Rethinking the multi-level perspective of technological transitions

In recent years numerous articles have been published which advocate a multi-level perspective (MLP) for the analysis of long-term technological transitions. This paper reviews current transitions research and considers the limitations of the MLP which need to be addressed to enhance understanding of processes of innovation affecting the transformation of technology and society. The paper suggests ways in which the MLP may be effectively rethought, based on more thoroughgoing application of a co-evolutionary concept of technological transitions.     

Toward a spatial perspective on sustainability transitions

In the past decade, the literature on transitions toward sustainable socio-technical systems has made a considerable contribution in understanding the complex and multi-dimensional shifts considered necessary to adapt societies and economies to sustainable modes of production and consumption. However, transition analyses have often neglected where transitions take place, and the spatial configurations and dynamics of the networks within which transitions evolve. A more explicit spatial perspective on sustainability transitions contributes to the extant transitions literature in three ways. Firstly it provides a contextualization on the limited territorial sensitivity of existing literature. Secondly, it explicitly acknowledges and investigates diversity in transition processes, which follows from a ‘natural’ variety in institutional conditions, networks, actor strategies and resources across space. Thirdly, it encompasses not only greater emphasis but also an opportunity to connect to a body of literature geared to understanding the international, trans-local nature of transition dynamics. Concerned with the prevalent lack of attention for the spatial dimensions of sustainability transitions in most studies, this paper seeks to unpick and make explicit sustainability transition geographies from the vantage point of economic geography. The paper argues that there are two interrelated problems requiring attention: the institutional embeddedness of socio-technical development processes within specific territorial spaces, and an explicit multi-scalar conception of socio-technical trajectories. Following these arguments, the paper concludes that transitions research would do well to take a closer look at the geographical unevenness of transition processes from the perspective of global networks and local nodes.     

Technological innovation systems and the multi-level perspective: Towards an integrated framework

Technological innovation systems and the multi-level framework are closely related concepts for the study of far-reaching technological change. They draw on common theoretical roots and analyze similar empirical phenomena. However, they have developed rather independent research strands over the past few years. The paper reviews the state of the art of both concepts and explores commonalities as well as differences. Against this background, we outline first elements of a path towards an integrated framework that combines the strengths of the two approaches and allows providing a better understanding of radical innovation processes and socio-technical transformations.     

Ontologies, socio-technical transitions (to sustainability), and the multi-level perspective

Using recent criticisms and suggestions regarding the multi-level perspective as stepping stones, the article aims to enhance the reflexivity in transition debates regarding social theories. To that end, the article discusses seven social science ontologies (rational choice, evolution theory, structuralism, interpretivism, functionalism, conflict and power struggle, relationism), their assumptions on agency and causal mechanisms, and their views on socio-technical transitions and environmental sustainability. The second goal is to position the multi-level perspective on transitions with regard to these ontologies and to identify directions for theoretical extensions. The MLP is characterized not as a grand or unifying theory, but as a middle range theory that makes crossovers to some ontologies and not to others.     

Innovation studies and sustainability transitions: The allure of the multi-level perspective and its challenges

Sustainable development is prompting a re-assessment of innovation and technological change. This review paper contributes three things towards this re-assessment activity. First, it considers how the history of innovation studies for sustainable development can be explained as a process of linking broader analytical frameworks to successively larger problem framings. Second it introduces an emerging framework whose allure rests in its ability to capture the bigger picture: the multi-level perspective on socio-technical transitions (MLP). Whilst burgeoning researcher networks and literature suggests this policy-relevant theory is attractive, it is not without its challenges. The third purpose of this paper is to elaborate these challenges as areas for further research and development. We do this by drawing upon contributions to this special section and the wider literature.     

Technological innovations and sectoral change: Transformative capacity, adaptability, patterns of change: An analytical framework

Following up on recent debates about sectoral systems of innovation and production, the paper introduces a heuristic framework for analyzing and explaining distinct patterns of technology-based sectoral change. The concept is based on two interrelated influencing factors. The first is the sectoral-specific transformative capacity of new technologies themselves, that is, their substantial or incremental impact on socioeconomic and institutional change in a given sectoral system. The second is the sectoral adaptability of socioeconomic structures, institutions, and actors confronted with the opportunities presented by new technologies. The first factor—the sectoral transformative capacity of new technologies—enables us to identify the technology-based pressure to change and adjust the structural, institutional, and organizational architectures of the sectoral system. The second, complementary factor—sectoral adaptability—helps us to discern the distinct social patterns of anticipating and adopting this technology-based pressure. The specific interplay between the two influencing factors creates distinguishable modes of sectoral transformation, ranging from anticipative and smooth adjustments to reactive and crisis-ridden patterns of change. Even processes of radical sectoral change continue over longer periods of mismatch and are characterized by numerous and mostly gradual organizational, structural and institutional transformations.     

Legitimizing research, technology and innovation policies for transformative change: Combining insights from innovation systems and multi-level perspective in a comprehensive ‘failures’ framework

The recent policy debates about orientating research, technology and innovation policy towards societal challenges, rather than economic growth objectives only, call for new lines of argumentation to systematically legitimize policy interventions. While the multi-level perspective on long-term transitions has attracted quite some interest over the past years as a framework for dealing with long-term processes of transformative change, but the innovation systems approach is still the dominant perspective for devising innovation policy. Innovation systems approaches stress the importance of improving innovation capabilities of firms and the institutional settings to support them, but they are less suited for dealing with the strategic challenges of transforming systems of innovation, production and consumption, and thus with long-term challenges such as climate change or resource depletion. It is therefore suggested to consider insights from transition studies more prominently in a policy framework that is based on the innovation systems approach and the associated notion of ‘failures’. We propose a comprehensive framework that allows legitimizing and devising policies for transformative change that draws on a combination of market failures, structural system failures and transformational system failures.     

基于多源数据的全球高层次科技人才群体判别研究——以基因组学领域为例

基于高层次科技人才胜任力冰山模型,从论文、专利、重点实验室、著名企业、著名奖项和高影响力学术荣誉6个维度构建高层次科技人才群体判别指标,并以基因组学领域为研究实例,识别基因组学领域的全球高层次科技人才群体。通过对该群体进行国别、机构、代表性学者分析发现,全球约60%的高层次科技人才分布在美国,主要聚集在布洛德研究所、哈佛大学、麻省理工学院和加州大学等科研机构,并培养了Emmanuelle Charpentier、JenniferA. Doudna和Eileen Furlong等杰出学者。     

Science,technology and innovation studies at a crossroad: SPRU as case study

The setting up of the Science Policy Research Unit (SPRU) at Sussex University 50 years ago represented a “transformative change” in the research on science policy and the understanding of the nature and origin of technological change and innovation studies. It influenced policymakers across the world in both the mature Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries and the developing world. It made the topic of science, technology and innovation (STI) familiar to business studies scholars. Today though, the analysis of STI appears to be somewhat in crisis. On the one hand, there is growing evidence that the growth and welfare gains of new technologies and innovation are no longer forthcoming in an automatic “trickle-down” fashion. The knowledge and technology diffusion “machine” appears broken. On the other hand, there are growing environmental concerns about the negative externalities of unsustainable fossil-fuel-based growth as industrialization spreads across the globe. STI policy appears somehow stuck in an industrial efficiency and consumerism mode that is unable to address in a satisfactory way the impact of such negative externalities. Can the broader historical approach as popularized within the so-called Science and Technology Studies (STS) tradition provide additional, complementary insights? Yes, if STI and STS scholars are prepared to leave their respective conceptual comfort zones and address in complementary fashion some of the major societal policy challenges confronting science, technology and innovation policy today.     

基于耗散结构理论的科技人才政策系统有序性评价:以山东省为例

基于耗散结构理论,对科技人才政策以系统论观点分析,从系统的资源输入、转换、输出和外部环境4个要素构建科技人才政策水平评价指标体系,建立系统熵模型,通过关联熵和运行熵评价系统内部结构的有序性和系统运行的有序性,并选取山东省为例进行实证分析。研究表明:2010—2019年间山东省科技人才政策系统关联熵先增后减,系统内部结构有序性呈现阶段性特征;运行熵逐年下降,系统运行呈现持续有序化的发展状态。在此基础上,从健全科技人才开发政策、完善科技体制机制和落实科技人才政策3个方面对山东省科技人才政策发展提出建议。     

居民视角下民族社区旅游化的空间演变过程及特征——以肇兴侗寨为例

从空间角度揭示旅游化的演变过程和特征可为深刻理解社区现象或问题提供参考.本文选取肇兴侗寨为案例地,通过2013年、2018年2次实地调查,采用参与式制图和半结构访谈获取一手数据,运用景观价值理论和质性空间分析方法,通过居民视角的景观价值变化探索社区旅游化在空间上的演变过程与特征.研究发现:①肇兴侗寨社区旅游化的过程包括...