Theoretical Review

Abstract

The need to involve citizens, end-users, and, more generally, all stakeholders having an interest in technology is at the core of a new ‘social contract’ between science, society and technology. The fact of explicitly bringing the values of individuals (or other normative elements) into light in order to shape research and economic policies as well as scientific and engineering activities has contributed to raise public awareness on science and technology, and therefore strengthened the legitimacy of policies while increasing the social acceptability and ethical desirability for innovation. The aim of this deliverable is to analyse and assess the various conceptions of innovation and responsibility that have been used in RRI existing theories. To this end, we first provide an historical account for the emergence of RRI and show the most critical limitations of CSR, SD, PTA approaches (Chapter 1).