Introduction or preface

Social innovation practices have attracted increasing attention in recent years. Especially in cities and urban areas, they have represented both a response to emerging social needs seldom addressed by declining forms of state welfare support and a platform for innovating inherited understandings of collective action and activism in cities. The authors argue that a regional perspective is needed when looking at such practices in southern European urban contexts. By looking at a variety of cases in Italian cities, this section aims to illuminate how key dimensions such as local governance models and legacies, social inclusiveness patterns, the relationship with formal and informal economies and the role of specific socio-spatial structures contribute to the shaping of social innovation practices in Italian cities.