Social Sciences and Governance

Urban territories are laboratories for rethinking how economies and communities sustain themselves, and a growing body of research examines how social innovation — new practices, institutions, and relationships that address collective needs — shapes local development beyond what markets or central governments typically deliver. Scholars in this space study how cooperatives, solidarity economy networks, and participatory governance arrangements emerge at the neighborhood or regional scale, and how they become durable enough to influence policy rather than remaining fragile experiments. A central tension in the literature concerns institutionalization: when grassroots initiatives gain formal recognition or public support, they risk losing the adaptive energy that made them effective in the first place. Researchers are actively working to understand which conditions allow social innovation to scale or spread across territories without that trade-off undermining their original civic purpose.

Works

309,721

Total citations

301,698

Keywords

Social InnovationEconomic DevelopmentTerritorial GovernanceSolidarity EconomyCommunity EngagementInstitutionalization