Design in a time of crisis: Social innovation in product-service-systems interconnections between existing developing and developed economic models towards social innovation

This paper represents part of an on-going participatory action research project within a city affected by the socio-economic crisis. The focus of research is to explore the possibilities of transforming idle capacity of skilled professionals into job opportunities and de fining strategies for designing a new value creation system between members in a community. Through a deep analysis of an abundant collection of emerging practices in both developing and developed contexts, significant synthetic notions can be drawn from very diverse communities that illustrate the role of trust, responsibility and reputation in the design of collaborative exchange mechanisms. The existing complementary currency models serve as an inspiration and foundation for conducting the research in collaborative and creative spaces, using a bottom-up approach in designing a new service model with potential users in order to create value for that community. If a successful long-term and not only crisis-driven model could be designed, prototyped and globally replicated, based on debt-credit system and knowledge economy with enormous benefits of access to products and services, then it could enhance economic efficiency and distribute social capital while promoting new forms of entrepreneurship.