Volume IV: Society, Culture, and Local Ecological Wisdom

Towards an Ecosystem Capacity Framework for Sustaining Islamic Social Innovation and Community Resilience

  • Ahmad Gemma Nurrahman UIN Sunan Gunung Djati Bandung, Indonesia

Keywords

Islamic social innovation; ecosystem capacity; community resilience; Islamic social finance; innovation ecosystem.

Abstract

Contemporary studies on Islamic social innovation primarily focus on the effectiveness of Islamic social finance instruments such as zakat, waqf, ṣadaqah, Islamic microfinance, and Islamic fintech in addressing socio-economic challenges. However, limited attention has been given to the ecosystem capacities that enable Islamic social innovation to emerge, evolve, and sustain its contribution over time. At the same time, innovation ecosystem scholarship emphasizes that innovation depends on interdependent actors, institutions, and support structures, while community resilience research highlights the adaptive, relational, and organizational capacities that sustain collective wellbeing under conditions of uncertainty and change. Yet these conversations have rarely been integrated into a single conceptual framework capable of explaining how Islamic social innovation can be sustained and how such continuity may contribute to community resilience. This study aims to develop an ecosystem capacity framework linking Islamic social innovation, ecosystem capacity, and community resilience. Methodologically, the paper is positioned as a conceptual study supported by an integrative literature review. It synthesizes insights from three adjacent domains of scholarship: (1) Islamic social finance and Islamic social innovation, (2) innovation ecosystems and social innovation ecosystems, and (3) community resilience. Through comparative conceptual synthesis, the study identifies five interrelated dimensions of ecosystem capacity that support the continuity of Islamic social innovation: institutional orchestration, resource integration, community embeddedness, adaptive learning, and ethical value alignment. The paper argues that Islamic social innovation should not be understood merely as a set of isolated welfare interventions or as a descriptive label attached to successful Islamic social-finance programs. Rather, it should be conceptualized as a continuous social process whose continuity depends on the capacity of the surrounding ecosystem to coordinate actors, combine resources, embed innovation in community life, support adaptive learning, and maintain ethical legitimacy over time. On this basis, community resilience is positioned not simply as a short-term program outcome, but as a longer-term collective condition that may be strengthened when Islamic social innovation becomes continuous, adaptive, and socially embedded. The study contributes by shifting the analytical focus from an instrument-centered perspective toward an ecosystem-capacity perspective, by clarifying the relationship between Islamic social finance and Islamic social innovation, and by proposing a conceptual bridge between Islamic social innovation and community resilience. The proposed framework provides a conceptual basis for assessing ecosystem readiness and for guiding future empirical research on how Muslim communities can sustain socially beneficial innovation and strengthen resilience in the face of evolving societal challenges.

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