Social innovation is often conceived as a unifying policy concept around which cross-sectoral stakeholders can coalesce and organise. The emphasis placed on ‘new’ and ‘novel’ approaches to social problems is presented as a departure from established modes of thinking and action that transcend existing political and socio-economic divisions. Rather than focusing on the alignment, complementarity or institutional hybridity through which support for social innovation is procured, it is important to consider the tensions that are avoided, accommodated and ignored in the social innovation policymaking process. To do so, this brief working paper examines the (a)political character of social innovation policy in Europe and what implications this has for affecting socio- structural change and power relations to tackle marginalisation. The purportedly cohesive conception and pursuit of social innovation across policy domains and structural levels, obscures from the fact that social innovation is a nested micro paradigm within the prevailing European political economy. A transference or realignment of power towards the powerless is central to the political project of social innovation in Europe. Without it, social innovation policymaking garners and gives credence to a conciliatory politics of need provision that focuses on ‘pragmatic solutions’ to ‘political problems’ regarding the redistribution of resource, power and opportunity.
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)