Review of Social Innovation: Dimensions, Elements and Links to Innovation Domains

The present study addresses the need for consolidation of the field of social innovation by providing a conceptual clarity in terms of delineating its elements and dimensions, differentiating it from the related field of social entrepreneurship and distinguishing it from innovation which is its precursor (in some senses) as well as bringing in definitional clarity to the field. We trace the evolution of the field and bring together the conceptualization, typologies and definitions from the past studies, to enable us to define social innovation holistically. This study is a systematic literature review and highlights the two streams, namely agentic and structuralist perspective in which social innovation has grown. We use business model innovation and innovation diffusion model as frameworks from the innovation literature to make our case for social innovation. The study has also reviewed related domains of innovation, vis-à vis, open innovation and design thinking in terms of their overlap with social innovation elements or process. This study also captures the barriers to social innovation and proposes the future scope of social innovation in terms of its link to domains like frugal innovation and bricolage.