Research on the history of innovation: From the spiritual to the social

Despite the largely negative connotations that the concept of innovation carried until the twentieth century, a positive notion of innovation as spiritual renewal existed during the English Reformation. This chapter documents this moment, then looks at how innovation came to be seen as progressive social change. We argue that social innovation is mostly used and defined in relation or opposition to technological innovation and that it became much more future-oriented in contrast to the return to a previous state that characterized the positive notion of innovation at the Reformation.