Social entrepreneurs’ use of spatial bricolage to create frugal innovation in a divided urban setting

Abstract

This study examines how social entrepreneurs mobilize resources to innovate in divided urban settings. Over a period of two years, we followed four social start-up entrepreneurs in the city of Cape Town, South Africa, characterized by some of the highest inequality levels in the world. We analyzed how social entrepreneurs navigate this urban divided context to mobilize resources from both resource-affluent and resource-constrained spaces to achieve innovation. Our findings suggest that these entrepreneurs use bridging and building approaches that cross over between spatial and digital spaces. Specifically, we discovered that social entrepreneurs mobilize resources using four distinct types of spaces and observed that they make use of these very spaces in their bricolage, hence expanding their portfolio of resources at hand. Based in our analysis, we build on the recently introduced concept of spatial bricolage to develop the notion of spatial awareness. By identifying a link between spatial awareness and frugal innovation, we contribute to the literature on social entrepreneurship and innovation in the African context.