Social innovation and transition: Which barriers for which proximities?

The article analyzes innovations whose objective is less about technology than about the transition issues of our society. We seek to better understand the development of these innovations, which can be described as third-generation social innovation, and to verify the presence of specific issues requiring adapted support. We study 20 SI projects, based on interviews and in light of the Proximity approach. Although, at first glance, this work highlights the usual characteristics (collective and multiscalar character) and obstacles of innovation (financing, acceptability, coordination), an in-depth analysis reveals unexpected results: spatial proximity, considered to be essential for the experimentation of SI projects, appears relatively weak, as does relational proximity. On the contrary, institutional (public authorities) and organizational (professional circles) proximity appear to be indispensable and suggest rethinking the existing mechanisms to encourage these projects.
JEL Codes: O350, O360, O320