Bringing communities together to tackle complex challenges

Broadening innovation to include social innovation is essential for a more balanced and forward-looking approach

Cultural heritage institutions (CHIs) – such as archives, libraries, museums, and heritage sites – have significant potential to act as drivers of innovation and connectors across sectors.

They achieve this by bringing together diverse communities, acting as translators between different forms of knowledge, and creating trusted spaces where societal challenges can be examined collectively.

Yet unlocking this potential requires a shift in how policy and funding systems operate. Innovation in heritage contexts rarely follows a linear or rapid trajectory. Instead, it unfolds gradually and relationally and rooted in care, sustained collaboration, and long-term community engagement. Public frameworks will need to better reflect these realities if the sector’s full contribution to society is to be realized.

HERE ARE EKIP´S MAIN FINDINGS:

Drawing on discussions and input from participants in the Policy Lab — further refined through a Community Review Workshop and complemented by background research — a set of recommendations has been developed to reinforce and expand the role of cultural heritage institutions in driving innovation. Among the most significant are:

● Develop a shared vision of innovation in heritage that values cultural, social, and civic outcomes alongside technological progress. Innovation in CHIs is not only about new tools or products, but about nurturing participation, inclusion, and long-term societal wellbeing.

● Foster capacity and motivation to innovate to ensure that people and institutions have the skills, resources, and confidence to experiment. Accessible funding, continuous learning opportunities, and sustainable career paths are essential to strengthen both individual and organizational capacity.

● Invest in networks and infrastructures for knowledge-sharing to support collective practices of innovation. Investing in digital and physical infrastructures, networks, and Living Labs will help CHIs exchange experiences, co-develop solutions, and build resilient communities of practice.

● Encourage and enable cross-sector collaboration to ensure CHIs are recognized as equal partners in innovation ecosystems. Cross-sector cooperation (linking culture with education, health, environment, and technology) should be supported through flexible frameworks, shared infrastructures, and incentives for joint projects.

● Support the scaling of experiments into innovation and replicable long-term initiatives. CHIs are involved in many innovative projects, but these rarely scale or continue once initial funding ends. Supporting the transition from one-off experiments to sustainable, replicable initiatives requires long-term and flexible support across funding and financing measures, innovation infrastructures, knowledge-sharing networks, and skills development.

Find out more!

Download the full report with policy recommendations in ekip’s Knowledge Bank.

ekip policy recommendation: Recognizing the importance of social and sustainable innovation, and the role of narrative creation.

When innovation is defined mainly in terms of technology and economic growth, major societal opportunities remain untapped. In this narrow frame, the cultural sector—especially cultural heritage—struggles for equal recognition. Broadening innovation to include social innovation is essential for a more balanced and forward-looking approach.

Johan Oomen, Head of Research and Heritage Services at Netherlands Institute for Sound & Vision, notes that social innovation should be far more explicitly recognized within European innovation policy. Yet this is not a new insight. The European Commission states in 2024 in Unleashing the Potential of the Cultural and Creative Industries, that “the key strategic orientations underline the role of social innovation, which goes beyond technical solutions and empowers societies to act on common challenges and propose concrete measures for implementing such innovation.”

As Johan Oomen points out, the heritage sector offers a useful precedent.

“The Faro Convention helped to find a common language between policymakers and public organizations. Adopted by individual Member States, and in some cases translated into dedicated implementation programs, it created shared commitment and practical follow-up. This model could serve as a blueprint for broader commitment within the cultural sector as a whole.”

He also stresses that recognition alone is insufficient.

“We need measurable ways to assess the success and impact of social innovation. In practice, that means evaluation frameworks must evolve to acknowledge outcomes like trust-building, inclusion, and long-term community wellbeing – not just audience numbers or short-term outputs. Establishing such evaluation tools will help validate and scale up innovative cultural practices by making their social benefits visible.”

Narrative creation is key to making social innovation visible and meaningful.

”Cultural and creative actors—particularly in media, publishing, and public spaces such as museums—play a crucial role in communicating examples of social and sustainable innovation. Recognizing and investing in this narrative capacity, he suggests, will significantly amplify the reach and societal acceptance of social innovation.”

ekip policy recommendation: Strengthening the research and innovation capacity of CHIs

Once cultural heritage institutions (CHIs) are recognized as innovation actors, the practical question follows: are they equipped to act as such?

“Innovation requires more than good intentions. It demands methods for co-creation, tools to gather evidence, and the organizational space to experiment – time, leadership support, and permission to iterate,” says Ragnar Siil, Director of Creativity Lab.

Many CHIs still lack these conditions.

Strengthening research and innovation capacity means making innovation part of everyday practice, not something triggered only by a project grant. It also requires that CHIs work confidently with universities, start-ups, municipalities, and community organizations, without being reduced to a venue or a dissemination partner.

”Capacity-building must include upskilling. CHIs need practical competences: facilitation, co-design, user research, service design, impact evaluation, and partnership management. Sometimes even a small percentage of staff hours dedicated to pilots can make a difference.”

Ragnar Siil also stresses that innovation also means stronger partnerships—where a museum or library acts as a true research partner, enabling community access and ethical knowledge exchange. Equally important is the adoption of participatory and sustainable business models. Participation is no longer just a program format, but part of value creation itself.

Project-based approaches often limit experimentation; more flexible support, microgrants, lighter reporting, and follow-on funding, would allow sustainable innovation to take root.

“Innovation is messy. You test something, learn it does not work as expected, adjust, and try again. Funding frameworks must reflect this reality.”