Synonyms
Definition
Living labs are a research and design methodology applied by research institutes in cooperation with public and private partners for developing and testing innovations in co-creation with users in real-life settings.
Introduction
Living lab refers to both a methodology to experimentation and innovation and the physical spaces in which this is situated. The methodology helps tackling problems at hand by designing and testing of new solutions. “Living labs” or “living laboratories” were originally developed for technological innovation in the 1990s. Since the 2000s, living labs have been an emerging practice in the social sciences, focusing on social innovation. Surprisingly, public administration research has paid scant attention to living labs to date.
An obvious obstacle to application of a living lab approach in public administration research is the lack of conceptual and methodological clarity (cf....
References
Almirall E, Wareham J (2011) Living labs: arbiters of mid- and ground-level innovation. Tech Anal Strat Manag 23:87–102
Bason C (2016) Design for policy. Routledge, Oxon
Bergvall-Kåreborn B, Ståhlbröst A (2009) Living Lab: an open and citizen-centric approach for innovation. Int J Innov Reg Dev 1(4):356–370
Dekker R, Franco Contreras JS, Meijer AJ (2019) The living lab as a methodology for public administration research: a systematic literature review of its applications in the social sciences. Int J Public Adm, early view online
Følstad A (2008) Living labs for innovation and development of communication technology: A literature review. Electron J Virtual Organ Netw 10:99–131
McGann M, Blomkamp E, Lewis JM (2018) The rise of public sector innovation labs: experiments in design thinking for policy. Policy Sci 51(3):249–267
Perry JL (2012) How can we improve our science to generate more usable knowledge for public professionals? Public Adm Rev 72(4):479–482
Pollitt C (2017) Public administration research since 1980: slipping away from the real world? Int J Public Sect Manag 30(6–7):555–565
Sabel CF, Zeitlin J (2012) Experimentalist governance. In: Levi-Faur D (ed) The Oxford handbook of governance. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 169–183
Tõnurist P, Kattel R, Lember V (2017) Innovation labs in the public sector: what they are and what they do? Public Manag Rev 19(10):1455–1479
Van Geenhuizen M (2013) From ivory tower to living lab: accelerating the use of university knowledge. Environ Plann C Gov Policy 31(6):1115–1132
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2020 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this entry
Cite this entry
Dekker, R., Meijer, A. (2020). Living Lab. In: Farazmand, A. (eds) Global Encyclopedia of Public Administration, Public Policy, and Governance. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31816-5_3981-1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31816-5_3981-1
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-31816-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-31816-5
eBook Packages: Springer Reference Economics and FinanceReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences