The Conservation Authorities of Ontario, Canada as a Social Innovation: Applying the Vision as Social Construction Model for Describing Social Innovations

This research uses the Vision as Social Construction model to describe the development of Ontario's Conservation Authorities (CAs) as a historical case of social innovation. Beginning in the early 1900s, our analysis describes the transformation of CAs in Ontario from a simple, broadly defined ideal to a province-wide network of highly institutionalized, quasi-governmental organizations. The original catalytic vision brought people together around the broad idea for integrated resource management at the watershed scale. Multi-level government partnerships were established in the legitimated vision phase with the political authority and financial resources to pursue integrated watershed management. Then, emerging research and grassroots conservation alliances further articulated the vision. The assent or adoption of the Conservation Authorities Act characterized the enacted vision phase. Finally, the embedded vision phase clarified and constrained the roles and responsibilities of CAs for several decades until cycles of crises and opportunity typical of institutionalized organizations marked full entry into the routinized vision phase.