The institutionalization of social innovations

This chapter addresses the institutionalization of social innovations. As innovations in social relations and practices, social innovations can be considered emergent proto-institutions. Institutionalization marks a process of becoming. It marks the gap between local, ephemeral and often fragile projects of social innovation on the one hand, and broader, lasting and stable societal structures on the other hand. This synthetic overview structures the diverse scholarship around a theoretical complication that is central to this topic: Instrumental questions about institutionalization dynamics and associated institutional entrepreneurship are intertwined with certain conceptual-normative understandings of what social innovations and institutions are, and of what they are good for. The chapter discusses the diversity of angles on 1) institutionalization dynamics, 2) conceptualizations of social innovations and institutions and 3) the associated finalities of social innovation institutionalization. It concludes with a critical reflection and an outlook on future research: Is social innovation research to be undertaken as a sub-stream of institutional theory?