Pushing Back on the Gentrification of Innovation
The other day, while chatting with a friend (he is a leader at a sector-based innovation space), I mentioned I am worried about the “gentrification of innovation”, and before I even had time to explain the idea, he clutched his chest and said “Ow, that hit me right in the heart!”
Me too.
So, what do I mean by the Gentrification of Innovation? It’s simple really. I mean that innovation has somehow become commonly thought of as something that is done in Post-Secondary Institutions, R&D divisions of corporations or in slick start-up incubators. The word conjures images of scientists, wunderkinds and tech geeks. Innovation has become a job that other people do, in places regular people don’t go. It has become something we wait for.
But is it really?
Innovation used to be something we did in our garages, home workshops and craft rooms. Although we likely didn’t call it innovation. People would solve everyday problems in ingenious ways, and the neighbours would gather around and give it their highest praise, which, depending on where you live, might sound like “that’s some smart!”
Somehow, that homemade brilliance has become unhooked from the innovation ecosystem. And it turns out there may be a simple explanation for that.
Citizen-based Innovation is Invisible
In a recent Freakonomics podcast, a place where a “Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything”, Steven Levitt investigated home-made innovation and revealed some startling insights. In an interview with M.I.T. innovation scholar Eric von Hippel, Levitt explored a paper that von Hippel has co-authored with Wellesley economist Daniel Sichel, which summarizes much of what the two have learned over the years. The paper is called “Household Innovation, R&D, and New Measures of Intangible Capital.”
Levitt says, “If you care even a little bit about innovation, or the economy, or how the world really works, it’s hard to not be seduced by the thesis of this paper. “Household R&D (or household innovation),” the authors write, “is an important source of innovation that has to date been largely overlooked … Indeed, it is not currently counted as investment in the literatures on household production and human capital.” In other words, home innovation is missing from economic measures like GDP.”
So, it’s not counted in the GDP. But is it prevalent enough to pay attention to?
Well, yes!
Von Hippel and Sichel calculate that Americans invest about $41 billion a year in household innovation. “This,” they write, “is about half of what producers spend in R&D to develop new products for consumers — a sizable fraction.”
Most interestingly, the researchers found that Users (referring to the household geniuses) often drive innovation in Producers, and not the other way around, citing the personal computer, mountain bikes and the artificial pancreas as examples. The difference is that the Users are primarily motivated to solve a personal problem, which may be shared with their community, but often not commercialized. Resulting in organizations like the OECD reinforcing the notion that “an innovation is not an innovation until it’s been placed on the market.” Which means that all User Innovation, User Hacks, and User Inventions (the innovation done in basements, garages and community-based makerspaces) is effectively invisible. Which means it’s not incented, supported or nurtured.
And while measuring the economic impact of Citizen Innovation is important, I am most interested in raising awareness and finding ways to foster these home-grown places of grass-roots brilliance.
“A population that believes that we all have the capacity for innovative thinking is foundational to prosperity and resilience. By recognizing, celebrating and nurturing citizen-based innovation we turn that capacity into a capability. ”
Recognizing and Nurturing the Full Innovation Eco-System
Before going any further I want to emphasize that drawing attention to Citizen Innovation does not mean that I am advocating for a full re-thinking of the current innovation eco-system. Over the course of my career I have contributed to the development of Sector-Based Research and Innovation Hubs, cheered the emergence of the sector-based Superclusters; and as a senior leader in government, launched the development of “Sand Boxes” which foster cross-disciplinary innovation and entrepreneurship in Nova Scotia’s Post-Secondary Innovation Spaces. I am an unabashed fan of start-up labs and incubators, the emergence of Innovation Districts, and the countless other efforts that bring business and institutions together. These are all important and necessary components of an innovation eco-system. I am advocating for the recognition of a third innovation domain; the Home-based and Community-based Innovation Domain and the Citizen Makerspaces which are already out there and would benefit from being acknowledged and nurtured.
Why is it important that we all think of ourselves as innovators?
A population that believes that we all have the capacity for innovative thinking is foundational to prosperity and resilience. By recognizing, celebrating and nurturing citizen-based innovation we turn that capacity into a capability. People who see themselves as innovators, also see themselves as life-long learners, leading to more resilience and hopefulness. Whether we are solving our own problems, solving our community’s problems, or potentially commercializing our solutions, Citizen Innovation is linked to empowerment. It is also contagious. Talking about ourselves as innovative, causes our children to believe they are innovative, which leads to more innovation.
Completing the Innovation Eco-System
Currently, models of the Innovation Eco-System look something like this:
Traditional Models of the Innovation Eco-System
This model reflects the traditional collection of players: entrepreneurs, investors, governments, universities and corporations. The model does not include citizen-based innovation which is happening in garages, home workshops and community makerspaces. Those places where everyday people solve problems in brilliant ways.
To advance the twin goals of innovation-driven entrepreneurship and inclusive economic growth, it is proposed that the conceptual framework for the Innovation Eco-system expand to include citizen-based innovation.
The Inclusive Innovation Ecosystem
Community-based Makerspaces are more important than ever because of where we live
More and more of our future innovators are moving into apartments, condos and other forms of communal living arrangements. Often, they do not have access to basements, garages or other spaces to tinker, putter and discover. And the truth is, that although Sector-Based and PSE-Based Innovation Hubs are wonderful, it would be rare that a regular citizen would wander into any of those spaces with a pair of welding gloves, copper wire and a great idea.
The 2016 Census Brief on Dwellings tells us that 46.4 % of people in Canada report that they do not live in a single detached home, with most living in apartments and condo buildings. Which is something to pay attention to because there are more people outside of the current innovation eco-system than in it, and almost half of them are living in places and spaces that don’t support home-based innovation.
What does a Citizen Makerspace look like anyway?
Well that depends on who created it. The Halifax Maker Space includes “a dedicated woodworking shop….a couple of “clean rooms” for electronics, teaching classes, sewing.…And….a “smelly room” for our laser cutter, painting and 3D printer!” Some community maker spaces focus on textile art and include looms and dying vats. Some spaces rally around bringing accessible innovation spaces to populations who have historically not been included in the sciences. Many are membership-based, others receive grants. A few have tool libraries. Some consist of a neighbour with a big garage and a generous spirit. They all include people who are driven to explore, make, invent and solve. In a future installment we will take a look at some of the amazing makerspaces in Nova Scotia and what they are up to.
Growing a Movement
Back to the Freakonomics podcast, Levitt also interviewed Edmund Phelps, a Nobel Prize winning economist who had this to say about traditional economic thinking:
“(the) idea was that when scientists and navigators discover something new, then countries with very zealous, eager entrepreneurs will work out the commercial applications of the scientific discovery. In that vision of the economy, nobody has got any really deep imagination. They might be good at figuring out how to make some gadget work. But they don’t have great imaginative powers. Only scientists have imagination. And I’m repelled by that idea. Horrified by it, really. And I like to insist — probably I go too far — but I like to insist that the great masses of people have imagination. And if they’re in the economy and in firms that are that are receptive to new ideas, many of them, much of the time, will have ideas of their own.”
Fortunately for us, we have masses of people with imagination and ideas of their own. By thinking beyond institutional and sector-based innovation, we begin to see the genius that is happening every day in makerspaces, communal workshops and garages everywhere. We would work hard to find ways to network the brilliance, encourage the grassroots, and give access to equipment, materials and knowledge.
Together, we can find ways to cause the movement to soar and grow a population that thinks innovation can happen anywhere. And, that my friends, “is some smart”.
Sandra McKenzie
Co-Founder
sandra@theforgeinstitute.ca
