also come to the forefront of discussions about social innovation. Some attempt to coordinate and support the energy of social entrepreneurs and social enterprises has been made, with examples such as the Office of the Third Sector in the UK and the newly created Centre for Social Innovation in the US. Other governments have chosen simply to promote the “production” of innovation, with funding for research and development and the technology sectors. Yet, while funding innovative initiatives can be one option, it neglects the actual context that may have created the need
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for innovative solutions in the first place and therefore, may do little to effect systemic change. Political intent aside, a lack of debate and understanding about the range of policy options that could best support the process of social innovation is minimal amongst both practitioners and scholars. The conceptual piece presented here is our attempt to begin a more extensive discussion. This paper argues that successful social innovation has at least four distinct phases and therefore, different policies are needed to support social innovation depending on the phase. Therefore, policy makers need to understand what they are trying to change and the phase of the possible solutions that are available or that could be created.
The Cycle of Social Innovation Social innovation is an important component of being resilient – new ideas will keep a society adaptable, flexible and learning. Therefore, the better the understanding of the conditions that enable innovations not only to emerge, but to take hold, become routinized within our broader social structures, and then to face disruption or disturbance, the greater the capacity humans will have to be resilient. The theory of resilience provides a meaningful lens to improve this understanding and is used as a basis to frame the argument presented here.
Resilience theory stems from work in ecology in the 1970s and the adaptive cycle (or infinity
loop) is a key feature. The theory rests upon the idea that any resilient ecosystem is dynamically moving through an adaptive cycle and that remaining stagnant in a fixed equilibrium is not healthy. The adaptive cycle has at least four distinct phases in what is best pictured as a figure eight, which are exploitation, conservation, release, and reorganization (Gunderson & Holling, 2002). Rather than focusing on ecosystems, this work examines how innovations may improve the resilience of our social ecological systems. In doing so, it applies resilience theory and the adaptive cycle to consider the four phases that social innovations must go through. Essentially, resilience theory indicates that at any given time a disturbance can affect a system, whether it is a financial crisis, a natural disaster, or some other type of event that may create a tipping point, and then resources and capital, including social capital, intellectual capital along with more
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traditional forms such as financial capital are released, or freed up. Due to the disturbance or crisis, a breakdown may occur in some existing social structures which can present both a period of seeming chaos, but also a place where emergence can occur; that is, different interactions may now take place amongst the newly freed up resources, and new knowledge and new ideas may arise as a result of the new connections. A similar idea of a cycle is reflected in literature on private sector innovation, and the period of massive disturbance is frequently referred to as Schumpeter’s (1942) process of creative destruction. In the adaptive cycle, once the disturbance and the increased activity and interactions occurs, the system moves into the back part of the figure eight loop. In this back loop of the social innovation process, some people may start to cluster around the new ideas that have emerged or start to reorganize themselves with others who share a similar vision for the future. It is in the back loop where true novelty and innovation is likely to emerge. Moving forward into the front loop, choices are made that support or showcase certain innovations, which prove its effectiveness or meaningfulness. Many innovations get trapped here and cannot move into the front loop. Common wisdom is that many excellent new ideas regularly emerge, but they are unable or unsuccessful in challenging people at the right time to ensure support or in framing their innovation in a way that makes it appear as legitimate, desirable and needed. Consequently, sufficient resources are never devoted to these innovations. The literature about social entrepreneurs often explores questions about how and why some people are better able to achieve this step. If resources do begin to be devoted to that innovation, other social structures begin to emerge, whether this involves certain norms becoming widely accepted, institutions being created, or regulations being established. In any broad social system, numerous adaptive loops that represent sub‐ systems would exist in various phases of the adaptive cycle at any given time. Using a technological example, we can think of the Internet as it moved from being an idea of a few people, to beginning to gain support and resources to develop it, then actually being able to gain users who would support the innovation as an important tool, which garnered further resources, and slowly its use began to be institutionalized and in turn, institutions related to its regulation and its further development all began
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to be established. At the same time, we can imagine the hardware for wireless technology at any of its phases in another loop. Most significantly is the interaction between the loops – when an innovation is able to actually cross scales into a larger system.
Social Innovation: What Role for Government? We posit that government has a role in social innovation. But what does the theory of resilience indicate the role of public policy to be with regards to social innovation? Firstly, it emphasizes that the role is going to be dynamic throughout the process and therefore, this paper argues that no single policy is going to be useful for the entire innovation lifecycle. Yet while both the literature on innovation and the variety of literature emerging on governance concurs that governments now need to be flexible, adaptive, and that they need to engage with non state actors such as the private sector in order to enable and support innovation, what does this actually mean for public policy? What forms of governance have been developed to tackle complex problems? Although there is a lack of scholarship linking governance to social innovation, various attempts have been made to create governance paradigms designed to allow government to manage complex problems. In the field of ecology for example, building on resilience theory, a group of researchers have created the concept of adaptive governance, designed to create the ideal conditions for building resilient social ecological systems (Olsson, et al., 2004a; Olsson, et al., 2004b; Folke, et al., 2005; Olsson, et al., 2006). Another paradigm is reflexive governance (Voß, et al., 2006) created to allow effective responses in situations where uncertainty is high, decision making power is widely and unequally dispersed and there is conflict between interest groups over values and goals. The kinds of challenges these two paradigms are intended to address are roughly analogous to the challenge of social innovation when it is examined through a resilience lens and hence, should mark a promising starting point for this study.
Promisingly, there is a great deal of overlap between these paradigms, indicating that some
agreement exists about the governance elements that are important when complex problems are at stake (see fig. 1). It should be immediately apparent from the table that neither of these paradigms is
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focused at the level of concrete public policy, rather they are describing desirable characteristics of entire governance systems. We have additionally grouped these into themes, though in some cases, a single element fits into more than one theme. Fig. 1:Themes of Complexity Governance Governance Theme
Elements of Reflexive Governance (From Voss and Kemp 2006)
Transdisciplinary knowledge production Governance as ongoing experiment
Transdisciplinary knowledge production Experiments and adaptivity of strategies and institutions Iterative, participatory goal formulation
Participatory approaches
Continuous learning Taking a systems perspective Flexibility
Elements of Adaptive Governance (Synthesized from Olsson et al 2006; Olsson, Folke and Berkes 2004 and Olsson, Folke and Hahn 2004) Integration and mobilization of diverse sets of knowledge Ongoing experimentation in ecosystem management actions; Monitoring Collaboration of multiple and diverse actors; Self organization; Development and mobilization of social networks to facilitate leaning, knowledge sharing and collaboration Dynamic learning; Monitoring
Interactive strategy development Anticipation of long‐term Whole systems perspective systemic effects Experiments and Flexibility; Site specificity adaptivity of strategies and institutions
It is clear that the two paradigms do not give equal weight to all the themes and elements we have identified. This may partly be explained by the fact that adaptive governance is more sensitive to the need for accurate and credible knowledge and therefore concentrates on knowledge and learning networks, while reflexive governance is more cautious and recognizes that participatory approaches
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often involve value conflicts that need to be resolved before larger problem solving becomes possible and therefore emphasizes goals and strategies. Although the themes described in this table do not focus on the level of policy, they may be useful in helping to categorize types of policy action. For example, policies directed towards encouraging learning might include monitoring programs and learning workshops, while policies that encourage participation might include volunteer programs and open meetings. Additionally, some policies will additionally achieve several aims, such as challenge grants (discussed further in the section Reorganization Phase) might encourage participation, experimentation and selection of innovations. Using these categories we can begin to understand the broad range of activities that government is able to engage in as a means to address complex problems. Strikingly however, the notion that the task of governance changes over time is neglected by both of these paradigms. Although they emphasize flexibility and learning and clearly recognize that complex problems are constantly evolving, neither has attempted the task of navigating these problems into distinct stages requiring different types of intervention. In fact, there is a tendency to place a greater emphasis on constant experimentation and deliberation, which while crucial for the release and reorganization phases of the adaptive cycle, are costly and inefficient in the long run and may in fact prevent the system from transitioning to a conservation stage which is a necessary part of the social innovation cycle. This paper argues that this type of understanding is critical to managing the process of social innovation. Undoubtedly all of the types of policy categories as well as the characteristics of these governance systems are necessary for navigating these process, they may not all be necessary or even helpful if employed at the same time rather than at different stage of the cycle when different types of policy action may be needed. Yet, static governance models (those that focus on remaining in one or two stages only) continue to prevail and only after serious calamity do they become called into question. This can be observed by looking at the effect of the recent economic crash on the financial policy environment. Before the crisis, the emphasis for many was on deregulation, private investment, privatizing financial institutions and encouraging flexibility, creativity and freedom in the financial economy. The effects of this approach are well known and the calls for a reversal of policy came quickly after the crash. The
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state was forced to invest heavily in keeping the private institutions afloat with the result that it has become a majority shareholder in many cases and in others has fully nationalized previously private organizations. Along with this investment have come calls for regulation and particularly for a clamp down on bonuses. Although there is support for this economic model, there is also criticism by those arguing that although regulation may have been effective in preventing the crash, what will now be needed is to allow the economy to retain its freedom to allow plenty of room for new enterprise so that recovery can begin to occur. From a resilience perspective we can say that a transition from conservation to release phases has occurred and policy makers need to pay close attention to the changing conditions and tailor policy accordingly, rather than simply reinforcing the system that persisted before. Currently, numerous options for policy tools that could, and in many cases, have been used to foster social innovation exist, including: regulation, subsidies, the indirect provision of services (e.g. financial support for universities), the direct provision of services (e.g. medical care), tax arrangements, enforcement and implementation agreements, signaling (e.g. employment equity provisions), awareness campaigns, incentives for consumers, incentives for businesses, Royal Commissions and other convening exercises, and awards. The difficulty is in understanding which policy lever is most suited to enabling social innovation and when should it be used. This paper argues that different policies are going to be more useful depending on the actual phase of innovation and that the adaptive cycle is a helpful tool to consider the impacts of different policy tools in the four different phases of social innovation.
Examples of the PolicySocial Innovation Relationship For this section, we will describe the characteristics of the phases of social innovation in more detail and describe potential policy initiatives that would be well placed in the different phases, using examples to illustrate.
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Release Phase: Policy approaches for “sense making” for complex problems and/or when no tangible innovation clearly exists The release phase immediately follows a period of creative destruction, or a disruption to a system. In this phase, the greatest need is for new ideas and creative solutions as opposed to creating a market or scaling up an existing innovation. The opportunity context may seem opaque in this phase, with people genuinely uncertain about “what the right idea is” and how to make anything significant happen. In fact, many will not agree yet on the definition of the problem itself. Simultaneously, some groups will resist the vulnerability and change by attempting to return to the pre‐disturbance state, while many others will be actively seeking and supportive of new ideas in this phase more than any other. Therefore, this phase is where the seeds of change are truly planted. With the lack of a clear problem definition and the high level of uncertainty about potential solutions that characterize this phase, policy levers the promote discussion, social learning, and creative solutions to address the issues are needed. Research has shown that new knowledge and different ideas are more likely to emerge when diverse actors that do not normally interact closely with one another are exposed and come in contact with each other (Burt, 1992; Gilsing & Duysters, 2008) which provides a foundation for policy makers to consider. However, once this interaction occurs, the path may go one of three different ways. Firstly, if decision making processes are designed too simply for the complexity or scale of a problem, quick convergence may occur; that is, everyone quickly agrees on the same solution or idea (Mason, et al., 2008) which may be useful in terms of the rate at which decisions and change can happen, but it can also lead to sub‐optimal ideas rapidly spreading (Mason, et al., 2008). The consequence is that resources are devoted to one idea without adequate consideration and exploration of novel alternatives. Secondly, while diversity is needed among actors, if too many different signals and knowledge inputs are received by people, their cognitive limits may be reached, which could eventually lead to possible misunderstandings (Mason, et al., 2008). As well, in order for people to be willing to share the risks of innovation, relationships that are characterized by trust are important, which is not inherent to relationships between people who never interact regularly (e.g. Uzzi, 1997). Social innovation then,
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can really only follow a third path where the “right mix” of diversity and trust is found (Burt, 2004; Gilsing & Duysters, 2008; Bodin & Crona, 2009). Public policy instruments that are most useful in this phase then are those that convene different individuals or groups together and provide a forum for sharing ideas and for building trusting relationships. Multi‐stakeholder collaborations, consultations, Royal Commissions, and participatory planning processes based on models such as Future Search are all excellent examples of tools that will help foster new insights, new partnerships, and new solutions to emerge. Proposition: When complex problems need to be better understood and new ideas are needed, processes that enable interactions and build trust between previously disconnected groups are helpful to the generation of social innovations.
Reorganization Phase: Policy Levers to Stimulate and Select Entirely New Innovations In the reorganization phase, the actual definition of the problem is far clearer than in the release phase and the result is that groups, structures, and opinions becoming formed which will provide the eventual support of different innovations through the remaining two phases. In fact, this phase marks a key transition from mere “idea” to planning for implementation. Public policies that support social innovation in this phase then are those that assist innovators and the newly formed groups to develop short and long term plans and then encourage a selection process. That is, forums for the mere generation of new ideas are not needed in this phase; rather decisions about which innovation will be chosen and therefore, which one should be invested in becomes a primary concern. Many potentially good ideas will come forward out of the previous release phase and one of the most common pitfalls is to develop a policy in this phase that only commits to a principle of “fairness” in the distribution of resources for the next phase, which can translate to providing only minimal support for any and all innovators with no single innovation receiving adequate support to succeed. We argue the “fairness” principle should instead be embodied in the opportunities to access and participate in the generation of new innovations and then in the process of selection. With finite resources we
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emphasize that policies need to support selection and the capacity of groups to collectively make informed choices about how to invest resources. One of the most significant difficulties with selection processes that governments and others face is the lack of appropriate evaluation techniques to measure social innovation and the often intangible benefits they provide. Without appropriate metrics, it becomes difficult to determine which innovation is worth moving towards the next phase. Pilot projects with complete evaluations and challenges that encourage competition and partnerships are effective in this phase. Examples include the “Bike to Work” week campaigns that encourage people to adopt different modes of transportation for commuting and provide incentives for groups who collectively bike the most mileage, and the UK’s Big Green Challenge which involves a 1 million pound challenge intended to stimulate community led response to climate change. The Challenge organizers selected 100 of the most promising groups, who received support from the Big Green Challenge team to develop their ideas into detailed plans. From this group, 10 Finalists were shortlisted who are now putting their ideas into practice to compete for the £1 million prize. They have until October 2009 to reduce CO2 emissions in their community. While it is still too early to determine the effectiveness of the challenge in generating socially transformative solutions, early indications are that some novel ideas have emerged and that those ideas have come from communities and actors that are not the usual suspects, in terms of who would normally be applying for funding to reduce carbon emissions.
Other policy options include enabling the innovations to be selected through other means – in this case, this may mean governments support the existence of certain areas where innovation could occur to ensure they continue to survive. Funding for universities and education, grants for the arts community, and student loans are all examples of options that would support this enabling environment. Proposition: policies that not only motivate and reward the generation of innovative ideas but also involve an evaluation process to select amongst the many potential innovations, is one of the more successful options for the reorganization phase.
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Exploitation Phase: Policy Levers to Scale Out New innovations
In this phase, the most important step becomes leveraging resources to support the
development of the innovation selected through the previous phase. This phase may involve the final development of innovations. Often by this phase, the innovation has already been successful at a local scale and the goal becomes to scale out the innovation on a broader scale. Scaling out however, may require different components to be created that will contribute to a broader social innovation, as described in the RDSP example that follows. For social innovations that lead to truly transformative change, this phase often places less demand on the innovation and places greater emphasis on requiring the structural barriers to the innovation be addressed. Structural change will typically require resources and a source of authority or power that may not previously have existed for those seeking the change. Scholars studying social movements, networks, the relevance of social capital, innovation in the private sector, or the increasing role of a range of actors in global governance all provide useful insights as to how different people and groups may seek to gain access and legitimately leverage new resources in certain circumstances. But how can public policy proactively support social innovations in this phase? One example involves the social innovation of changing how individuals with disabilities are cared for in Canada. Al Etmanski initially created PLAN, an organization that helps build local support networks for children with disabilities and their families, which was met with great success. Recognizing that these local networks were insufficient to change perceptions and the long term security of individuals with disabilities more substantially however, Etmanski worked with others, including government and financial experts, to create the Registered Disability Savings Plan (RDSP) ‐ a tax deferred bond and matching government grant that enables tax free funds to be invested and saved long term for an individual with a disability, that one day, will lose his/her parents, guardians or caregivers and will require a financial means to survive. By adopting the RDSP as a policy option to focus on, the government redirected not only its resources, but also approved the financial institutions where families could open an RDSP providing some structural support. As the financial institutions became engaged in the process, others also redirected their resources to raising awareness about the issues facing families where one member has
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a disability and providing support. For example, one of the leading pharmacy chains called London Drugs ran a contest for families who could win a $1500 start up contribution to a fund. In this way, the government policy of an RDSP helped to leverage resources and to begin the shifting belief systems about how people with disabilities can achieve financial security and in the process assisted an innovation to move towards the conservation phase. Proposition: Policies that enable social innovations and the innovators to access resources, including social, intellectual and financial, are critical to scaling out innovations from local successes to broader systemic change. These policies often involved proactively addressing structural barriers to social innovation, but must be very specific so as not to open opportunities for negative or needless exploitation of scarce resources.
Conservation Phase: Policy Levers to Establish Available Innovations As the New “Business As Usual” The conservation phase represents a phase when the system in which the social innovation is operating is quite mature; that is, most of the available resources and capital are invested into existing, and generally only a few dominant ones. Consequently, with only a few firms holding most of the resources, and most of the resources flowing in, out and between only these few firms for more mature products, very little diversity exists. Products are cost‐effective and their development is well established and efficient by this phase. Therefore, as innovations enter the conservation phase we suggest the most successful policy levers are those that allow an innovation to fit in the existing mature system rather than radically alter it. Policies that provide subtle changes in the supply chain or infrastructure related to the innovation are important in this phase. To some extent, the social impact of these policies and the innovations they support is more incremental rather than transformative. Policies also may support the inevitable creative destruction or disturbance that will enter the system by ensuring a continued investment in the next innovation. Government incentives for environmental technologies, such as hybrid cars, geothermal heating systems for residences, water and energy efficient appliances are the best example for this phase because they help to create a
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market or market mechanisms for innovations that in many ways, are already established. For instance, the incentives from governments for hybrid cars are for an item that already have been introduced to the market and has been relatively proven as a technology, although, knowledge with the product will continue to grow for some time yet. The policy is not meant to support the innovation in the phase when it was first trying to create the hybrid. It is only useful if applied at a suitable phase and it is even more useful if investment is simultaneously made into the development of future technologies. Similarly, the City of Victoria’s adjustment of the size of some street parking spaces to suit Smart cars is an example of altering infrastructure to supports the adoption of an existing innovation While this phase may sound less difficult than some of the other phases or less likely to lead to significant change, this phase requires an extremely strong capacity to adopt innovations. The other phases may require government to create policies that support, enable or stimulate creative new ideas, but this phase requires a government to draw on and absorb the innovations and the knowledge surrounding it. In many cases, the innovation may not have come from within that specific nation or state, but rather is the result of external efforts. The capacity to recognize these innovations, adopt them in a timely fashion, and adapt them as needed to the local context is referred to as the “absorptive capacity” (Cohen & Levinthal, 1990). Thus far, market and consumer‐based incentives are one of the clearest examples where we can see government policy supporting adoption and creating a market for an existing innovation. Proposition: In this phase, innovations already exist and have been tested successfully. The need exists to adopt the innovation and establish it as the new status quo. Policies that create a market or demand for the innovation, whether it is an idea, program, or technology are necessary.
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Conclusion and Future Research: In closing, it was argued that certain policies have greater impact at specific points of time, and that recognizing the distinct phases of social innovation is central to understanding which policy will be most suitable. The paper moves scholarship towards a theory of phase appropriate government interventions using resilience theory as a means to understand the characteristics of each phase. Ultimately, we put forth four propositions about policy options to support the different phases of social innovation, including the following: Proposition: When complex problems need to be better understood and new ideas are needed, processes that enable interactions and build trust between previously disconnected groups are helpful to the generation of social innovations. Proposition: policies that not only motivate and reward the generation of innovative ideas but also involve an evaluation process to select amongst the many potential innovations, is one of the more successful options for the reorganization phase. Proposition: Policies that enable social innovations and the innovators to access resources, including social, intellectual and financial, are critical to scaling out innovations from local successes to broader systemic change. These policies often involved proactively addressing structural barriers to social innovation, but must be very specific so as not to open opportunities for negative or needless exploitation of scarce resources. Proposition: In this phase, innovations already exist and have been tested successfully. The need exists to adopt the innovation and establish it as the new status quo. Policies that create a market or demand for the innovation, whether it be an idea, program, or technology are necessary.
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Future research needs to examine policy instruments, including successes and failures, for a detailed empirical evaluation of our propositions. Additionally, research needs to explore how policy instruments can be combined, if there are indicators that can help governments to more clearly determine which lever to use when, and we are undertaking other work to examine questions about the extent to which policy from the state is a key factor in successful social innovations versus the leadership skills of a social entrepreneur or the mobilization of networks. Areas of interest may include social finance, education and public awareness campaigns as sources of social innovations.
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Author Biographies Michele‐Lee Moore Michele‐Lee Moore is a PhD candidate in Global Governance at the Balsillie School of International Affairs and a McConnell Fellow at SiG@Waterloo. Her research interests include global environmental governance, networks, social innovation, and the mobilization of different forms of scientific knowledge into policy and practice. Previously a water strategy advisor for the Government of British Columbia, Michele‐Lee completed her MSc at the University of Victoria. Frances Westley
Frances Westley is the J.W. McConnell Chair in Social Innovation at the University of Waterloo. Her research, writing, and teaching centers on social innovation in complex problem domains, with particular emphasis on leadership and managing strategic change. Her most recent book entitled Getting to Maybe (Random House, 2006) focuses on the inter‐relationship of individual and system dynamics in social innovation and transformation. Dr. Westley received her PhD and MA in Sociology from McGill University. Ola Tjornbo Ola Tjornbo is currently a McConnell Fellow at SiG@Waterloo. Ola has been deeply engaged in SiG’s case writing project, helping to develop a SiG case writing template to assist researchers and practitioners in utilizing a social innovation theoretical framework to look at and understand examples of innovative projects. Ola has also begun to put the template into practice, developing two teaching cases based on a series of qualitative interviews conducted in British Columbia in April 2008.
Carin Holroyd Dr. Carin Holroyd is a faculty member with SiG@Waterloo as well as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science, University of Waterloo. She is a Senior Fellow, Centre for International Governance Innovation and a Senior Research Analyst with the Asia‐Pacific Foundation (based in Vancouver, B.C.) Carin previously taught at universities in Canada, New Zealand and Japan. She has been co‐President of the Japan Studies Association of Canada and is one of the coordinators of the 2008 Japan Studies Association of Canada Conference, slated for Waterloo in October 2008. Dr. Holroyd's field of research interest includes government‐business relations, Canada‐Japan relations, international trade and national innovation policies.
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About Social Innovation Generation Social Innovation Generation (SiG) is a collaborative partnership between the Montreal‐based J.W. McConnell Family Foundation, the University of Waterloo, the MaRS Discovery District in Toronto, the Causeway national social finance project, and the PLAN Institute in Vancouver. It seeks to address Canada’s social and ecological challenges by creating a culture of continuous social innovation. The project is designed to enhance the conditions for social innovation in Canada, including providing practical new support for social innovators in cultivating organizations and initiatives. The SiG project is focused very specifically on social innovations that have durability, impact and scale. Our interest is on profound change processes and our overall aim is to encourage effective methods of addressing persistent social problems on a national scale. To find out more, please visit www.sigeneration.ca
About the University of Waterloo SiG@Waterloo is an important partner in the national SiG collaboration and is housed in the Faculty of Arts at the University of Waterloo, recognized as one of Canada's most innovative universities. In just half a century, the University of Waterloo, located at the heart of Canada's Technology Triangle, has become one of Canada’s leading comprehensive universities with 28,000 full and part‐time students in undergraduate and graduate programs. In the next decade, the university is committed to building a better future for Canada and the world by championing innovation and collaboration to create solutions relevant to the needs of today and tomorrow. Waterloo, as home to the world’s largest post‐secondary co‐operative education program, embraces its connections to the world and encourages enterprising partnerships in learning, research, and discovery.
To find out more, please visit www.uwaterloo.ca
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SiG@Waterloo 195 King St. W., Suite 202 Kitchener, ON N2G 1B1 T: 519 888 4490 F: 519 578 7168 W: www.sig.uwaterloo.ca
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