Rounding off my working year it
seemed a good time reflect on my research to date on Digital Social Innovation.
Offering my initial thoughts on a definition for Digital Social Innovation and
hopefully complementing the exciting research going on elsewhere in this
emerging field – e.g. the work of NESTA and others mapping digital social innovation across Europe. As
an academic researcher I find it interesting that the concept of digital social
innovation has emerged from practice. Developed and used by organisations such
as the European Commission, The Nominet
Trust and Google. Some of these organisations use alternative but
equivalent terminology for digital social innovation such as ‘technology for
good’, ‘social computing’ or ‘social tech’. Whilst from an academic
perspective, the concept of digital social innovation has yet to become
established within the literature. This of course provides some very intriguing
avenues for research which I’ll be exploring over the next couple of years. Not
least the addressing the challenges of adequately defining the term Digital
Social Innovation. So here is my current by no means definitive sketch of a
definition.
Digital Social Innovations are new solutions
that meet a social need, more effectively than existing solutions, and are
enabled by digital technologies. Simultaneously, DSIs enhance society’s
capacity to act - leading to new or improved capabilities and relationships and
better use of assets and resources – and transform existing socio-technical
structures - by digitally mediating relationships and embedding digital
artefacts.
This statement integrates aspects
of established definitions for Social Innovation (The Young
Foundation 2012) – emerging from the ground-breaking
work of the TEPSIE project - and Digital Innovation
(Yoo, Lyytinen et al. 2010). At this point it is worth briefly
grounding this rather abstract discussion, by exploring the key components of
the definition using Streetbank as an illustrative
example.
“Streetbank is a (web)site that helps you
share and borrow things from your neighbours (e.g. drills, ladders, skills …).
Streetbank is meant for everyone. It is not for private benefit - for
individuals to make a profit or professionals to sell their services. It is for
the common good.” - http://www.streetbank.com/faq
- A new solution that meets a social need: Streetbank is a new solution to the social need of developing social cohesion within neighbourhoods and communities. By enabling neighbours to share resources and get to know each other Streetbank seeks to make communities nicer places to live. In a neighbourhood where people borrow and share with their friends and family, and neighbours interact predominately face-to-face through ad hoc meetings, then use of Streetbank would be novel (i.e. a new solution).
- More effectively than existing solutions: in a neighbourhood where there is limited social cohesion Streetbank is likely to be more effective than relying on ad hoc face-to-face interactions alone (i.e. the existing solution).
- Enabled by digital technologies: the Streetbank website enables neighbours to share things, and view other the offers of people living with a 1 miles radius. Without the website it is challenging to see how the Streetbank concept could operate effectively.
- Enhance society’s capacity to act: the use of Streetbank with a neighbourhood leads an improved capability to share things, to new relationships forming between neighbours and to the things shared by neighbours being used more frequently (i.e. a better use of resources).
- Transforming existing socio-technical structures: the use of Streetbank changes the nature of the neighbour relationship. With the scope of the relationship being expanded to include someone identified and initially contacted via the Streetbank website (i.e. a digitally mediated relationship). So the Streetbank website (i.e. a digital artefact) itself becomes embedded within the socio-technical structure of the neighbourhood.
One of the challenges I have
faced in forging a definition for Digital Social Innovation is that the terms
Social Innovation and Digital Innovation both remain relatively hotly contested.
With some pretty fundamental questions remaining open for debate and further
research such as: is digital innovation a distinct form of innovation? What is
the relationship between social innovation and technology or business driven
innovation? At the moment though, I have taken a pragmatic decision to somewhat
set aside the implications of such fundamental questions. Working instead to
identify the core characteristics a Digital Social Innovation, alongside the characteristics
one might frequently expect to observe. My initial thinking on these two sets
of characteristics is shown in the diagrams below. Again here I draw on the work
of the TEPSIE project (The Young
Foundation 2012) and Yoo et al. (2010), adding
insight from the literature on innovation in complex socio-technical systems (Geels 2005).
In concluding this blog it feels
apt to consider my future research plans, via a little personal detour. On
Sunday during a pre-Christmas family visit I was posed a tricky question (by my
girlfriend’s father) – what are your big plans for 2014? I have to admit to
struggling to summon an articulate response to this off the cuff, but after a
little reflection research-wise (at least) I feel a vision is starting to come
together. So now three months in to my 2 year ERSC
Fellowship, I feel I have an exciting programme of research on Digital Social
Innovation to pursue throughout 2014 (and beyond). This research will draws on
and further develops the definition proposed above, and seek to address some
tricky research questions including: What are the narratives, within the Social
Innovation literature, on the relationship between the Social Innovation and Digital
technologies? What examples exploring the relationship between digital
technologies and social innovation exist? How to the digital and social aspects
of Digital Social Innovation evolved together over time?
