Co-creating social change through citizen science: Systematic literature analysis

Abstract

Citizen science encompasses partnerships between professional scientists and socie-ty, opening opportunities for more active citizen engagement in co-creation of social change. Members of the scientific community and citizens are starting to experiment with digital and offline resources to collaborate with each other to solve societal prob-lems. This article aims to discuss the possible role of citizen science in co-creating social change in society or local community settings. The article is based on systematic literature analysis. The findings* show that co‐created research might have a particular-ly strong impact on the wealth of society and wider outcomes in the local or regional settings. However, such cases are not very common yet. Although academic research on co-creative approaches to citizen science and stakeholder engagement is growing at a steady rate, it remains a relatively emergent domain.