In his opening presentation, Jürgen Howaldt (TU Dortmund University, Social Research Centre) described the main features of the concept as well as developments in German innovation policy and its strategic focus on comprehensively tackling major societal challenges. Filipe Almeida (President of Portugal Inovacao Social) presented the Portuguese experience of state support for social innovation through the establishment of a national agency and discussed approaches and challenges in measuring social impact. Sandra Lapointe (Canadian Forum for Social Innovation) spoke about the development of the Canadian ecosystem for social innovation and presented the goals and activities of the Canadian Forum for Social Innovation. In the second part of the plenary discussion, Judith Terstriep (IAT Gelsenkirchen) and Jorge Cunha (University of Minho), Peter Milley (University of Ottawa) and Karen Benzies (University of Calgary) gave an insight into the current academic debate on the topic. In the further course of the conference, the results were discussed from the perspective of the participants. The debate centred on the diverse forms of concepts and instruments developed in the regional initiatives.

On the day before the conference, experiences on the status of the development of national ecosystems in the field of social innovation were exchanged in a roundtable with representatives of the Alberta government and national networks in Canada.

More  Information here.

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