Written by Maria Cruz Diaz de Teran Velasco,

Coordinator of REDWINN (Iberoamerican Network for Innovation and training to Strengthen Women’s Impact in Innovation Ecosystems).

What is innovation? The concept itself is constantly evolving. Today, it is common to turn to the Oslo Manual, produced by the OECD and Eurostat, to talk about and measure innovation. The four editions of this guide, published between 1992 and 2018, show how innovation has focused on diverse fields over time, such as the market, technology or the social sphere. However, they coincide in that those who carry them out are people.

If we follow the definition of ‘innovate’ given in the Royal Academy Dictionary, we can affirm that innovation is associated with creative, inspired people, willing to take risks to solve a problem efficiently. Although it is from the 1990s onwards that the term innovation gained relevance, the truth is that innovators have always existed. In ancient times, Greek dialects, Sumerian cuneiform writing and Egyptian hieroglyphs were major innovations. In the Middle Ages, innovations concentrated mainly on ways of managing traditional measures of production and economic growth. Think of crop rotation or the printing press.

“Their contributions represented a new way of approaching the usual problems.”

In the Contemporary Age, social innovations have a place of their own. According to the European Commission’s Guide to Social Innovation, social innovation is capable of responding to social demands, improving people’s well-being. One example is the incorporation of women into university studies in the 20th century. Their presence at university meant a change in people’s mentality, i.e., an innovative approach. Along with the possibility of developing an academic career, there were those who opted for the free exercise of their profession. In this context, their contributions represented a new way of approaching the usual problems, giving rise to new and innovative solutions.

If there is an area in which innovations are inserted in the social sphere, it is the legal world. Three pioneers in Spanish law, Clara Campoamor (1888-1972) , Mercedes Formica (1916-2002) and María Telo (1915-2014), faced problems that had existed for centuries and introduced changes with the aim of eradicating them in a sustainable way in space and time, creating value for society, so it can be said that they were true social innovators.

Campoamor was in favor of a series of women’s rights. She defended the right to vote for women and the inclusion of the right to universal suffrage in the Constitution (Article 34). She also advocated the principle of non-discrimination on the basis of sex (Article 25) and the access of all Spaniards, without distinction of sex, to public employment and public positions, according to their merit and ability (Article 40).

Formica, through her writings, developed a great work in denouncing the unequal treatment suffered by women in the workplace and demanded a change in access to jobs and official positions (change that was achieved, in a first step, in 1961 and, fully, in 1966). In 1953 she initiated a campaign to modify the Civil Code. The change was achieved in 1958: women could be guardians and witnesses in wills. Also, the married woman who remarried retained parental authority over the children born in the first marriage, while the woman in the process of separation and presumed innocent spouse should not leave the home, now considered “family home” (as opposed to the previous “husband’s home”), nor could she be deposited by her husband during the separation process. Moreover, during this time she was not deprived of custody of the children.

“They were able to identify social needs that were not being met.”

In economic matters, the reform was less extensive, since marital leave was maintained. Its end came with the entry of women jurists in the General Codification Commission (GCC). After an intense epistolary exchange, in 1972 María Telo received from the Minister of Justice the notification of the possibility of incorporating women into the CGC. The work of the Special Section of the CGC bore its first fruit with Law 14/1975 of May 2, 1975. The approval of this law replaced the duty of obedience that married women had towards their husbands with the duty of spouses to respect and protect each other, always acting in the interest of the family. It also abolished the requirement of marital license that was required for anything significant and left Spanish married women in an anachronistic disenfranchisement.

Nowadays, it is common to relate innovation in the legal field with aspects such as the processing of complex databases(big data), which provide law firms with the possibility of analyzing and categorizing millions of regulations, laws and other legal documents in record time, or the use ofsmart contracts that use blockchain technology to automatically execute the terms and conditions established in such agreements. However, there is no doubt that both Campoamor and Formica and Telo knew how to identify unmet social needs and provided effective and stable solutions over time. It is therefore interesting to add perspectives in innovation.

Maria Cruz Diaz Diaz de Teran Velasco

The views expressed by the authors of videos, academic or non-academic articles, blogs, academic books or essays (“the material”) are those of their author(s); they do not in any way bind the members of the Global Wo.Men Hub, who, between them, do not necessarily think the same. By sponsoring the publication of this material, the Global Wo.Men Hub believes that it contributes to useful social debates. Therefore, material may be published in response to others.