WINIR 2023
This conference was initially planned in September 2020
Understanding when institutions change, how institutional innovations are propagated and how institutional evolution occurs, are key theoretical and empirical questions that have long shaped institutional research in economics, sociology, politics, history, geography, and other disciplines.
In today’s context of major challenges and transformations, these questions are arguably more pressing than ever. Ours is an era in which digital and other new technologies are recasting economic and political institutions, and social media are transforming personal relationships, reconfiguring civil society and altering the functioning of democracies. As the climate emergency furthermore threatens social stability and human survival, the global balance of power is also shifting, posing challenges to existing institutions set up to maintain world order.
Organised in collaboration with the University of Catania, the Eighth WINIR Conference explored these and related issues, and used the opportunity to enhance our theoretical understanding of how institutions evolve. The event took place at the late Baroque Monastero dei Benedettini, which currently houses the university’s Department of Humanities.
The conference opened on the afternoon of Wednesday 20 September and ended with a dinner at the beautiful Palazzo Manganelli on Friday 22 September, during which the 2023 Elinor Ostrom Prize and the Reviewer of the Year Award were announced. There was an optional tour to Mount Etna on Saturday 23 September.
The conference was preceded by a WINIR Young Scholars Workshop on Technology & Institutional Change on Tuesday 19 September.
Keynotes lectures were given by:
Eric Beinhocker (University of Oxford, UK)*
Geoffrey M. Hodgson (Loughborough University London, UK)
David Sloan Wilson (Binghamton University, USA)
* Eric Beinhocker’s keynote was unfortunately cancelled.
174 delegates from 34 countries attended this event.
The conference was organised by:
Maurizio Caserta (caserta@unict.it), Francesca Gagliardi (f.gagliardi@herts.ac.uk), David Gindis (david.gindis@warwick.ac.uk), Maria Olivella Rizza (mariaolivellarizza@gmail.com), Paolo Silvestri (paolo.silvestri@unict.it), Salvatore Spagano (spagano@unict.it), Massimiliano Vatiero (massimiliano.vatiero@usi.ch)
Generous support for the WINIR Conference on Institutional Innovation and Evolution is provided by