Navigating Inclusive Innovation - The role of institutional entrepreneurs in inclusive innovation initiatives
Due to the COVID-19 crisis the PhD defence of Mario Andrés Pinzón Camargo will take place (partly) online.
The PhD defence can be followed by a live stream.
Mario Andrés Pinzón Camargo is a PhD student in the department of Technology, Policy and Society (TPS), Section of Science, Technology, and Policy Studies (STePS)). His supervisor is prof.dr. S. Kuhlmann and his co-supervisor is dr. G. Ordóñez Matamoros from the Faculty of Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences (BMS).
This research was conducted in the Global South, based on three cases from the Colombian Andean Mountains. The cases illustrate mistrust, poverty and inequality and other social disparities that institutional entrepreneurs have addressed by building path-transformative alternatives. In this frame, and despite the low and sometimes the total lack of state support, policy programs emerged to foster inclusive innovation processes in those communities. However, little is known about the role of Institutional Entrepreneurs in building path-transformative alternatives in settings like those from the Global South and about their role in inclusive innovation initiatives supported by national entities.
This research contributes to understanding the role of an agent of change, the institutional entrepreneurs, in inclusive innovation initiatives supported by national entities in local communities. This study is supported by three literature branches: inclusive innovation, path dependence and creation, and institutional entrepreneurship. The first branch provides a useful approach to address social concerns and needs under a direct approach to development. In turn, path dependence and creation support the study of those path-transformative alternatives by trying to build more sustainable and inclusive development. Finally, the concept of Institutional Entrepreneurship contributes to studying inclusive innovation from the actors’ perspective and understanding their role in building path-transformative alternatives. Thus, the combination of these literature branches helps in answering the following research question: what is the role of Institutional Entrepreneurs in Inclusive Innovation Initiatives supported by National Entities in local communities?
From a methodological viewpoint, this study combines an abductive approach (Awuzie & McDermott, 2017) with case study research (Yin, 2018). In this vein, the metaphor “navigation” is suggested to explain the back-and-forth movement between theory and data to reveal the coordinates to answer the research question. Three cases from the Colombian Andean Mountains are studied in-depth, through nine months of fieldwork with semi-structured interviews, official archive documents, academic documents, news reports and articles from local newspapers, and other data gathered to triangulate the findings.
As part of this cruise, it was found that in inclusive innovation initiatives supported by national entities (here mainly Colciencias) in local communities, institutional entrepreneurs function as channelisers. This role was crucial for two reasons. First, it prevents the initiatives from hampering or undermining the path-transformative process. Second, it contributes to exploiting the positive effects of the initiatives. Thus, this channeliser role of institutional entrepreneurs aligns the inclusive innovation initiatives supported by Colciencias, with the path-transformative processes led by institutional entrepreneurs in their communities. In performing this role, institutional entrepreneurs channelled the initiatives to strengthen their vision of change and simultaneously cope with pressures that resist change. This role is supported through three critical activities: i. A strategic analysis about the needs to be attended; ii. Bargaining between the institutional entrepreneur and the entity that supported the initiative; and iii. The surveillance of the initiative’s implementation.
Besides, to answer the research question, this study provides a set of five contributions: i. A set of two heuristics are developed to navigate the social complexity. They are assembled in the theoretical realm and improved while navigating the studied cases; ii. This study provides the building blocks to advance in understanding the notion of inclusive innovation as a multidimensional concept; iii. Instead of a linear process, the building paths process is presented in the form of phases or modules led by institutional entrepreneurs; iv. Institutional entrepreneurs are studied in different settings from those reported in the literature. Besides, it is confirmed that agency is distributed and relational. These contributions support the study of actors in transformative processes; and v. Finally, this research leads to a reflection on the contributions from a setting that could be identified as part of the Global South to the Global Norths.
