PUBLIC SECTOR INNOVATION Research Journey

4/1/2018

Joint Research Partnership
Politics for Tomorrow and Forum Northern European Politics
April till August 2018

Good Practices from Scandinavia

The Baltic Sea Region hosts some internationally recognised cases and tools fostering public sector innovation. The Swedish public administration is a front-runner in e-government. The Danish intra-ministerial innovation lab applying citizen-centred policy-making tools has spawned imitations all over the globe. Regional and national innovation funding authorities in Finland and Sweden tested successfully new competitive procurement methods. Local authorities in Northern Europe are experimenting like Google with new working models to create time slots for inspiration and outside the box thinking among their employees.

Incentives for Public Sector Innovation in Germany

Why do the Nordic countries innovate so successfully their public sectors? What can Germany learn? These were the initial questions of the joined research journey through Sweden, Finland and Denmark by the initiative `Politics for Tomorrow´ and the `Forum Northern European Politics´ in May and June 2018.

We found new sources of inspiration, best practices and dialogue partners on how to innovate the German public sector.

20 expert interviews were executed by Caroline Paulick-Thiel and Christin Skiera. Among others, among others we visited the Centre for Public Sector Innovation in Copenhagen, which measures the innovation capacities of the public sector with its Innovationbarometer. Another stop at the journey were made at VINNOVA - Sweden`s innovation agency – and at Aalto University in Finland, whose research and guidance on Design for Government provides human-centred design research for government and administration

Sharing Exploration and Learning

We gained many inspirations from the interviewed innovation pioneers for our work in Germany. Some Ideas and approaches have we published for you on our blog:

Measuring innovation in the public sector: a conversation with Lene Krogh Jeppesen, senior consultant at the Danish National Centre for Public Sector Innovation (COI)

Radikale Ideen fördern? Warum machen wir es nicht wie die Schweden?

Besser Regieren mit Design?! An der Aalto-Universität Helsinki lernen Studierende wie.