Social innovation for poverty reduction and sustainable development: Some governance and policy perspectives

The systematic deployment of social innovation has been largely overlooked by policy makers concerned to reduce poverty and promote sustainable development. According to research funded by the European Commission, the policies of international organizations rarely refer to the potential of social innovation, neither generally nor in the context of achieving the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda. However, a huge number of initiatives around the global are successfully using social innovation approaches, but most do so without using this term. They thereby do not fully understand the potential and strength that a more systematic deployment of social innovation theories, methods and practices could bring. This paper aims to at least partially redress this balance by reporting on evidence derived from the on-going empirical and theoretical research undertaken by the SI-DRIVE research project in relation to policy reduction and sustainable development, in particular by focusing on the governance and policy implications.