Beyond social acceptance in wicked problems

Abstract

Introducing emerging technologies is often seen as successful when social acceptance has been achieved. In the case of ‘wicked’ problems, social acceptance might be an insufficient quality criterion for the desirability of technological developments, because the focus on social acceptance can risk overlooking crucial ethical considerations. As such, this paper addresses the research question of whether technology governance frameworks can go beyond mere social acceptance issues and incorporate ethical considerations. By exploring three projects in which potable water reuse has been introduced, we have identified the limitations of common governance approaches to enhance social acceptance, including common participation and ‘Opening Up’ participation strategies. Our explorative study indicates that even an ideal participation strategy is insufficient to ensure ethical acceptability due to the lack of critical reflection on the problem this technology development is solving. If a given problem is too narrowly defined to artificially favor one solution over another, the exploration of alternative solutions will be hindered, potentially reinforcing unsustainable practices. To extend on existing approaches to participation, we propose a socio-ethical assessment framework that integrates social acceptance measures with ethical acceptability considerations to address these shortcomings. This framework emphasizes the importance of ethical participation, including the representation of marginalized voices, future generations, and non-human entities. It also urges to critically examine the framing of the problem itself, acknowledging the wicked nature of issues like water scarcity. By doing so, technology governance can become more responsible by aligning societal and ethical considerations.