Developing Responsible Innovation Systems

Abstract

Technologies used in the energy sector, and many other sectors, are too complex for innovation by a single actor. Many influences from different types of actors are required to advance the technology, creating a collective innovation process. However, without the right accountability structures between different types of actors, unfavourable outcomes might emerge as the result of collective irresponsibility. Responsible Innovation is a theory that aims to improve the degree of responsibility of innovation processes, by incorporating the dimensions of anticipation, inclusion, reflexivity and responsiveness in the innovation process. However, to date this has been mostly applied to individual organisations. No framework exists that can assess and guide the responsibility of the collective innovation process of an entire system of actors. The objective of this exploratory research is to create a first version of a framework that can do such and perform an initial case study to generate insights for its future use.\
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From a literature review, responsible innovation in the collective innovation process was specified as the application of the intertwining dimensions of anticipation, reflexivity, inclusion and responsiveness in an evolutionary environment with actors of an innovation system that contains a constant group of institutions, while an open knowledge environment is present. Three concepts helped to define what a responsible innovation system is. Systems of Innovation helped to determine that innovation systems emerge on a regional level. The Quadruple Helix helped with the categorisation of the active institutions (Government, Industry, Academia, Civil Society) and the evolutionary characteristics of a system. Open Innovation helped to determine what an open knowledge environment entails in innovation. A responsible innovation system is then defined as an open knowledge network that allows for both emergence and evolution of the four institutions of the Quadruple Helix and the regional innovation system to develop, while the dimensions of anticipation, reflexivity, inclusion and responsiveness are mutually shared among the actors. A combined framework was constructed consisting of three elements: components, relations and functions. In the components, the actors are characterised according to the Quadruple Helix and the system is evaluated on its inclusion of all institutions. In the relations, two-way knowledge channels are revealed, with the help of Open Innovation. In the functions the three virtual spaces of Knowledge, Innovation and Consensus are created, each with its specific role of explaining interaction in the system. The Consensus Space will only form if the dimensions of anticipation, reflexivity and responsiveness are found in the activities within and among the actors of the system. Also a number of conditions for a responsible innovation system to emerge were set up.\
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The framework is subsequently applied to the case of the Indian innovation system of rural energy technology, after an institutional analysis showed that all of the institutions are present and active in the system. The framework was applied in three data collection methods, which covered different parts of the collective innovation process, explained as the exploration, construction and implementation phases. Several local event visits showed that in the exploration phase has arenas exist where responsibility prevails, but governmental policy feedback events are far from inclusive, anticipatory and responsive. Structured interviews with 17 organisations, predominantly actors from industry and civil society, reveal that in the construction phase, inclusion of governmental and academic partners is limited. Also two-way communication channels were often absent, preventing alignment of goals and values through anticipation, reflexivity and responsiveness in the Consensus Space. From the actor analysis, CLEAN appeared to be the most central actor of the system. Semi-structured interviews with end-users showed that full inclusion is also absent in the implementation phase, while also responsiveness should be increased. The framework appeared to succeed in revealing the important interactions of an innovation system, because it became clear that government and academic actors are not sufficiently included in the innovation activities of the industry and civil society institutions, further preventing alignment of objectives in order to achieve responsible innovations. Evaluation of the conditions showed that these indeed left some gaps to be filled. Overall, the results show that actors in the system should perform more co-creation activities between institutions.\
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It should be noted that a validation of the results generated several limitations to the research and the framework, leading to recommendations for further research. It was shown that due to multiple realities in the intersections of an innovation system, the results of the framework can not always be generalised and needs to have input from central actors of all institutions. Also, the way a component or relation contributes to anticipation, reflexivity and responsiveness should be revised, because the framework fails to capture gradations in such contribution. Next to that, the oversimplification of the characterisation of actors might prevent a good evaluation of the system. Furthermore, there appears to be a tension between effectiveness of the activities of organisations and responsibility, due to the large amount of resources that are needed. This means that to become responsible might take more time and effort, making the activities less efficient in reaching the objectives. This would make the framework more usable for the exploration phase, opposed to the other two phases, because in this phase the goal is generally to have a broad perspective, while in the construction and implementation phases a certain focus is required and intervention of many stakeholders might trouble the process. Also, the conditions of the framework should be further examined and enhanced, possibly with a role for CLEAN as the central actor. Lastly, in line with global issues, the framework could be extended with the Quintuple Helix with the environment as additional institution, so that innovation systems might also be in line with ecological constraints. Also, among some other operational limitations, the research failed to question all institutions, creating a potential bias in the results.

More research is needed to validate the framework and the results, both within and outside of India. Still, a first exploratory step has been taken towards a framework for assessing and guiding towards responsible innovation systems.