D2.4 Theoretical landscape - White paper
The aim of this deliverable is to carry out a contextual and critical analysis of Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) in order to provide a framework for understanding and applying the RRI concept throughout the rest of the RESPONSIBILITY project. Given this aim of a White Paper describing developments and relevance of RRI activity fields, there is a twofold exploration. The first part (chapter 1, 2, 3) is an exploration of the theoretical foundations of RRI as it has emerged through the literature. The second part (chapter 4, 5) of the deliverable considers the practical application of this through deliberating upon developments and issues in ICT. Furthermore an Annex takes briefly national and international organisations with RRI Interests and Competencies in to consideration. Initially there is a contextualised theoretical analysis of the RRI concept deliberated in the first two sections. After the introduction, the second chapter covers the emergence of RRI as the dominant policy framework for the governance of research and innovation in the European Commission and beyond. The third chapter explores the characteristics that various commentators in the literature of RRI have attributed to the concept of RRI. We draw upon a framework developed by Owen and colleagues [1] to investigate what are commonly considered fundamental 'ingredients' of RRI and the justifications that are usually attributed to these characteristics. In doing this, we are able to unpack these key terms and elaborate on the framework, as well as present a concern regarding where the implementation of such a framework and the operationalization of RRI may be problematic- for instance given the pluralistic nature of society of different perspectives of what is 'good' and 'bad' that stem from these. We identify that there seems to be a certain "gap" in the theories of RRI and how it may be that we can begin to remedy this. Having considered theoretical aspects of RRI, and having raised some of the issues that may surround the implementation of it in practice, the fourth chapter of the deliverable moves onto a discussion of practical issues regarding RRI. This is done through an exploration of the application of RRI to the ICT field. The ICT issues discussed in this section are some of the most important issues that can profoundly affect different aspects of society such as: security, privacy, sustainability, Internet of Things, e-health, intellectual property rights, Social Media, etc. This Section does not pretend to be exhaustive for the RRI issues on ICT, but provides important examples on current RRI issues in the ICT field and how they can be addressed. We conclude by reiterating the importance of the RRI program to the EU, in helping us to prevent undesirable consequence s of R&I, and also steer R&I in a trajectory that enables us to address the grand challenges we as a society in the EU and globally face today. We emphasise that RRI is distinct and novel, not in the creation of new governance tools, but in the sense that it hopes to configure existing governance approaches in particular ways to form a broad governance framework (within which existing forms of governance such as `TA' can be embedded). The Annex of the deliverable takes into consideration a selection of national and international organisations as well as networks and programs with RRI interests and competencies. This annex and the considerations which it presents are very much recognition not only of the international nature of the RESPONSIBILITY project, but importantly the global dimension of RRI. Finally, given the diversity of the world and contextually embedded perspectives within this regarding 'good practice' and 'bad practice', this deliverable presents wide-ranging complexities to the practical realization of RRI in regards to relating and developing the theory and 'aims' of the program, to empirical reality.