Management & Marketing no. 2/2014

Current trends in social innovation research: social capital, corporate social responsibility, impact measurement

Carmen Păunescu,
The Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Romania

Abstract. The paper highlights the most popular topics in social innovation research identified in the scientific literature, trying to emphasize the dimensions of the concept and its links with adjacent notions. The paper quantifies the frequency with which social innovation is addressed in the literature and then critically analyses its most debated aspects. The research is based on a literature review of the articles indexed in Thomson Reuters ISI Web of Knowledge during the period 1966‐2014. Social innovation as a field of research is rather new but in the last ten years it has gained an amazing popularity among scholars, particularly with respect to pressing social issues like poor education, poverty, hunger, illness or social injustice. It is obvious why this field is more present in research, as social problems that affect a large number of populations are significant and their impact could be scaled and measured appropriately. The paper is meant to help academics and research scholars advance research in the social innovation field, by building on existing streams of research presented in the current paper, which need further investigation. As such, the findings of the paper will have a theoretical applicability and implication in what regards the understanding of the concept of social innovation, as well as its content and links with other related terms.

Keyword: social innovation, social capital, social networks, corporate social responsibility, social entrepreneurship, social measurement of innovation.

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