https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8166-5888
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ABSTRACT
Our paper reprises the concept deep institutionalisation of responsible innovation considering why and how it matters to add the adjective ‘deep’. We distinguish de facto responsible research and innovation (rri) as the study of how actors frame and govern responsibility through existing practices (‘in the wild’) and investigate how these practices become institutionalised. We present a diagnostic framework comprising four axes which facilitates the critical and reflexive empirical interrogation of deep institutionalisation (DI). Deploying the framework, the paper explores DI in two very different cases: an inter-organisational case of Participatory Guarantee Systems (PGS) in Bolivia; and an intra-organisational case of societal engagement within TNO in the Netherlands. Controversially perhaps, we argue that normative features of responsibility are enacted, amplified and potentially institutionalised through markets. Both cases show how particular market features become recursively qualified through the four mutually reinforcing processes that comprise deep institutionalisation: (i) historical contingency; (ii) institutional amplification; (iii) systemic overflowing; and (iv)multi-level alignment.
Acknowledgements
The research was conducted partly in two projects: Res-AGorA (Responsible Research and Innovation in a Distributed Anticipatory Governance Frame: A Constructive Socio-Normative Approach; European Commission Project No 321427; 2013–2016) and JERRI (Joining Efforts for Responsible Research and Innovation; European Commission Project No 709747; 2016–2019). With thanks to Professor Philippe Laredo for many discussions towards the development of the ‘6 Grand Narratives’.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 The Responsible Research and Innovation in a Distributed Anticipatory Governance Frame (Res-AGorA) project received funding (2013–2016) from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement no 321427 (http://Res-AGorA.eu/).
3 The Joining Efforts for Responsible Research and Innovation (JERRI) project received funding (2016–2019) from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Grant Agreement No. 709747 (https://www.jerri-project.eu/jerri/index.php).
4 TNO is the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research. It is a Research and Technology Organisation (RTO) that counted 3,400 employees in 2023.
5 The five keys are: public engagement, research ethics, gender equality, science education, and the open access in scientific publications. The sixth key of “governance” was dropped.
8 A chronology and timeline of the specific steps of the longitudinal multi-method action research in the PGS (from 2013 to 2021) and TNO (from 2016 to 2019) cases is presented in Table A1, Appendix 1. The table details the mix of methods employed in both cases, comprising analysis of policy documents and reports, convening and participating in workshops, conducting interviews, and engaging in participant-observation at meetings and conferences.
10 Movimiento Agroecológico de América Latina y el Caribe (MAELA), International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM), German Technical Cooperation (GIZ), Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
11 https://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBR0003906/2022-05-01. Articles 4 and 5 outline TNO’s objectives: to conduct applied scientific research and to contribute to the application of research findings to serve the common good. TNO’s mission is to ‘strengthen the competitiveness of companies and the welfare of society in a sustainable way’ (www.tno.nl).
12 https://www.tno.nl/en/about-tno/organisation/. These Units were further re-organized at the end of 2022; they are now: Mobility and Built Environment (merger of 1 and 9); Defence, Safety and Security (same as 3); Energy and Materials Transition (merger of 2 and 4); Healthy Living and Work (same as 5); High-Tech Industry (mainly 6); and ICT, Strategy and Policy (merger of 7 and 8).
13 Art. 15(4) TNO Law; one of TNO’s obligations (in public law) is to have Strategy Advisory Councils (SACs).
14 TNO Annual Report 2020, pp. 42–43 (https://www.tno.nl/media/18208/tno_annual_report_2020.pdf).
17 IFOAM PGS Definition; http://www.ifoam.org/en/valuechain/participatory-guarantee-systems-pgs.
18 Loconto (2013) Linking responsible research and innovation on the farm: the case of participatory guarantee systems (http://Res-AGorA.eu/assets/IFRIS-2-Stage-2.pdf).
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Sally Randles
Sally Randles is Professor of Sustainability and Innovation, Faculty of Business and Law, Manchester Metropolitan University.
Allison Loconto
Allison Loconto is Senior Research Scientist at the French National Institute for Research on Agriculture, Food and Environment (INRAE) and Deputy Director of the Interdisciplinary Laboratory for Science, Innovation and Society (LISIS).
Marc Steen
Marc Steen is Senior Research Scientist at TNO (the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research).
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