The Role of Social Innovation in Climate Neutrality

Abstract Achieving climate-neutrality by 2030 is a significant challenge for cities involved in the EU 100 Climate-Neutral and Smart Cities Mission. A systemic approach, involving cross-sector collaboration, is essential for cities to identify emis-sion challenges, co-create actions, and implement solutions effectively. Social inno-vation can support this in meaningful ways and is a crucial component in achieving a just transition, offering a collaborative, inclusive, and people-centered approach to address complex challenges like climate-neutrality. It can support cities accel-erate the pace of change through innovative business models, policies, and processes that mobilize knowledge, experience, and resources. This chapter emphasizes social innovation’s role in three primary ways: as a collaborative process for multi-actor engagement, as platforms for action and inclusion, and as solutions to emerging needs resulting from the transition, taking evidence from the experiences thus far collected in the NetZeroCities project. It also offers directions for further research on how SI can support cities achieve climate-neutrality.