The main goal of this paper is to elaborate social innovation and to emphasize the importance of civil society organisations in this field. Social innovations are new ideas that creatively respond to social needs and foster social progress. The fact that social innovations are indispensable in the major strategies and programs of the European Union points out that they are currently one of the main topics and solutions. They represent better solutions for social challenges and for crossing traditionally entrenched boundaries- organizational, sectoral and national. An invironment that is adequate for the development of social innovation implies openness, sharing knowledge and experience, cooperation and partnership between various structures. Important role in this goes to civil society organisations that have developed a number of solutions that are innovative examples of good practice, especially in Croatia. They are flexible structures close to the citizens, that can bring together various experts and have great innovation potential. Through social entrepreneurship and cooperation with other organizations and sectors, they can generate new solutions of great importance for society, to offer a framework for social change. The users (citizens) have an important role in the process of social innovation, and emphasis on local resources and potential of community is also inherent to the civil society organizations. Questions are often issues related to transparency, trust and regional distribution of civil society organisations, as well as the impact of innovative solutions to the quality of life. That encourages further work and analysis on this point.