LIST OF WORKSHOPS

1.RESEARCH QUESTION

Public sector innovation is influenced by a complex interplay of organizational capacities, inter-organizational dynamics, and institutional environments. Understanding how these contexts enable or constrain innovation is crucial for explaining why some initiatives thrive while others stall or remain symbolic. This workshop brings together scholars exploring the conditions of innovation across organizational, meso-, and macro-levels, aiming to bridge perspectives from public management, policy studies, and governance research.

To guide submissions (pick any that fit your focus):

• How do organizational factors (e.g., leadership, culture, capacity, and routines) shape innovative activities, such as the initiation, implementation and sustainability of innovations within policy design, policy implementation or public service delivery?

• How do networks, partnerships, sectoral ecosystems, and professional communities influence the design, diffusion, scaling, and legitimacy of innovations?

•How do political institutions, economic conditions, administrative traditions, legal frameworks, and reform trajectories open or limit possibilities for innovation?

2.CONTEXT

Public sector organizations in several countries are under pressure due to economic, financial, security, social, health, and demographic challenges (Demircioglu & Vivona, 2020). At the same time, a new generation of technological innovations such as digital platforms and artificial intelligence offers possibilities to rethink long-standing practices (Guenduez et al., 2025). The combination of social challenges and rapidly advancing technologies has created a complex environment for policy design, policy implementation and public service delivery. Persistent cutbacks forces governments to make difficult choices between short-term service delivery and long-term reform. Health emergencies and security threats expose weaknesses in crisis management. Social fragmentation, demographic shifts, and migration increase the demand for more tailored, inclusive, and preventive policy and service design. At the same time, digital technologies offer ways to redesign service systems, improve policy foresight, and build trust through openness, yet their potential remains highly context dependent (Eom and Lee, 2022 ).

In many countries, innovation within policy and service delivery is constrained not by a lack of ideas but by the conditions under which those ideas must operate. Rigid administrative procedures, fragmented accountability structures, limited investment in digital infrastructure, and risk-averse cultures often prevent the experimentation of new ideas. In others, political turnover or unstable governance undermines continuity and learning that leads to repeated waves of reform. Conversely, some governments can turn contextual constraints into enablers and used crises or fiscal austerity as catalysts for innovation (Demircioglu & Audretsch, 2024)

The significance of context is therefore central to understand when and how innovation in public sector can emerge and survive. At the organizational level, agency is surrounded by organisational factors such as leadership, managerial autonomy, organisational routines and structures that determine whether new practices are developed and sustained. At the meso level, collaboration arrangements, citizen participation, advocacy coalitions and policy ecosystems mediate how ideas circulate and gain legitimacy across jurisdictions or service domains. At the macro level, socio-economic conditions, administrative traditions, political institutions, and reform trajectories define the boundaries of what is possible and the pace at which transformative or incremental change can occur.

The workshop takes this diversity of pressures and opportunities as its point of departure. By comparing how contexts at different or cross-levels shape the adoption, diffusion, and sustainability of innovation, the discussions will illuminate why some governments convert contextual constraints into productive change while others remain locked in established practices.

3.STATE OF THE ART

Research on innovation in the public sector has evolved from diffusion perspectives (Walker et al., 2011; Walker, 2014) toward a more nuanced understanding of how organizational and institutional contexts condition innovation processes (Borins, 2018; Cinar et al. 2024a). Foundational studies (Borins, 1998;2014; Hartley et al., 2013; Osborne & Brown, 2011) established that innovation in the public sector differs fundamentally from private sector models, as it unfolds within political, legal, and administrative constraints. Research has since revealed substantial variation in innovation types and trajectories across countries, reflecting the influence of political institutions, administrative traditions, and governance arrangements (Cinar et al., 2024a; 2024b; 2025; Suchitwarasan et al., 2024). This lead to a need to develop multi- level understanding linking the organizational, meso, and macro contexts of innovation considering the service logic in the public sector (Osborne et al., 2022).

At the organizational level, leadership, learning culture, managerial autonomy, and workforce composition play decisive roles in the initiation and sustainability of of public sector innovation (Damanpour et al., 2009). Additionally, Eempirical studies highlight that demographic factors, agency type, and internal routines shape the implementation of innovative practices (Demircioglu, 2020). This underscores the need to treat organizational context as a dynamic enabler or barrier rather than a static background variable. 

At the meso level, collaborative networks, professional communities, and sectoral ecosystems are central to how innovations are generated and disseminated. Network governance research (Klijn & Koppenjan, 2016; Ansell & Torfing, 2021) shows that the structure of inter-organizational ties, particularly their density, centrality, and coordination, shapes both creativity and implementation. Chen, Huang, and Zhang (2023) demonstrate that collaborative innovation depends on how actor–project networks are organized: centralized structures enhance coordination, whereas distributed ones foster diversity but risk fragmentation. Such dynamics reveal that governance design mediates whether collaboration becomes a driver or barrier to innovation. However, comparative evidence remains limited on how these mechanisms function across different contexts, where power asymmetries and resource dependencies often determine the balance between cooperation and constraint.

At the macro level, national contexts critically influence how innovation in the public sector emerges, evolves, and survive. Comparative studies show political, administrative and social contexts produce distinct innovation configurations in different countries (Cinar et al., 2024a,2024b; Suchitwarasan et al., 2024). Cinar et al., (2025) conducted a multi-level political context analysis and illustrates through the case of Ukraine, political contexts at international, national and sub-national levels are not static backdrops but contested arenas shaped by critical junctures, path dependency, and power redistribution. These dynamics reveal that macro-level conditions both constrain and enable innovation depending on how actors and advocacy coalitions interpret and respond to institutional legacies and critical junctures. Yet, comparative evidence remains limited on how such political and institutional dynamics interact with organizational and meso-level factors to shape enduring innovation trajectories. There is also a pressing need for more empirical evidence from the Global South and Asia, where diverse governance traditions, reform trajectories, and development priorities can yield valuable insights into how contextual factors drive or hinder public sector innovation.

4.HYPOTHESES:

Contextual Interdependence Hypothesis    – Innovation outcomes in the public sector are not determined by single-level conditions but by the interdependence between organizational, meso-level, and macro-level contexts. Alignment across these levels enhances the initiation, diffusion, and sustainability of innovation, particularly in systems where policy responsibilities and fiscal capacities are distributed across multiple tiers of government.

Governance Design Hypothesis – The design of collaborative and network governance structures mediates how contextual factors influence innovation. Arrangements that balance coordination and autonomy, across governmental, civic, and community-based actors, are more likely to transform contextual constraints into enablers of innovation, fostering legitimacy and inclusiveness in reform processes.

Contextual Divergence Hypothesis – The enabling or constraining effects of context vary across governance systems and regions. Evidence from diverse administrative and social environments can reveal how distinct institutional legacies, power structures, and developmental priorities generate different pathways for innovation.

5.PAPERS

The workshop welcomes empirical, theoretical, and methodological contributions that deepen understanding of how contextual conditions shape innovation in policy and public services. Submissions may focus on any single level—organizational, meso, or macro—or explore interactions across them. Comparative and multi-level analyses are particularly encouraged, as are studies that investigate how power, governance design, and institutional diversity influence innovation trajectories.

Empirical papers may include case studies, longitudinal analyses, or comparative research examining how political–institutional arrangements, collaborative networks, or organizational factors enable or constrain innovation. Theoretical papers may advance frameworks that integrate multi-level contexts, service logic, or power-sensitive perspectives into the study of public sector innovation. Methodological papers are invited to propose new ways of capturing contextual interdependence, such as through configurational analysis, process tracing, mixed methods, or text mining.

6.AGENDA

The workshop will be organized as an interactive and developmental forum, combining short paper presentations, structured discussions, and synthesis sessions designed to generate conceptual and empirical advances on how contextual conditions shape public sector innovation. The format will emphasize dialogue rather than formal presentations, enabling participants to engage across disciplinary and methodological boundaries.

The sessions will begin with thematic clusters aligned with the three contextual levels—organizational, meso, and macro—  followed by an integrative discussion on cross-level linkages. Each presenter will provide a concise 10-minute overview of their paper, followed by a focused discussion led by an assigned discussant and open debate with participants. A final plenary synthesis will bring together insights from all sessions to identify converging themes, conceptual frameworks, and methodological challenges for future research.

To support continuity and collaboration beyond the workshop, participants will be invited to contribute to a collective research agenda aimed at developing comparative and multi-level approaches to studying innovation in policy and service systems. The organizers plan to pursue a special issue on “Putting Public Sector Innovation in Context,”  depending on the quality and complementarity of accepted papers.

REFERENCES

Borins, S F. 2014. “The Persistence of Innovation in Government.” Brookings Institution Press with  Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation

Borins, S F. 2018. “Public Sector Innovation in a Context of Radical Populism.” Public Management Review 20 (12): 1858–1871. doi:10.1080/14719037.2018.1441430.

Cinar, E., Prodius, O., Sokoly, I., Ozcan, S., & Guenduez, A. A. (2025). The political context of public sector innovation: A critical interpretive synthesis on Ukraine. Research Policy, 54(10), 105322.

Cinar, E., Simms, C., Trott, P., & Demircioglu, M. A. (2024). Public sector innovation in context: A comparative study of innovation types. Public Management Review, 26(1), 265-292.

Cinar, E., Demircioglu, M. A., Acik, A. C., & Simms, C. (2024). Public sector innovation in a city state: exploring innovation types and national context in Singapore. Research Policy, 53(2), 104915.

Damanpour, F., Walker, R. M., & Avellaneda, C. N. (2009). Combinative effects of innovation types and organizational performance: A longitudinal study of service organizations. Journal of Management Studies, 46(4), 650-675.

 Demircioglu, M. A., & Vivona, R. (2021). Depoliticizing the European immigration debate: How to employ public sector innovation to integrate migrants. Research Policy, 50(2), 104150.

 Eom, S. J., & Lee, J. (2022). Digital government transformation in turbulent times: Responses, challenges, and future direction. Government Information Quarterly, 39(2), 101690.

Guenduez, A. A., Demircioglu, M. A., Mueller, E. M., & Cinar, E. (2025). Digital innovation strategies in the public sector. Research Policy, 54(8), 105274

Hartley J, Sørensen E and Torfing J. 2013. Collaborative Innovation: A Viable Alternative to Market Competition and Organizational Entrepreneurship. Public Admin Rev 73 (6): 821–830.  doi:10.1111/puar.12136.

Osborne, S. P., Powell, M., Cui, T., & Strokosch, K. (2022). Value creation in the public service ecosystem: An integrative framework. Public Administration Review, 82(4), 634-645.

Suchitwarasan, C., Cinar, E., Simms, C., & Kim, J. Y. (2024). Public sector innovation for sustainable development goals: A comparative study of innovation types in Thailand and Korea. Australian Journal of Public Administration, 83(4), 603-624.

Walker, R M. 2014. “Internal and External Antecedents of Process Innovation: A Review and Extension.” Public Management Review 16 (1, SI): 21–44. doi:10.1080/14719037.2013.771698.

Walker, RM, F Damanpour, and CA. Devece. 2011. ”Management Innovation and Organizational  Performance: The Mediating Effect of Performance Management.” Journal of Public  Administration Research and Theory 21 (2): 367–86.

Public sector innovation is deeply influenced by its context: from leadership and culture within organizations to collaboration across networks and the wider political and institutional environment. Despite decades of research, we still know too little about how and why certain innovations succeed, spread, or endure under specific contextual conditions. This workshop seeks to advance that conversation by bringing together scholars examining the organizational, meso-, and macro-level contexts of innovation in policy and public services.

We invite empirical, theoretical, and methodological papers that explore:

How leadership, learning, and organizational routines shape the initiation, implementation and sustainability of innovation.

How inter-organizational collaboration, networks, and professional communities influence diffusion and legitimacy of innovations

How political institutions, reform trajectories, and administrative traditions open or constrain opportunities for innovation

How power relations and governance design mediate innovation across multi-level systems.

Comparative, longitudinal, and cross-level analyses are particularly welcome, as are contributions that draw on under-researched regions and governance traditions. We encourage papers using qualitative, quantitative, mixed, or network-based methods to capture the complexity of context and power in innovation processes.

The workshop will feature interactive sessions organized by thematic clusters, followed by integrative discussions to identify emerging frameworks and collaborative research opportunities for a special issue on “Putting Public Sector Innovation in Context”.

ABSTRACT

Public sector innovation is increasingly recognized as a multi-level process shaped by organizational capabilities, inter-organizational dynamics, and political–institutional environments. Yet, despite growing attention to innovation in governance and public management, the role of context remains underexplored. Why do some public sector innovations thrive and scale, while others stall or remain symbolic? This workshop brings together scholars examining how different contextual layers (organizational, meso-, and macro-level) enable or constrain innovation in policy design, implementation, and service delivery.

The workshop situates PSI within complex governance systems where political authority, fiscal capacity, and accountability are distributed across multiple tiers of government. It invites theoretical, empirical, and methodological contributions that address how contextual interdependence, governance design, and power relations shape innovation trajectories. Key themes include how leadership and culture drive organizational change; how networks, partnerships, and professional communities support the diffusion and legitimacy of innovation; and how political institutions, administrative traditions, and reform trajectories define the boundaries of transformative change.

The session will be organized around thematic clusters corresponding to these three levels, followed by integrative discussions exploring cross-level linkages and power dynamics. By bridging insights from public management, policy studies, and institutional theory, the workshop aims to advance a comparative and power-sensitive understanding of innovation processes.

Participants will collaboratively identify emerging research priorities and methodological approaches to studying innovation in diverse governance contexts. The workshop will conclude with plans for a collective research agenda and the development of a special issue on “Putting Public Sector Innovation in Context”. In doing so, it seeks to connect global scholarship on PSI with new empirical frontiers, highlighting how multi-level governance, contextual asymmetries, and institutional diversity shape the possibilities for innovation in public service systems.

Emre Cinar is an Associate Professor at the University of Portsmouth. His research examines the types and process dynamics of public sector innovation, particularly how these are shaped by national contexts. In parallel, he also studies public entrepreneurship, exploring how entrepreneurial approaches can transform public services. His work has been published in leading journals, including Research Policy, Public Administration Review, Public Management Review, Governance, Small Business Economics, and the Journal of Technology Transfer.

Ali A. Gündüz is Assistant Professor of Digital Government and head of the Smart Government Lab at the University of St. Gallen. His research interests include digital government, digital transformation, public sector innovation, public policy, and technology adoption in public administration. He is a founding member and academic director of the international “Smart Government Akademie Bodensee,” which fosters knowledge exchange across nine cities and four universities in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

He has published in leading peer-reviewed journals such as Research Policy, Information Polity, Government Information Quarterly, Cities, and Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and Practice.

Mehmet Akif Demircioglu is an associate professor at the School of Public Policy and Administration at Carleton University in Canada and is affiliated with the National University of Singapore, the University of St. Gallen, Yonsei University, Indiana University, and Arizona State University. Most of his research focuses on innovation and entrepreneurship in the public sector. His first co-authored book, Public Sector Innovation (with David Audretsch), was published by Cambridge University Press in 2024.

Roberto Vivona is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of St. Gallen. His research examines leadership, innovation, and entrepreneurship in public organizations, with a focus on entrepreneurial leadership, bureaucratic entrepreneurship, and the impact of emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence on public sector leadership and organizational change. His work has appeared in journals like Research Policy, Small Business Economics, Public Management Review, Policy and Society, and the Review of Public Personnel Administration.