Social innovation, practices to produce autonomy, empowerment and new institutionality?

Abstract

Based on an analysis of the Catalunya case, this article contributes to the ongoing debate on social innovation, offering a general vision of the development of socially innovative practices and looking into its transforming potential in three key areas: 1) creation of social auton-omy spaces; 2) citizen empowerment (especially within communities/ collectives and in high social risk/vulner-ability areas) and 3) development of new institutional ar-chitectures that would promote and reinforce social as well as citizen rights. The article forms part of an exten-sive investigation that has combined social innovation mapping, an online survey and various semi-structured interviews with key informants. The article outlines the potential and limitations of social innovation as a factor of social transformation, and thus points out the need for creation of favourable institutional conditions for its spread and consolidation.