Social innovations are urgently needed as we confront complex social problems. As these social problems feature substantial interdependencies among multiple systems and actors, developing and implementing innovative solutions involve the re-negotiating of settled institutions or the building of new ones. In this introductory article, we introduce a stylized three-cycle model highlighting the institutional nature of social innovation efforts. The model conceptualizes social innovation processes as the product of agentic, relational, and situated dynamics in three interrelated cycles that operate at the (...) micro, meso, and macro levels of analysis. The five papers included in this special issue address one or more of these cycles. We draw on these papers and the model to stimulate and offer guidance to future conversations on social innovations from an institutional theory perspective. (shrink)

The starting premise of this paper is that business models can transform social reality—sometimes to an extreme. Then, building on the concept of “grand challenges,” we argue that such transformations can be either positive or negative in nature —even in the case of business models designed to improve value not only economically but environmentally and socially as well. To further our understanding of the negative aspects, we introduced two conceptual categories of business model: those for oppression or depletion and exclusionary (...) ones. We further argue that bringing the notion of grand challenges center-stage highlights four elements that can contribute to emerging research and inform practice on transformational business models. These elements are: participatory forms of architecture; multivocal inscriptions; scaffolding; and proximity. They are central components of what we name transformational business models. (shrink)

Prior research has shown that human trafficking has multiple facets and is deeply enmeshed in societies around the world. Two central challenges for anti-trafficking organizations pertain to confronting systemic injustices and establishing caring organizations for survivors to start the process of healing and restoration. Analyzing the work of an anti-trafficking organization, International Sanctuary in Mumbai, we seek to elucidate how a space for caring for trafficking survivors is constructed in a largely non-egalitarian and unjust context. We contribute to discussions on (...) how caring infrastructures are possibly developed so that they do not write off existing gendered and in-egalitarian social structures and how they shape individual biographies. We also highlight how the specific, situated context—defined by those very structures—shapes and influences the transformative potential of care interventions. (shrink)

This study examines activities and processes through which projects of moral regulation are implemented as well as lived, transformed, and resisted by their targeted actors. Our ethnographic study focuses on discourses and practices of civic duty for orderly and hygienic conduct in the rehabilitation of marketplaces in Yaoundé, Cameroon. By drawing on the inhabited institutions approach and the literature on ethics as practice, our analysis extends research on moral work to put forward a perspective on moral regulation as a situated (...) practice. We show how moral work is built on individual reflections but is simultaneously negotiated through actors’ relationships, that is, responsibilities to family, interactions within the community, and personal history. (shrink)