Futurizing politics and the sustainability of real-world experiments: what role for innovation and exnovation in the German energy transition?

Abstract

The German energy transition towards more sustainable forms of energy production has been characterized as a large-scale or real-world experiment. Whereas experiments are open-ended processes set up explicitly to allow (or even generate) surprises, by contrast sustainability implies the pursuit of clearly defined, normative ends. Whereas much of the literature on system transformation builds on the concept of innovation, our hypothesis is that focusing on the “natural” flipside of innovation—called here “exnovation,” i.e., departing from unsustainable pathways—should also be seen as a valuable conceptual strategy for coping with the tension between the unavoidable indeterminacy resulting from unknown risks and the necessary amendment and redefinition of goals and rules. In this paper the German energy transition (Energiewende) is used to exemplify the recursive processes of experimentation that make it possible to accommodate surprise, and, thus, to conceptualize the unavoidable tension between innovation and the maintenance of older, unsustainable structures.

Supporting food systems transformation: The what, why, who, where and how of mission-oriented agricultural innovation systems

“…the capacity of an AIS to simultaneously manage existing networks and policies to support (incremental) innovation in current food systems, and create new networks and policies to overcome lock-in and support radical innovation and food systems transformation. Perhaps paradoxically, food systems transformation thus also implies deconstruction of existing AIS systems or ‘exnovation’, by for example phasing out research investments in a non-sustainable technology or practice ( David and Gross, 2019 ; Kivimaa and Kern, 2016 ; Krüger and Pellicer-Sifres, 2020 ). Beyond questioning environmental sustainability of production systems and supply chain set-up, exnovation may also include questioning prevalent economic paradigms (e.g.…”

Deliberate decline: An emerging frontier for the study and practice of decarbonization

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“…Martin David and Matthias Groß investigate processes of abandoning technologies (David and Gross 2019). They call these "exnovations"-the "flipside" or reverse of innovations and real-world experiments.…”