Suchergebnisse

"The Handbook of Sustainable Innovation maps the multiple lineages of research and understanding that constitute academic work on how technological change relates to sustainable practices of production and consumption. Leading academics contribute by mapping the general evolution of this academic field, our understanding of sustainable innovation at the firm, user, and systems level, the governance of sustainable innovation, and the methodological approaches used. The Handbook explores the distinctiveness of sustainable innovation and concludes with suggestions for generating future research avenues that exploit the current diversity of work while seeking increased systemic insight. This unique and original book will have a broad appeal among scholars, researchers and advanced students interested in innovation, environmental studies and technological transitions"--

Contents: 1. An Introduction: Mapping the field(s) of sustainable innovation / Frank Boons and Andrew McMeekin -- Part I: Visions of sustainable innovation -- 2. How does innovation sustain 'sustainable innovation'? / Benoît Godin and Gérald Gaglio -- 3. Innovation in the circular and the performance economy / Walter R. Stahel -- Part II: Sustainable innovation at the firm level -- 4. Determinants of eco-innovation at the firm level / Jens Horbach -- 5. Taxonomy and dimensions of eco-innovation from a resource-based perspective / Javier Carrillo-Hermosilla, Christoph P. Kiefer and Pablo del Río -- 6. Strategies and drivers of sustainable business model innovation / Florian Lüdeke-Freund, Stefan Schaltegger and Krzysztof Dembek -- 7. Sustainable innovation in business models: Celebrated but not interrogated / Oksana Mont, Katherine Whalen and Julia Nussholz -- Part III: Governance and policy of sustainable innovation -- 8. Reviewing responsible research and innovation: Lessons for a sustainable innovation research agenda? / Eefje Cuppen, Elisabeth van de Grift and Udo Pesch -- 9. Policy mixes for sustainable innovation: Conceptual considerations and empirical insights / Karoline S. Rogge -- 10. Firms, institutions and politics: The role of corporate political activity in sustainable innovation / Jonatan Pinkse -- Part IV: Sustainable innovation as systems change -- 11. Technological innovation systems: A review of recent findings and suggestions for future research / Anna Bergek -- 12. An institutional perspective on sustainability transitions / Lea Fuenfschilling -- Part V: Users and practices of sustainable innovation -- 13. The role of users in sustainable innovation / Geert Verbong, Bram Verhees and Anna Wieczorek -- 14. Sustainable innovation, consumption and everyday life / Jo Mylan -- Part VI: Sites and domains of sustainable innovation -- 15. Sustainable innovation as a challenge for urban governance / Harald Rohracher and Michael Ornetzeder -- 16. Innovation and ecological impact: The case of automobility / Peter Wells -- Part VII: Research methods for sustainable innovation -- 17. Sustainable innovation research methods / Floortje Alkemade -- 18. Advances in modelling sustainable innovation: From technology bias to system theories and behavioural dynamics / Jonathan Köhler -- 19 the impact of circular economy / Dionne Ewen, Karen Maas and Helen Toxopeus -- 20. Conclusion / Frank Boons and Andrew McMeekin -- Index.

From SAGE Publishing via Jisc Publications Router ; History: epub 2021-03-16 ; Publication status: Published ; Funder: Economic and Social Research Council; FundRef: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100000269; Grant(s): ES/T015055/1 ; In this paper, we take the concept of 'new urban spaces' as our jumping off point to engage with the efforts of Alphabet/Google affiliate Sidewalk Labs to cultivate a new integrated digital and infrastructural urban space on the Toronto waterfront. We interrogate the process and politics of imagining this new, digital urban space as an urban socio-technical imaginary. The paper critically examines the central role of 'big tech' in producing the urban socio-technical imaginary not as a snapshot but, rather, as a 'process of becoming'. This processual focus on the role of big tech allows us to develop three interrelated analytical contributions. First, we generate in-depth understanding of the proxy politics of urban socio-technical imaginaries in constituting new digital urban spaces. Second, we argue that an urban socio-technical imaginary was used as a Trojan horse to promote private experimentation with urban governance. Third, we demonstrate attempts to imagine a global beachhead via 'the global model' of a new digital urban space predicated on the digital control of integrated urban infrastructure systems.

This paper discusses the re-emergence of biofuel innovation systems in the USA and Brazil. We develop a view of eco-innovation systems as emerging and evolving to solve ecological problems. We then consider the role of the State as a core actor in the mobilization of innovation systems and discuss how specific institutional arrangements, political contexts and technological competencies influence how problems are framed. We argue that the way ecological problems are framed and articulated has a significant impact on the direction and momentum of system evolution. Finally, we draw attention to the dynamic and evolving characteristics of eco-innovation systems that result from recurrent re-specifications of the problem in focus, as partial solutions emerge and as the political and economic dimensions are reframed. © 2011 Taylor & Francis.

This paper discusses the re-emergence of biofuel innovation systems in the United States and Brazil. We argue that innovation systems emerge and evolve to solve a problem, and that the way the problem is framed and articulated has a significant impact on the direction and momentum of this evolution. Additionally, innovation sequences occur with a recurrent pattern of changing problems and innovative solutions. We consider the role of the State as a core actor in the mobilisation of innovation systems and discuss how specific institutional arrangements, political contexts and technological competencies influence how problems are framed. We find that role of the State varies across time as well as across different geographical regions. Finally, we suggest that as ecological problems intensify we might expect to see an increase in State intervention in innovation systems.

This book addresses current controversial debates about food quality. What is it that makes people decide that food is of good, or alternatively of dubious, 'quality'? How food is produced, how it is prepared, how it tastes and in what circumstances it is consumed are all dimensions of its quality. Chapters address a number of intriguing questions: how do people make judgements about taste?; how do such judgements come to be shared by groups or people?; what social and organisational processes result in foods being certified as of decent or proper quality?; how has dissatisfaction with the food system been expressed?; what alternatives are thought to be possible? The book shows that there are many different answers to such questions because there are many different attributes of food about which judgements may be made. The complexity and the significance of the evaluations of the foods we eat are analysed from a variety of perspectives, by sociologists, economists, geographers and anthropologists. The first part of the book focuses on theoretical and conceptual issues, the second part considers processes of formal and informal regulation, while the third part examines social and political responses to industrialised food production and mass consumption. Qualities of food will be of interest to researchers and students in all the social science disciplines that are concerned with food, whether marketing, sociology, cultural studies, anthropology, human nutrition or economics.

This essay examines the issues that the ongoing revolution in biosciences and biotechnology pose to social science. A convenient frame for examining these issues is the framework of "thematic priorities" established by the British funding agency for social science, the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). These "thematic priorities" are used to identify major challenges and opportunities that currently confront social research. Though not constructed as part of a futures exercise, this framework proved useful for organising the issues that were generated from literature review and brainstorming, provided a stimulus to identify new issues, and was a useful filter for presenting results to the ESRC, which sponsored the study. This range of issues does not just call for interaction between natural and social scientists: there is also need for the sharing of knowledge and perspectives across diverse fields of social science. In order to help inform future research priorities, we need to move beyond the perspectives of single disciplines, and make sure that we do not simply emphasise those areas where social scientists have already been actively engaged. The study concludes clearly that there is a huge range of vital questions that social science needs to address if we are to understand, let alone bring more social intelligence to bear on shaping, the scientific and technological revolutions that are under way, and their broader social implications.

The structure and regulation of consumption and demand has recently become of great interest to sociologists and economists alike, and at the same time there is growing interest in trying to understand the patterns and drivers of technological innovation. This book brings together a range of sociologists and economists to study the role of demand and consumption in the innovative process. The book starts with a broad conceptual overview of ways that the sociological and economics literatures address issues of innovation, demand and consumption. It goes on to offer different approaches to the economics of demand and innovation through an evolutionary framework, before reviewing how consumption fits into evolutionary models of economic development. Food consumption is then looked at as an example of innovation by demand, including an examination of the dynamic nature of socially-constituted consumption routines. The book includes a number of illuminating case studies, including an analysis of how black Americans use consumption to express collective identity, and a number of demand-innovation relationships within matrices or chains of producers and users or other actors, including service industries such as security, and the environmental performance of companies. The involvement of consumers in innovation is looked at, including an analysis of how consumer needs may be incorporated in the design of high-tech products. The final chapter argues for the need to build an economic sociology of demand that goes from micro-individual through to macro-structural features.