Assessment of Responsible Innovation

Abstract

Responsible innovation encourages innovators to work together with stakeholders during the research and innovation process, to better align the outcomes of innovation with the values, needs and expectations of society. Assessing the benefits and costs of responsible innovation is crucial for furthering the responsible conduct of science, technology and innovation. However, until now there has only been limited academic work on responsible innovation assessment. This book fills this lacuna.Assessment of Responsible Innovation: Methods and Practices presents tools for measuring, monitoring and reporting upon the responsible innovation process and the social, environmental, scientific and economic impacts of innovations. These tools help innovators to mitigate risk and to strengthen their strategic planning. This book aligns assessment tools and practices with the United Nations sustainable development goals (SDGs). The prospects as well as the limitations of various responsible innovation assessment approaches and tools are discussed, as well as their applicability in various industry contexts.The book brings together leading scholars in the field to present the most comprehensive review of responsible innovation tools. It articulates the importance of assessment and value creation, the different metrics and monitoring systems that can be deployed and the reporting mechanisms, including the importance of effective communication.

Translating tools and indicators in territorial RRI

“…One cannot defend expenditures of public money without somehow measuring or monitoring the effectiveness of the funded activities. Also scholars within a typical aRRI discourse have argued for the reasonableness of defining success criteria and performance indicators for RRI (Wickson and Carew, 2014;Yaghmaei and van den Poel, 2020). However, the tension in how to understand the content of RRI-summarized in the aRRI/pRRI-distinction-was reproduced in the debates on how to evaluate RRI, even within the attempts taken by DG RTD to clarify the issue.…”

How to drive corporate responsible innovation? A dual perspective from internal and external drivers of environmental protection enterprises

“…In addition, some scholars have researched and proposed a more comprehensive set of drivers for responsible corporate innovation. On the one hand, instrumental motives (e.g., profit-seeking), relational motives (e.g., voluntary compliance with laws and regulations under regulatory pressure, legitimacy craving) and moral motives (originating from companies and employee groups with high demands for moral and ethical norms) (Yaghmaei and Poel, 2021), or economic/competitive, institutional/relational and ethical motives (Chatfield et al, 2017b) are three important motivators that lead organizations to implement responsible innovation. On the other hand, the six factors, including regulatory framework, availability of financial resources, market orientation, customer knowledge, organizational structure and knowledge among innovation partners, will affect the degree of responsible innovation (Auer and Jarmai, 2018).…”

Responsible digital agri‐food innovation in Australian and New Zealand public research organisations

“…Corresponding activities then need to be practical, context specific, and perceived to add value by a range of actors, which can create gaps between the ideal and realised outcomes of RI (Macnaghten, 2020; Owen & Pansera, 2019; Owen et al., 2021; Wittrock et al., 2021). Given the hitherto limited practical application of comprehensive RI approaches in the digital agtech domain, their costs and benefits also require evaluation, including for public research organisations whose performance may be assessed against different public good and commercial criteria (McCampbell et al., 2022; Yaghmaei & van de Poel, 2020). Furthermore, the growing need to collaborate, and often co‐invest, with the private sector in the development and deployment of digital agtech raises questions around the ‘business case’ for RI (Eastwood et al., 2021; Gurzawska et al., 2017; Lubberink et al., 2017; Schönherr et al., 2020).…”

“…These dimensions are, as Macnaghten (2016, p. 6) notes, 'important characteristics of a more responsible vision of innovation, which can … be heuristically helpful for decision‐making on how to shape science and technology in line with societal values'. Despite the concept's growing popularity, turning RI aspirations into practice remains difficult for individual innovation projects and in terms of its wider institutionalisation (Jakobsen et al., 2019; Ludwig et al., 2019; Macnaghten, 2020; Wittrock et al., 2021; Yaghmaei & van de Poel, 2020).…”