Introducing Social Innovation

This paper reports the processes by which an interdisciplinary research project overcame the usual problems of antagonism among disciplines and succeeded in introducing a number of social innovations into a community. In terms of the experience five "principles" of successful social innovation are suggested: (a) the principle of maximum investment, (b) the principle of co-optation, (c) the principle of egalitarian responsibility, (d) the principle of research as creative play, and (e) the principle of ideological research leadership. A high degree of staff involvement is made possible by a relaxation of superego prohibitions against novelty and originality, by allowing maximum feasible participation of all project personnel, and by providing realistically wide but unambiguous boundaries and limits. Under these conditions the research group may take on certain of the emotionally charged, proselyting characteristics of a small social movement and may have an impact on the community out of all proportion to its size.