A meta-analysis and explanation of innovation processes through the outline of Social Fields Theory

Modern reports and studies on innovation processes offer a variety of possibilities for measuring and explaining innovation processes. These reports have a comparable model for operationalization of the concept of innovation, as they include both quantitative and qualitative indicators. The complexity of the modern societies and the interaction of actors, determines also to look for alternative models, which would embrace this complexity. We do not question these approaches and their reliability toward measuring the innovation performance, but rather to focus on alternative operationalization and explanation. Thus, through the embedment of the Social Fields Theory in the context of innovation processes it would offer various possibilities of applying a more coherent operationalization toward the explaining innovation. This article will display a critical assessment of a number of studies and projects, which used this approach in order to explain the innovation, but also using different methodologies that incorporate innovation processes and the theory of Social Fields.