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The purpose of this paper is three-fold. Firstly, through selected case studies, to provide an overview of how non-traditional data from digital public services were used as a source of knowledge for policymaking. Secondly, to argue for a design for policy approach to support the successful integration of non-traditional data into policymaking practice, thus supporting data-driven innovation for policymaking. Thirdly, to encourage a vision of the relation between data-driven innovation and public policy that considers policymaking outside the authoritative instrumental logic perspective.

A qualitative small-N case study analysis based on desk research data was developed to provide an overview of how data-centric public services could become a source of knowledge for policymaking. The analysis was based on an original theoretical-conceptual framework that merges the policy cycle model and the policy capacity framework.

This paper identifies three potential areas of contribution of a design for policy approach in a scenario of data-driven innovation for policymaking practice: the development of sensemaking and prefiguring activities to shape a shared rationale behind intra-/inter-organisational data sharing and data collaboratives; the realisation of collaborative experimentations for enhancing the systemic policy analytical capacity of a governing body, e.g. by integrating non-traditional data into new and trusted indicators for policy evaluation; and service design as approach for data-centric public services that connects policy decisions to the socio-technical context in which data are collected.

The small-N sample (four cases) selected is not representative of a broader population but isolates exemplary initiatives. Moreover, the analysis was based on secondary sources, limiting the assessment quality of the real use of non-traditional data for policymaking. This level of empirical understanding is considered sufficient for an explorative analysis that supports the original perspective proposed here. Future research will need to collect primary data about the potential and dynamics of how data from data-centric public services can inform policymaking and substantiate the proposed areas of a design for policy contribution with practical experimentations and cases.

This paper proposes a convergence, yet largely underexplored, between the two emerging perspectives on innovation in policymaking: data for policy and design for policy. This convergence helps to address the designing of data-driven innovations for policymaking, while considering pragmatic indications of socially acceptable practices in this space for practitioners.

The paper examines the moderating role of a purchasing function's absorptive capacity (AC) on the relationship between the use of electronic purchasing tools and category level purchasing performance. The authors argue that an e‐purchasing tool may not in itself positively influence performance unless combined with AC as a human interface to maximise its information and transactional improvement potential.

Survey data collected from 297 procurement executives of large companies in ten countries are analysed using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and hierarchical moderated regression.

The results demonstrate few significant direct effects of e‐purchasing tools on category performance. All performance measures studied are enhanced when dimensions of AC and their interactions with the e‐purchasing tools are added. Specifically, buyer competence, manager competence and communications climate have performance‐enhancing effects. In some cases, AC on its own appears to increase performance more than e‐tools.

This paper is the first to study the moderating effects of AC on the relationship between e‐purchasing tool usage and category performance. Its findings support the view that simply implementing technology does not lead to performance improvements, but that a human interface is required to maximise the information and transactional improvement potential of e‐purchasing tools.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an analytical overview of the academic output of eminent Italian scholars in the period from the end of the Second World War to the 1970s on the subject of corporate social responsibility (CSR).

Through the use of content analysis, possible logical and conceptual similarities between the theories of the scholars and present-day definition of CSR have been identified.

Concepts as ethical values and stakeholders included in definition of CSR come from the thinking of the Italian Economia Aziendale scholars, so that it is possible to get pioneering aspects in the light of the international debate on CSR today.

The originality of this paper derives from the fact that the theme of CSR has rarely been examined from a historical point of view and that the development of the theme in Italy has rarely been examined through analysis of the ideas of the leading Italian Economia Aziendale Scholars.