Stimulated by the strong increase in political and public interest in Social Innovation, the relevant scientific discussion has experienced a significant international upswing in recent years. The efforts to develop a cross-field discourse are increasing, as are the differentiation of the field that has taken place, to give the term a more theoretical foundation as an analytical concept with a clearly defined object of investigation and related epistemological interest. After a long period of almost non-existent or largely neglected conceptual and theoretical debate, contours of an autonomous scientific field (Fagerberg and Verspagen, 2009) are becoming visible, based on a common research object, a shared knowledge base and a working communication structure.

For long it has been discussed whether one can even talk about an academic field of research, but these days it continues on its road towards institutionalization. Next to networks such as the European School of Social Innovation (ESSI) and the International Social Innovation Research Conference (ISIRC), many European and nationally funded projects focusing on social innovations in different policy domains, there are also academic journals such as the EPSIR or NOvation becoming more established.

On 19 November 2024, ESSI took the publication of the ‘Encyclopedia of Social Innovation’, edited by Jürgen Howaldt and Christoph Kaletka as an opportunity to discuss the development of the scientific field. The webinar provided an overview of the current discussion and described its future challenges. About 30 participants discussed the current status and future challenges in the further development of the scientific field together with experts and authors of the Encyclopedia of Social Innovation during this interactive webinar.

Programme and video recordings: