Socially Responsible Innovation Between Corporate Social Responsibility and Social Entrepreneurship: Towards Holistic Integration of Stakeholder Management, Ethics, and Sustainable Development Goals

Facing the challenges of climate change, environmental degradation and
the need for sustainable development, society and business need a new and more responsible form of business innovation and entrepreneurship. Confronted with such a search for new forms of management, the theoretical scope of this conceptual article is to present a new concept of socially responsible innovation that combines corporate social responsibility and social entrepreneurship. The research question is “What is the relation between socially responsible innovation and other concepts like business ethics, good corporate citizenship, and sustainable development goals (SDGs)? The aim of the article is to develop a concept of innovation, social entrepreneurship and management that considers socially responsible innovation from the point of view of ethics and sustainable development goals. This concept of socially responsible innovation must be conceived as a holistic kind of management that contributes with a comprehensive integration of stakeholder management, ethics, and sustainable development goals in a value-based vision of the requirements for social innovation in business and management. Thus, a key take-away and learn-
ing point of the contribution of the article is the conceptualization of socially
responsible innovation as closely connected to environmental innovation and orientation towards implementation of sustainable development goals as essential for social innovation, management, and entrepreneurship.