Contextuality and Co-Creation Matter: A Qualitative Case Study Comparison of Living Lab Concepts in Urban Research

Abstract

IntroductionLiving labs have become an established tool for testing and developing new products or services with users in real-life environments (see Leminen et al., 2012;Veeckman et al., 2013). They were also introduced into urban research agendas by the Finnish European Union Presidency in 2006. Since then, research programmes have been using living labs as a methodological tool to connect research to public and private stakeholders with citizens in order to co-create and co-design products and services to improve the quality of life in cities (Edwards-Schachter et al., 2012;Pascu & Van Lieshout, 2009). Although projects and approaches to urban living labs differ widely, the benefits lie in user integration and the use of results to develop need-based products and services that can be implemented into the living environments of citizens. As Schuurman (2015) points out, the key components of living labs are user involvement and user co-creation. Contrary to the predominately technology-centred living lab concepts, urban living labs add not only the urban component to the conceptual design, but also a range of topics including societal, political, and technological questions. As a result, a more nuanced understanding of living lab design in diverging research contexts is necessary to provide adequate frameworks in diverging fields of research.This article extends the existing knowledge on living lab approaches by considering living labs as a tool to create a contextualized methodology within urban research. We introduce and use a typology to compare three different types and concepts of urban living labs from ongoing research projects by descriptive dimensions Innovation development is key to transforming a product-based economy into an innovative service economy by integrating users as co-creators in real-life environments. User co-creation and user involvement are key elements in living labs. Urban living labs add not only the urban component to the conceptual design, but also societal, political, and technological questions. Fields of analysis in urban research relate to socio-spatial environment, living together, and urban policies. The leading question of this article is: to what extent can urban living labs be used as an instrument to support these fields of investigation? Comparing three different approaches for urban living labs, ranging from socially-centred to more technology-centred, we offer a more nuanced understanding of urban living lab design in diverging research contexts. All three case studies manage to go beyond testing and improving new products, which is normally the aim of existing living labs, by embedding innovation in appropriate social, structural, and institutional frameworks, and targeting civil society involvement. The community benefits from this case study comparison because it contextualizes living labs as research methodology to be applied in future urban research projects. My greatest challenge has been to

The Defining Characteristics of Urban Living Labs

“…Learning and experimenting (McCormick, 2016;Pallot & Pawar, 2012;Schaub, 2016;Vincent, 2016) refers to the production and exchange of knowledge among participants (ASC, 2016;Bijsterveldt, 2016;Friedrich et al, 2013;Heijden, 2016;McCormick, 2016;Pallot & Pawar, 2012). Thus, the aim is not only to learn from the experiences from the particular lab environment, but also to replicate the innovation elsewhere, in real life, or to further future innovation (ASC, 2016;Bijsterveldt, 2016;Franz et al, 2015;Juujärvi & Lund, 2016). It is this emphasis on formalized knowledge production -lessons that are formulated and that can be disseminated -that sets living labs apart from other policy experiments and niches of innovation (Evans & Karvonen, 2014).…”

“…Living labs should comprise the development of a product, which can be all sorts of artifacts, including process innovations, and not only, for example, testing or implementation (Budweg et al, 2011;Coenen et al, 2014;Feurstein et al, 2008;Gray et al, 2014;Leminen, 2015;Schaffers et al, 2007;Tang & Hämäläinen, 2012). A key element in this development process is co-creation (Bijsterveldt, 2016;ENoLL, 2016;Feurstein et al, 2008;Franz et al, 2015;Gómez-Barroso et al, 2009;Heijden, 2016;Schaub, 2016). The essence of a living lab is that the solution is sought together with the user, rather than just applying a fixed solution and involving the user only for testing.…”

“…www.timreview.ca Given these alleged benefits, it is no surprise that, in recent years, the "urban living lab" has become a popular development approach on which hope is fixed to accelerate the generation and adoption of sustainable innovations in the urban system in the light of the urban sustainability transition. However, evaluative accounts of urban living labs in practice indicate that many of these experience difficulty in achieving the full benefits of this approach (Bulkeley & Castán Broto, 2013;Franz et al, 2015;Karré et al, 2015;. These authors point to a lack of methodological deepening of the living lab approach as a reason for such difficulties.…”

“I Stood By and Watched”: An Autoethnography of Stakeholder Participation in a Living Lab

“…Other examples highlight issues regarding end-user participation. In a qualitative case study comparison, Franz et al (2015) demonstrated a deficit in the traditional co-creation methodology, as the project team was responsible for most decisions about defining the problem, as well as selecting stakeholders and methods. Hyysalo and Hakkarainen (2014) show that collaboration between designers and users is often a hard and frustrating process.…”

Revisión sistemática del concepto de laboratorios vivos

“…Da la oportunidad de integrar ideas y prototipos de productos complejos dentro de un entorno que se parece mucho al contexto del producto en la vida real". Franz, Tausz & Thiel (2015): Contextuality and Co-creation Matter: A qualitative case study comparison on Living Lab concepts in urban research "Aunque los proyectos y enfoques de los Laboratorios Vivos difieren ampliamente, los beneficios radican en la integración del usuario y el uso de los resultados para desarrollar productos y servicios basados en las necesidades que se pueden implementar en los entornos de vida de los ciudadanos" Bergvall-Kåreborn, Eriksson, & Ståhlbröst (2015): Places and Spaces within Living Labs "Un Laboratorio Vivo es un entorno de innovación centrado en el usuario basado en la práctica e investigación diaria, con un enfoque que facilita la influencia del usuario en procesos de innovación abiertos y distribuidos, involucrando a todos los socios relevantes en contextos de la vida real, con el objetivo de crear valores sostenibles". Rits, Schuurman & Ballon (2015): Exploring the Benefits of Integrating Business Model Research within Living Lab Projects "La definición de Laboratorio Vivo sigue siendo una discusión no resuelta y en gran parte semántica.…”