Axis 1 : What links between territories, places and social/socio-cultural innovations?

It is a question of discussing here the relationship between territory and social innovations, knowing in particular that it is their proximity and their in-depth knowledge of the populations which allow the actors and socio-cultural structures to detect the existing social needs – little, badly satisfied – or emerging, and to provide answers through a process of experimentation and modeling of the solutions created.

Axis 2 : Does the "crisis" create an opportunity for social and socio-cultural innovation?

An acute form of change, the "crisis" is a notion that often participates in the reading of contemporary changes at work. Sometimes it is a question of designating a social event which is characterized by a paroxysm of suffering, contradictions or uncertainties, likely to produce explosions of violence or revolt. Sometimes it is a question of evoking with the "crisis" the window of opportunity which opens - concomitantly with the breakdown of social balances - and leads to other methods of resource management by the system concerned, as well as new mobilizations and multi-sectoral changes. The crisis would then become the crucible of new visions or practices that emerge through civil society initiatives and are based on social innovations on a global or local scale.

Axis 3 : Innovations in the sociocultural field, between instituted and instituting

As some analyze, social and socio-cultural animation must position itself in the field of two antagonistic forces, one innovative, the other conservative. In several aspects, the original innovations have given way to institutionalization, raising the question of its own tensions between innovative and conservative postures over the transformations of the socio-cultural field. Knowing that, moreover, the institutionalization of socio-cultural innovations is not only synonymous with compromise: it can mean the consecration of its success insofar as it allows a diffusion and recognition of its contributions in society…

Axis 4 : Technological Innovations, vectors of social innovations?

Innovation is a polysemic notion, which has long been – and which is still – considered essentially from its technical aspect: against the narrowness of this prism, social innovation has been constructed as a mirror of technological innovation. Starting from there, this axis aims to question the complex and sometimes problematic links between technological innovation and social innovation, based on concrete examples mobilized in the socio-cultural fields and social intervention: digital developments, digitalization, eco-technologies, etc.

Axis 5 – What social innovations in front of the recompositions of populations?

Health and climate crises, with the migratory flows they generate (refugees from countries at war or in situations of severe poverty, climate refugees to come, etc.), are examples of global contexts that shed light on and arouse interest in an intercultural approach, such as there are also other changes having an impact on internal social relations (minorities, etc.). In fact, all the players (institutions, associations, NGOs, etc.), confronted with certain mutations in the paradigms of social intervention, are sometimes led to rethink new integration and inclusive processes within the framework of socio-cultural animation. Social innovation necessarily passes through the emergence of incubator processes and appropriate tools, which socio-cultural animation and social intervention must invent to meet the challenges of living together in host societies.