Social Innovation and Human Development—How the Capabilities Approach and Social Innovation Theory Mutually Support Each Other

In light of the growing importance of social innovations in addressing the big social challenges, this article examines the need to develop a concept of social innovation as an analytical category. As such, social innovation is grounded in social theory, which looks at its various manifestations, actors and cultural contexts as well as its interrelationship with processes of social change. With recourse to social practice theories and the social theory of Gabriel Tarde, social innovations are analyzed as an intentional new figuration of social practices and as a generative mechanism of social change. Based on the outlined social-theoretical foundation of social innovations, the various interactions between social practices, social innovations and concepts of human development are discussed.