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Synonyms

Co-production; Hybrid organizations; Nonprofit; Social entrepreneurship

Definition

Social innovation is a process that results in a new and better solution (products, services, models, markets, processes) to meet social needs. It is specific for a particular territory or context and leads to new or improved capabilities, relationships between participants and end-users, or use of assets and resources.

Introduction

Social innovation is the application of new solutions to social problems in areas such as welfare, health, education, youth unemployment, adaptation of migrants, and territorial integration of regions. Social innovations allow nonprofits and other organizations to meet needs of society more effectively than existing options, respond to social challenges, offer new solutions to social problems, develop social interaction, and create alliances (Caulier-Grice et al. 2012). There are different types of social innovations. Most commonly the distinction is between product...

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Acknowledgment

Support from the Basic Research Program of the National Research University Higher School of Economics is gratefully acknowledged.

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Correspondence to Irina Krasnopolskaya .

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Krasnopolskaya, I., Minnigaleeva, G. (2018). Social Innovation. In: Farazmand, A. (eds) Global Encyclopedia of Public Administration, Public Policy, and Governance. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31816-5_3012-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31816-5_3012-1

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  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-31816-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-31816-5

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