Quadruple Helix co-creation and cities: Behavioral and institutional changes in innovation capacities and cultures

Recent research has shown that civil society increasingly participates in innovation processes and outcomes. In collaborating with the research, private and public sectors, civil society organizations form part of what has been called the “Quadruple Helix” of innovation. The processes whereby these four helices co-innovate have been conceptualized under the term “co-creation”. This being a relatively new mode of innovation, the field of co-creation research has only recently begun to reveal the multiplicity of co-creation practices in existence. This budding research field can therefore benefit from significantly more empirical research on the diversity of co-creation experiences. Cities and city-regions deserve particular attention because they are the locus of many Quadruple Helix co-creation processes, due to the density and diversity of activities, capacities and urban problems they behold. In the present research, we contribute a significant base of evidence to show some of the potential benefits that (Quadruple Helix) co-creation could bring to city innovations. From the combined review of experiences in twenty-four city-focused co-creation projects, our study draws a typology of three types of co-creation outcomes which could benefit cities. We find these outcomes to be (i) holistic approaches, which enhance territorial resources and relocalize value chains, (ii) inter-helix mediations, which help forge trust, develop common innovation languages and build new data and knowledge communities, and (iii) enhanced prototyping and ideation capacities. We argue that these three types of co-creation outcomes can help foster behavioral and institutional changes in urban innovation cultures, which could in turn better align city innovations with societal needs.