Social Innovation Within Societal Changes: A Historical Perspective

The emerging societal dynamics determine the crucial role of social innovation as a driver for resilience and sustainability. This research explores how social innovation is embedded within the societal dynamics and how it can boost the resilient transformations and sustainable transitions of societal systems. We apply a historical analysis that covers a period from the 19th to the 21st century and defines particular milestones in the development of social innovation conception, namely philosophical concept related to “social change” (19th century); part of sociology and management (20th century); and an independent conception within scientific and applied initiatives (21st century). Within the prism of innovation theory, we analyze how innovation processes were embedded in the formation of different socioeconomic models. We provide our conception of social innovation as a driver of resilient transformations and sustainable transitions of societies.