The ecosystem for social innovation in Austria

As part of the SI Plus project, we present our report on the Austrian social innovation ecosystem. Social innovation is a broad term, even in a small country like Austria. With the following report, SI plus aims to provide the most up-to-date overview possible of actors, measures and support services that contribute to shaping and promoting social innovation in Austria.

The term “ecosystem” was chosen deliberately, as social innovation is always about diversity of ideas, and innovations of all kinds thrive best where “they are integrated into a network of interrelated, mutually supportive or complementary institutions. Civil society, non-profit sector organizations, social enterprises, start-ups, social innovators, science and academia, public sector institutions and private sector companies can contribute to addressing societal challenges through new approaches, solutions and practices and to generating and disseminating social innovations.”

The mapping is primarily about providing an overview of social innovators. Who does what, where, with what focus, for whom. It shows which structural obstacles are being overcome, or at least tackled, and by whom, thus achieving sustainable added value for society.

However, ecosystems are also always subject to change. Some projects are only visible for a short time, others use different terms and are therefore not so easy to find, or can only be found in a specific niche. The report on the ecosystem of social innovation in Austria therefore does not claim the permanent status quo of completeness.

This mapping is therefore also an invitation to all the initiatives presented and those that may not yet have been mentioned to get in touch with us, to participate in the discussion and to add to it in order to draw as complete a picture as possible of the Austrian social innovation ecosystem and to be able to make it available.

Please send any ideas and suggestions for additions to the report to: Reinhard.Millner@wu.ac.at

Interested in the latest report on the social innovation ecosystem?

Click here to download the report.