Reconceptualising responsible research and innovation from a Global South perspective

ABSTRACT

The concept of Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) has been developed in the Global North with little reference to what RRI or RRI-like practices mean in the context of the Global South. We discuss the contextual factors driving the emergence of responsible innovation practice and ways in which they can inform efforts to develop an inclusive and global conceptualization of RRI. Findings show that some activities in the Global South are comparable to those of the Global North, although important differences exist in motivations and structures. We go beyond prior framings to propose a reconfigured, inclusive theoretical framework that accounts for trans-regional differences by looking at three cases to illustrate international differences and to demonstrate an RRI continuum. Netherlands represents a more Global North concept of RRI; Malawi a Global South RRI concept and Brazil sits between these two extremes and assimilates RRI concepts from both ends of the continuum.

KEYWORDS:

• Global South
• Global North
• North-centric
• responsible research and innovation (RRI)
• responsible innovation (RI)

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 In this paper Global North refers to countries with a developed economy (e.g. The Netherlands) and Global South denotes countries with a developing economy e.g. Malawi and countries with an emerging economy e.g. Brazil. This is with reference on the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development statistical definition (OECD 2006).

2 While a distinction can be made between a policy-driven, top-down concept of Responsible Research and Innovation and a broader Responsible Innovation narrative, both terms emerged in parallel and share common features (Owen and Pansera 2019) and will be used interchangeably in this paper.

3 In this paper, we use the term top-down within a policy context. For instance, the six RRI keys are a top-down approach which were designed and developed within a policy context.

4 https://wttventures.net/en/home/.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by European Commission [grant number 788503].

Notes on contributors

Kutoma Wakunuma

Dr Kutoma Wakunuma is Associate Professor Research and Teaching in Information Systems at De Montfort University while she works within the Centre for Computing and Social Responsibility. Her research interests are in understanding the social and ethical implications of ICTs and the role that emerging technologies play in both the developed and developing world. In particular, her research work has focussed on RRI, ethics, ICT for development and gender – areas she has published widely in. In addition to projects funded by other agencies, she has also been involved in several EU funded projects focussed on emerging technologies, ethics and RRI. She is also Programme Leader for MSc Computing and Deputy Subject Group Leader for the IS group within the School of Computing Engineering and Media. Her teaching involves the area of ICT for Development, Computing Ethics as well as RRI in ICT. She also supervisors a number of PhD students.

Fabio de Castro

Dr Fabio de Castro is Senior Lecturer at the Centre for Latin American Research and Documentation at the Department of Humanities of the University of Amsterdam. He is a political ecologist specialized in Environmental Governance in Latin America. His research interests include sustainability and development in Brazil and has published extensively on sustainable production, rural development, environmental justice, community-based management, and social innovation.

Tilimbe Jiya

Dr Tilimbe Jiya is a Programme Leader for Project Management BSc (Hons) Top-up and a lecturer in Project Management in the Faculty of Business and Law at the University of Northampton. He is also a member of the Centre for Sustainable Business Practices (CSBP) at the University. Before joining the University of Northampton, Tilimbe worked at De Montfort University as a Research Fellow where he was highly involved in several international EU funded projects. He has facilitated several workshops across Europe and presented at national and international conferences. Tilimbe's research interests are in the areas of project management, responsible research and innovation, information systems, and sustainable development.

Edurne A. Inigo

Dr Edurne A. Inigo is an Assistant Professor at Deusto Business School, San Sebastian, Spain. She was a postdoctoral researcher at Wageningen University, where she conducted research leading to this manuscript focusing on responsible innovation in business. Her research focuses on the relationship between responsibility, ethics and sustainability in innovation, with a particular emphasis on the design of transitions towards sustainable systems. She has published in Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Industrial Marketing Management and Journal of Cleaner Production, among others. Before joining academia, she worked as a consultant for governance, business and legal aspects related to sustainability for the public and private sectors.

Vincent Blok

Dr Vincent Blok is Associate Professor in Philosophy and Ethics of Technology and Innovation at the Philosophy Group, Wageningen University (The Netherlands). In 2005 he received his PhD degree in philosophy at Leiden University with a specialization in philosophy of technology. Blok's research group is specialized in Business Ethics, Philosophy of Technology and Responsible Innovation. Together with six PhD candidates and four Post-docs, he is involved in several (European) research projects. His books include Ernst Jünger's Philosophy of Technology. Heidegger and the Poetics of the Anthropocene (Routledge, 2017) and Heidegger's Concept of philosophical Method (Routledge, 2020). Blok published over hundred articles in high ranked philosophy journals like Environmental Values, Business Ethics Quarterly, Synthese and Philosophy & Technology, and in multi-disciplinary journals like Journal of Cleaner Production, Public understanding of Science and Journal of Responsible Innovation. See www.vincentblok.nl for more information about his current research.

Vincent Bryce

Vincent Bryce is a PRINCE2 and MSP certified HR project manager and chartered member of the Institute for Personnel and Development with fifteen years experience in equality and diversity management, strategy and policy development, HR systems administration and analytics. He is a mature PhD candidate at the Horizon Centre for Doctoral Training in the School of Computer Science, University of Nottingham and a member of the De Montfort University Centre for Computing and Social Responsibility. Vincent's research interests are in the areas of responsible research and innovation in industry, information systems, and human resource management.