Building Bridges: Social inclusion problems as research and innovation issues.

The paper discusses why specific efforts aimed at establishing direct relationships between social inclusion problems and research and innovation projects are needed, what the main difficulties to achieve this are, and how can these difficulties be addressed. Its concrete anchorage comes from the successive calls for applications of a program implemented by the Research Council of the Universidad de la República, Uruguay, Research and Innovation Oriented to Social Inclusion”.

A critical appraisal of this experience and the main lessons learned are presented through the lens of an analytical tool: a circuit in which different types of actors interact, starting with the recognition that a social inclusion problem exists and ending with an effective solution for the problem.