University’s Contribution to Society: Benchmarking of Social Innovation

Social innovation is crucial to tackling the challenges faced by contemporary societies. Universities are rich in resources that, through their active involvement in social innovation, can solve social problems. However, the ambiguity of the term social innovation is a concern and has implications for academic social innovation initiatives. A deeper understanding of the role of universities in society is needed, particularly in leveraging social innovation to address unmet social needs. This paper combines conceptual and empirical literature to explore how universities are evolving in their approach to managing social innovation. While there is a wide variety of initiatives and approaches that explore the challenges of universities in promoting social innovation in their communities, the broader capacity of the universities’ engagement in social responsibility and sustainable development is also presented. This paper highlights that the notion of a world-class university is outdated; what is needed is (i) the alignment of social innovation with universities’ core teaching and research activities to increase legitimation and recognition of social innovation practices; (ii) the idea of a sustainable management system promoting dynamic coordination of social and private interests, positioning engagement centrally; and (iii) the idea of a culture that is tolerant of error and manages it in a way that incentivizes academic involvement in social innovation activities. This paper also emphasizes the relevance of introducing incentives for university staff involvement in problem-solving activities and in delivering social services via service-learning.