Social innovations in social services: concept and main features

Abstract

The overwhelming goal of the research was to provide a knowledge basis for the process of the selection of social innovation ideas within the open call organized by the Society Integration Foundation of the Republic of Latvia. This competition is one of the actions within the ESF+ financed project “Support for new approaches in the provision of community-based social services”. The tasks involved the development of the comprehensive definition and indicators of social innovation for the field of Social Services, as well as evaluation criteria for Social Innovation ideas and projects, and practical methodology for criteria application. The goal of the current research was to build a common understanding of social innovations and their features. Data was processed by means of content analysis with the application of Voyant Tool, and analysis of the experts’ answers. The main identified features of social innovation in the field of social services are initial stimulus, novelty, need for collaboration, effectiveness, sustainability, social value, and scalability and repeatability.