Stakeholder studies have discovered that strong stakeholder corporate social responsibility (CSR) orientation can motivate firms to engage better in environmental activities. However, when multiple stakeholders are involved, strong yet incongruent stakeholder pressure may not lead to improved environmental performance. The authors integrate complexity science with stakeholder management theory to address this issue. Using a sample of 149 Chinese small and medium-sized enterprises, they find that the average stakeholder's CSR orientation improves environmental strengths, but generates an inverted U-shaped relationship with environmental concerns. Further, results indicate that the congruence in stakeholders’ CSR orientation enhances this inverted U-shaped relationship, and that the moderating impact of congruence is weaker when entrepreneurial orientation is higher.

Publication date: Available online 15 August 2017
Source:Technological Forecasting and Social Change

Author(s): Raul Gouvea, Dimitri Kapelianis, Sul Kassicieh

The link between information and communications technology and sustainability has been discussed by many authors, yet a macro-level analysis of the link coupled with an examination of the link between new technology areas, human development and the interaction between all of these measures has not been fully explored. In this paper, we hypothesize the link between environmental sustainability, information and communication technology, and human development. We find that information and communications technology and human development have significant main and interactive effects on environmental sustainability. Our discussion section proposes further research into these areas to understand some of the micro-level interactions.

Publication date: Available online 13 September 2017
Source:Technological Forecasting and Social Change

Author(s): Thomas Magnusson, Christian Berggren

According to sustainability transitions theories, innovation policies should create protective spaces (‘niches’) for promising new technologies. Moreover they should support a cumulative process of market formation and growth. Based on results from comparative case studies of two competing technological innovation systems for heavy transport (biogas and electrification), this paper argues that these recommendations are contradictory when technology alternatives with different degrees of maturity compete for the same niche. Should innovation policies open up the niche for the promising but immature alternative, or should they continue to support the technology that already has attained a niche position? If this contradiction remains unsolved, there is a risk for conflicts that block the progress of both alternatives. The paper suggests that there is a need for differentiated policies to resolve the contraction. In order to facilitate further development of both systems, the paper suggests that niche nurturing for immature systems needs to be combined with redeployment into new market segments for more mature systems.

Publication date: September 2017
Source:Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Volume 122

Author(s): Bernhard Truffer, Jens Schippl, Torsten Fleischer

Sustainability transitions of sectors like energy, transport or water have become explicit goals of national policy programs in several parts of the world. The governance of associated innovation and transformation processes requires an integrated assessment on how new and seemingly superior technologies will interact with manifold societal, economic, industrial and political contexts. Failing to do so is likely to quickly undermine political support for these ambitious and long term projects. Part of the program of technology assessment is to anticipate the impacts of new technologies on society and the environment. However, in order to address the challenge of sustainability transitions, institutional dynamics have not been considered explicitly enough in existing approaches. We elaborate a methodological proposal on how to analyze the interaction between technological and institutional developments in specific technology fields. We identify potential future variations of core institutional structures of a socio-technical regime, construct matching regime constellations, and elaborate on interactions with technological design alternatives. The framework will be applied to recent developments in the field of electric mobility in the context of the German Energiewende. The results provide some fresh perspectives for academics and policy makers on how to better consider interactive dynamics in socio-technical systems.