the context of innovation journeys

The Context of Innovation Journeyscaim_640 158..170

Arie Rip

While the innovation literature offers many insights about the dynamics of innovations and tosome extent their embedding in society, the contexts in which this happens are often treatedas specific and/or contingent. After a brief theoretical discussion of co-evolutionary and actor-network theories, I show that there are general patterns (‘layers’) in the context, in particular,niches, regimes and socio-technical landscapes. A new ‘layer’ of institutionalized anticipatoryco-ordination is emerging, stimulated by the challenge of handling emerging technologieslike nanotechnology. The analysis in terms of ‘layers’ raises questions about what the scope ofagency can be.

Introduction

A lot is known about innovation – in so faras it is possible to ‘know’ a complex and

uncertain phenomenon like innovation. Inno-vation and its management in organizationshave been studied extensively. Less studied,but particularly interesting are the dynamicsof innovation. Van de Ven et al. (1999) haveemphasized vicissitudes of innovation byspeaking of innovation journeys. Rip andSchot (2002) have extended this idea concep-tually by including market introduction andembedding in society, and added an empiricalclaim, that there are certain patterns in thejourneys, linked to institutional and broadercontexts of innovation like the rise of industrialresearch (see also Rip, 2010a).1 The seminalwork of Abernathy and Clark (1985) whomapped ‘the winds of creative destruction’ byconsidering the extent to which existing tech-nological capacities and market linkages haveto be changed, is important to understand thedynamics of innovation. Again, an extension isin order, to include the changes involved inthe embedding of technical innovations insociety (Deuten, Rip & Jelsma, 1997).2

Innovation journeys do not occur in avacuum. They are part of larger processes, andare entangled with organizations, other tech-nologies, sector dynamics, and anticipationsof, and responses from, society. One can ana-lytically separate the innovation journey fromits contexts when sufficient institutionalizationof such contexts has occurred. This is alreadyvisible within an organization, when there isan R&D department responsible for working

on innovation. In society, a division of labourhas emerged between developers of technol-ogy and recipients, and there are frameworkconditions like the patent system, regulatorymeasures, insurance, and the role of consumerorganizations. So it makes sense to speak ofthe context of innovation journeys, and inquirehow this context influences the dynamics ofinnovation (as well as conversely how ongoinginnovation will lead to changes in contexts,through expectations and adaptations; seeNelson, 1994).

This article takes a further step by recogniz-ing that there are general patterns and struc-tures in the context, relevant to innovationdynamics, over and above the specific constel-lation of actors and framework conditions atplay in the particular innovation journey that isconsidered. In claiming this, I can build onwhat has been called the multi-level model ofniches, regimes and ‘landscapes’ (Rip & Kemp,1998; Geels, 2005). I will develop this later, butnote here that niches (i.e., protected spaces),socio-technical regimes (i.e., a set of rules forfurther development of a technology), and‘landscapes’ providing a backdrop of opportu-nities and constraints, are always present, as itwere, as layers of the context. One or anotherlayer may be more important than others at aparticular stage of the innovation journey.For example, in an early stage when R&Dis carried out in the protected space of thelaboratory, the broader ‘landscape’ is oftenbackgrounded.

The concept of ‘layer’ is introduced to avoidrelying on a terminology of levels, with theirconnotation of micro, meso and macro. The

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point is that the context influences the dynam-ics of innovation journeys in different ways,not that there are different levels in thecontext. This concept of ‘layer’ must be posi-tioned theoretically, and I will do so in thenext section, drawing on co-evolutionarytheory of technological change and actor-network theory (ANT).3 Empirically, one canask whether there are further patterns in influ-encing dynamics of innovation, which havestabilized and thus become a layer, in additionto the three identified already. A candidatewould be how in the new ecology of innova-tion, promises (and expectation more gener-ally) play an important role, and how thereare calls for anticipatory co-ordination, andconcrete attempts to do so, for example inEuropean Technology Platforms. The possibil-ity that this adds up to a new layer is alsoexplored later.

While there are management implications ofthe analysis in this article, I will note them onlyoccasionally. My main purpose is to drawattention to general patterns in the context ofinnovation journeys, which enable and con-strain what happens.

A Theoretical Perspective Drawingon Actor-Network Theory and(Co-)Evolutionary Theory

To articulate the concept of ‘layer’, I will con-sider how such layers can emerge, and do sowith the help of a simple example. The emer-gence of a new layer is central to Deuten’s(2003) study of what he calls ‘cosmopolitaniza-tion’ of technological knowledge after it startsout as local knowledge. This is now generallyexpected to occur, but even then, it requireswork, for example on possible dominantdesigns (as he shows for the successive casesof videorecording). Earlier, as in the case ofreinforced concrete, 1860–1920 (which Deutenreconstructed), the companies kept theirexperience-based knowledge to themselves.Still, cosmopolitanization occurred but as aresponse to outside requirements. Authoritiesand users needed assurance that bridges andbuildings made of reinforced concrete wouldnot collapse, and this led to further experimen-tation to prove the robustness of the technicaldesigns. New activities and interactionsoccurred at the cosmopolitan level, testifyingto the existence of a somewhat independentlayer with its own dynamics.

Thus, a two-layered constellation emerged,where local (cf. niche) and cosmopolitan (cf.regime) have their own dynamics, but are alsomutually dependent. In fact, there is also a

third layer, that of ‘landscape’, the slowlychanging backdrop against which interactionsare played out. In the case of reinforced con-crete, the emergence of the regulatory state bythe end of the nineteenth century is one of the‘landscape’ elements.4

What one sees happening is how ongoingactions, interactions and practices becomeentangled, and a reversal occurs: the some-what stable result, for example the regime ofreinforced concrete, starts to shape whathappens locally. Thus, patterns are reproducedin the processes and structures emerge (Rip,2010b). Such patterns and structures enableand constrain further actions and interactions,up to lock-ins and so-called path dependency.In contrast with structural theories in socialscience, the nature of such structures-by-entanglement is not given as such; it is analways precarious outcome of interactions andprocesses. But such structures can be repro-duced over longer periods of time, and func-tion as a backdrop which is encountered (andin that sense given) when one moves about inthe world. That is why common notions ofstructure (including cultural patterns, industrystructures, societal structures) are applicableto some extent.

Clearly, I am working with a non-structuraltheory here, while still recognizing the phe-nomenon of (precarious) social order. It isimportant to use such a theoretical perspectiveto capture dynamics of innovation in context,so as to do justice to the open-ended characterof innovation and the fluidity of the situationthat goes with it.

Actor-network theory (ANT), an explicitlyanti-structural theory (see Latour, 2005) canaddress the fluidity. In Callon’s version ofactor-network theory, the distinction betweenunarticulated, fluid situations and articulated,stabilized situations is emphasized (Callon,2002). However, Callon, and ANT generally,prefer to study fluid, ‘hot’ situations. In doingso, they recognize the existence of ‘cold’ situ-ations, but are not much interested in them.Thus, studies under the banner of ANT haveneglected the processes of solidification andpartial irreversibilization turning the fluid intothe stabilized.5

Transitions from ‘hot’ to ‘cold’ are exactlywhat is happening in cases of new and emerg-ing science and technology. Not only do theyhave to survive and grow in existing, more orless stable regimes and landscapes, there is theexperience – and thus expectation – that theywill stabilize and become ‘cold’ themselves. Infact, actors anticipate possible future morestable assemblages. The literature on emer-gence of dominant designs is full of actorsanticipating and struggling, ‘knowing’ that

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such dominant designs will occur eventually(Tushman and Anderson, 1997; see alsoDeuten, 2003).

ANT has the conceptual resources toaddress these challenges. In particular, theconcept of entanglements – ‘associations thatlast longer than the interactions that formedthem’ (Callon and Latour, 1981, p. 283) – ismeant to emphasize that actors and activitiescan become mutually dependent: they can nolonger move independently (Rip, 2010b). Thereis some mutual accommodation, but not nec-essarily in the sense that conflict is reduced.(Cf. how parties on the battlefield recognizeeach other as enemies, and that is how thebattle can proceed.) On the other hand, mutualdependence does lead to outcomes that arelarger (or at least, ‘last longer’) than the inter-actions that went into them. One can inquireinto the alignments that have occurred, andhow these alignments add up to configura-tions that work, to some extent.

Zooming in on the processes, one seesenrolment, obligatory passage points, etc. – thebread-and-butter of ANT analyses (Callon,1986; Latour, 1987). ANT, in presenting itsarsenal of mechanisms, emphasizes descrip-tions of what actors do and what the short-term outcomes are. Its advice is then oftenlimited to the empty (because empiricallyalmost circular) suggestion to have more allies,and longer (more extended) networks.

Zooming out again, one sees variety, andsome novelties surviving, somehow. Whiletranslation and enrolment play a part, there areother actors, broader contexts, longer-termpatterns which in a sense select what willsurvive and what will not. Thus, evolutionarytheories must be added to ANT analysis.

There is a range of evolutionary theories oftechnological change (e.g., Nelson & Winter,1977; Dosi, 1982; Ziman, 2000), often linked toevolutionary economics (Nelson & Winter,1982). There are good reasons to adopt evolu-tionary approaches because novelty is beingintroduced and its fate depends on factors andcontexts outside the range of influence of theactors introducing the novelty (Rip, 2006a).Evolutionary theory emphasizes that there areno prior determinants shaping developments.Instead, one should think and analyse in termsof variation and independent selection (andretention of what was selected). The outcomes,however, can then stabilize. One could speakof species (in a technological eco-system), alsoparadigms shaping technological trajectories(Dosi, 1982), and patterns and regimes (Rip& Kemp, 1998), which shape what willhappen. All of them can be undermined bynew variations and/or changes in selectionenvironments.

In evolutionary theory, the unit of analysis isvariation/novelty, not actors (see Fleck, 2000).Actors are concerned about ‘their’ novelties,however, and try to protect and nurture them.Or develop alternative novelties, for thatmatter. Thus, to understand novelties and theirdevelopment, one should also study actorstrategies and their interactions. In otherwords, evolutionary approaches should notjust follow the biological model. A key differ-ence with neo-Darwinian theories of evolution(including the economic theories which focuson variety in a population) is the occurrence ofanticipation of future selection, and the insti-tutionalization of such anticipations.

An instructive example of institutionalizedanticipation is the use of tests and the emer-gence of test laboratories. In a sense, theseinternalize selection so that it can be experi-enced at a stage where corrections and alterna-tive variations are still possible. As Van denBelt and Rip (1987) showed for the syntheticdye industry in the late nineteenth century,this can lead to situations where market orother external selections become domesti-cated, i.e., depending on the supplier and histest laboratories. Another example of partialinternalization of selection environments, par-ticularly striking in recent decades, is the roleof expectations and promises which mobilizeresources from the selection environment, buthave to adapt to the requirements that comewith these resources (Van Lente & Rip, 1998).

Both ANT and evolutionary theories take astrong position on agency: interactions, asso-ciations and their outcomes are more impor-tant to understand eventual order and changethan intentions of actors and the actions thatare assumed to follow from them.6 In evolu-tionary theory, so-called agency can be posi-tioned as variation rather than intentionalaction.7 In so far as there is agency, it is alwaysembedded agency (see Garud, Hardy &Maguire, 2007).8 Still, with hindsight, storiesare told about heroic actors who accomplishgreat deeds; or just small stories about actorsrealizing something. The fact that such storiesare told then colours our interpretation ofongoing events: we look for agents and causes,even though this is premature and potentiallymisleading.9

A Multi-Layered Context

The general idea of entanglements leading tosomewhat stable patterns in the selection envi-ronment for technological change and innova-tion has been specified in terms of niches,regimes, and landscape (Rip, 1992; Rip andKemp, 1998; Kemp, Rip & Schot, 2001). As I



noted in the Introduction, this has been takenup in a multi-level model for technologicalchange, which is now used extensively toanalyse technological transitions (Geels, 2002,2005).

The model is visualized in Figure 1 (afterRip, 2000). The arrows represent innovationjourneys, and their location in the diagramreflects which of the layers influencing thejourney is particularly prominent at that stageof the journey. This visualization actually com-bines two different topics, and can thus bemisleading if used mechanically. One storythat is told by the visualization, highlighted bythe arrows, is about growth (increase of per-formance, increase of scope) over time, andperhaps decline. Such growth can lead tomodification of a regime, or even a newregime (an example would be biotechnology)and, eventually, changes in the landscape – thisis what makes the model interesting for analy-sis of (socio-)technical transitions, and forsuggestions how to work towards such transi-tions. The other story told by the visualizationis about three layers influencing developmentseach in their own way, and evolving in theirown right. What is influenced are ongoing‘local practices and novelty creation’, depictedin Figure 1 under the bottom line. Each ofthe three layers functions as an affordance,enabling and constraining practices andnovelty creation. The way they do so is differ-ent: niches are protected spaces, and thusshaped by requirements for protection, and

some boundary maintenance; regimes areabout rules (they provide a grammar forfurther development), while landscapes haveeffects through their gradients. Together, theyconstitute the general context of innovationjourneys. This has to be filled in for particularcases, and then more complexity will becomevisible.

In the second story, there is no place to visu-alize the innovation journey in the two-dimensional diagram; one would need a thirddimension. And the question would remainwhether increase in performance and scope,important in the first story, would be a goodway to characterize this third dimension. Onemight actually need more dimensions to char-acterize an innovation journey.

Figure 1 combines the two stories in a visu-ally powerful way, but one has to be carefulabout what it actually represents. Still, it iswidely reproduced and referred to in the lit-erature (and occasionally also criticized). Forthis article, the three layers, i.e., the secondstory, are important. The arrows are then areminder that one might eventually alsodevelop a proto-theory of innovation journeys,focusing on development of technology andits embedding in society.

In discussing the layers, let me start withhow regimes emerge and become part of theoverall constellation. Regime theorists such asNelson and Winter (1977), Dosi (1982) and Vanden Belt and Rip (1987) have emphasized theimportance of search routines, heuristics and

Evolvingsociotechnicallandscapes

Novel“configurationsthat work”

A patchworkof regimes

3

2

1

[1] Novelty, shaped by existing regime[2] Evolves, is taken up, may modify regime[3] Landscape is transformed

Figure 1. The Three-Layered Model of Socio-technical Change



other rules, and how these combine into agrammar that shapes action in and across com-munities of practice. Nelson and Winter’sexample is instructive:

the advent of the DC3 aircraft in the 1930sdefined a particular technological regime:metal skin, low wing, piston poweredplanes. Engineers had some strong notionsregarding the potential of this regime. Formore than two decades innovation in air-craft design essentially involved betterexploitation of this potential; improvingthe engines, enlarging the planes, makingthem more efficient (Nelson & Winter, 1977,pp. 56–7).

While rules (including possible standards)are proposed all the time, explicitly or de factoin ongoing activities, important is the shiftfrom them being tentative, which have to bedefended all the time, to authoritative, whichshape action, as a force in their own right. Inother words, a ‘reversal’ occurs, from beingdriven to being a driver. This is characteristicfor how the regime layer comes to shapeactivities in ongoing practices. After the rever-sal, there will be dynamics of its own, e.g.,consideration and improvement of the rules(cf. Deuten, 2003). An interesting example of areversal, in the large, is the shift in the 1960sfrom a ‘computing’ regime, where the newcomputer substituted for earlier computingtasks, to a ‘computer’ regime, where newtypes of application were developed, drivenby the potential of the computer (Van denEnde & Kemp, 1999). Enlightened technologystrategies take the nature and ongoing dynam-ics of regimes into account (cf. Metcalfe &Boden, 1992).

The regime or technological paradigm leadsto recognizable ‘trajectories’ (in the sense ofDosi, 1982) – the positive version of pathdependency – and its force also derives fromthe linkages, networks and their alignment, inwhich it is embedded. Together, this shapesco-evolution of innovations and industrystructures (Nelson, 1994), and more broadly, oftechnology and society. There are definite pat-terns in such co-evolution (Rip & Kemp, 1998).While there will always be contingencies (asemphasized in Darwinian evolutionary theoryand in some approaches in technologystudies), there is also linkage creation, increas-ing alignment, and de facto irreversibilityleading to path dependencies (Rip, Robinson &te Kulve, 2007).

The layer of niches, i.e., protected spaces forvulnerable novelties, ‘hopeful monstrosities’(Mokyr, 1990), has a different social location(cf. Schot & Geels, 2007). Protected spaces arecarved out in the selection environments,

sometimes by benevolent selectors (sponsors,‘uncles’ of start-up firms). Technologicaldevelopment in a niche gives rise to mini-paths and a lock-in into the requirements ofthe protected space – and thus a risk of notbeing able to survive in the wider world. Thisobservation led to the original idea of strategicniche management (Van den Belt & Rip, 1984;Rip, 1992), using the evolutionary metaphor ofsurvival of the fittest to define managementstrategies for gradual un-protection in order tobecome successful in addressing, and surviv-ing in, ever wider selection environments.

Protected spaces have different shapes andsizes. One example, mentioned already, is thetest lab for new products, functioning as adomesticated selection environment (wherethe risks of selection occur in private). Instruc-tive in how it extends the analysis of protectedspaces is Law and Callon’s (1992) study of thedevelopment of a fighter aircraft. The actualwork on the project needed a physically andorganizationally protected space, but to main-tain such protection a macro-protected spacewas necessary consisting of an agreementbetween the relevant Ministers (including theFrench collaborators). The continuation of themacro-protection had to be fed with optimisticprogress reports. When the macro-protectedspace collapsed (in this case, through a combi-nation of political shifts and disappointingproject results), the micro-protected spacebecame exposed and collapsed as well.

The third layer, of socio-technical land-scapes, shapes activities and interactions bycreating affordances and constraints throughits gradients, as in a material landscape withits hills and valleys traversed by the traveller.10

In Sahal’s well-known picture (Figure 2), apath in such a landscape is depicted includinga possible fork (Sahal, 1985).

An important component of socio-technicallandscapes is socio-technical infrastructure.An example is the infrastructure of electricitygeneration and use, including the grids(nationally and internationally) and the billingsystems. Electricity has become embedded insociety, and its use has become so importantthat the infrastructure of electricity generationis an almost obligatory passage point for fuelsand other energy carriers in order to reach endusers. Alternatives to electricity stand littlechance, at least in the short term.

A landscape with its gradients can be inten-tionally shaped, as in the example of RobertMoses, city architect of New York, who devel-oped beaches and parks on Long Island, andmade the overpasses over the roads leading tothem so low that buses, on which blacks andpoor whites had to rely, could not pass underthem. Once in place, they continued to have



their effect, independent of the original inten-tions (and their height can become irrelevantwhen everybody can go by private car).11 It is asocio-technical landscape because it has cul-tural components as well, for example the dis-ciplining in the society of the 1920s, whichmade the blacks and poor whites not think oftearing down the overpasses.

Socio-technical imaginaries, for exampleabout how and why to develop nuclear power(Jasanoff & Kim, 2009), become embedded ininstitutions and sunk investments, and arethen part of the socio-technical landscape.They also shape actions and policies (by beingfollowed, and occasionally by being contested)that constitute recognizable trajectories ofdevelopment. In that sense, they are like rules,now at the macro-level of society.

The Increasing Importance ofAnticipatory Co-ordination

The phenomenon of anticipatory co-ordinationhas become more important with increasingpolicy and strategic interest in new advancedtechnologies, biotechnology and recently nano-technologies being prime examples (cf. Joly, Rip& Callon, 2010). Their promise becomes part ofthe context of concrete innovation journeys.And some of the co-ordination work is actuallydone by the promises, as they mobilize actors.Thus, there will be some shaping of techno-logical development, and this will becomestronger when there is institutionalization ofanticipatory co-ordination as in the EuropeanTechnology Platforms. This appears to be adifferent kind of shaping compared withniches, regimes and landscapes, and mightthus be the beginning of a new layer.

As will be clear in the examples below,anticipatory co-ordination is an attempt toproject a path into the future, which is to be

co-produced by concerted action of the variousactors. The projection is presented as havinga certain inevitability to it, and may actuallywork as a self-fulfilling prophecy. There isalso informal and de facto anticipatoryco-ordination, for example through promises.The recurrent element is that projected futuresare put forward in the present, and are takenup and thus influence shape and direction ofinnovation journeys.

The realization of the projected innovationwill, of course, depend on the effort of variousactors. There is also a choice, well known fromthe strategy literature, whether to go for ‘fit’,keeping close to the present requirements andcontexts, or ‘stretch’, changing the context sothat there will be space for, and receptivity to,the innovation. There is a link with the discus-sion of incremental and breakthrough or archi-tectural innovation (Abernathy & Clark, 1985),where the latter appears to require ‘stretch’strategies. One can also think of a sequence,starting with fit, say to existing markets, orexisting technological competencies, and thenbecoming more ambitious.12

There will be self-fulfilling prophecy effects,for example when ‘stretch’ strategies are justi-fied through the reference to an impendingand/or necessary transition, and then contrib-ute to the actual realization of the ‘stretch’.13

In the complex interactions that are involved,the overall direction of development dependsof course on much more than the specific‘stretch’ efforts. So there may not be a transi-tion, or if there is, it might be of a differentkind than intended. Still, actors can be mobi-lized by the notion of a transition. And theremay be attempts at co-ordination of efforts, inthe large and in the small.14

Thus, anticipatory co-ordination can becharacterized in evolution-theoretical termsas a further move in the direction of domes-ticating a future selection environment which

Figure 2. Gradients in a Landscape affording Certain Paths (Sahal, 1985, p. 79)



is unknown but is deemed to become moremanageable thanks to forward-lookingco-ordination.

Anticipation is a general phenomenon.Prudent actors anticipate, and will work toreduce threats and push opportunities. Theyencounter other (prudent as well as impru-dent) actors, and these interactions lead tosome de facto co-ordination, and some align-ment. With such experience, anticipatoryco-ordination can become sought after inten-tionally. The history of the International Tech-nology Roadmap for Semiconductors (ITRS),responsible for a biannual roadmapping exer-cise, is illustrative, because of the gradualextension of the number of actors involved inthe consortium, and for the dominant role itnow plays in the sector.

The sector of semi-conductors shows rapidtechnological development, attempts to antici-pate, and shifting industry structures whichmake anticipatory co-ordination both impor-tant and difficult. For a long time, reductionof uncertainty was realized by referring toMoore’s Law, on the regular increase in speed,decrease in size, and decrease in productioncosts, as a guideline for what to expect andwhat efforts are necessary to achieve theexpected performance (if only because one’scompetitors would otherwise create an advan-tage for themselves in the ‘semi-conductorrace’). In this way, the validity of Moore’s Lawbecame a self-fulfilling prophecy since the late1970s.

There is now discussion, not only of physi-cal limits (‘ceilings’ or ‘red brick walls’) to thecontinuation of Moore’s Law, but also diverg-ing searches and identification of options thatare ‘More than Moore’ or ‘Beyond Moore’. Thepresent opening up of micro-electronics to avariety of alternatives to the CMOS path, as itwas and is entrenched in practices and strate-gies of semi-conductor firms, can be seen inevolutionary terms as the punctuation of anequilibrium. New spaces emerge for produc-tion and recognition of variety, and alternativeways of anticipatory co-ordination emerge.This is visible in the European-based micro-and nano-electronics platform ENIAC, theEuropean Nanoelectronics Initiative AdvisoryCouncil,15 led by the big incumbents inthe sector, and through its members alsoco-ordinating with their North American andEast Asian counterparts.

These recent developments offer twoinsights into anticipatory co-ordination. First,the fact that ENIAC is recognized as a Euro-pean Technology Platform, an instrument ofthe European Commission’s technology andinnovation policy, shows how these platformsmay evolve to become informal consortia for

co-ordination of strategies. This may take time.The Platform on NanoMedicine, led by direc-tors of the relevant divisions of Philips andSiemens, draws on the strong interest in nano-medicine, but has not yet built a tradition ofanticipatory co-ordination. It is still only aspace in which new interactions occur, withlittle or no entanglement leading to dynamicsof its own.

Second, the key to formal and informalanticipatory co-ordination are spaces for inter-action where actors can mutually position theiractivities and strategies in relation to possibleand emerging paths. Such spaces can emergewithin ongoing entanglements, opening up, asit were, but also after a time closing down.16

Important for the productivity of spacesaround new and emerging science and technol-ogy is the role of a public or semi-public actoroffering room for interaction between privateactors; this has been very visible in EuropeanUnion Framework programs and projects(Edler, 2000). A further important aspect isthe role of linking-pin and other institutionalentrepreneurs (te Kulve, 2010).

Anticipation builds on expectations, as tech-nology development does anyhow. What isnew is not just the importance of promises inresource mobilization, but their role in tech-nology and innovation policy, and in strategiesof various technology actors. A further phe-nomenon, important for my question about apossible new layer, is the role of globally for-mulated promises like ‘nanotechnology leadsto a third industrial revolution’; ‘personalizedmedicine’; ‘the hydrogen economy’; andearlier, ‘the electronic superhighway’.17 Suchglobal promises are part of policy and strategydiscourses. They float above specific promisesabout better performance of a device and con-crete resource mobilization (and the furtherarticulation of requirements on the newoption). The global promise often remainsalive in policy independent of actual suc-cesses. Konrad (2006) has traced the dualdynamics of the surviving (and in that sense,successful) global promise of the electronicsuperhighway and the failure of a number ofconcrete projects (in her case studies, in theSouth of Germany). The pattern that is visiblein her study can be recognized in otherdomains (see also Parandian, Rip & te Kulve,forthcoming). It is visualized in Figure 3,which builds on earlier analysis of promise-requirement cycles (Van Lente & Rip, 1998).

There is interaction between the global andthe specific dynamics, starting (see left-handside of Figure 3) with the signalling of a specificopportunity linked to ideas about a new field ofopportunities (say, a new diagnostic sensor andthe field of point-of-care medicine). Brave new



worlds are articulated in the global discourse,while specific performance promises areturned into requirements for further work, saylowering energy requirements and costs of thediagnostic sensor. Such requirements can bearticulated as necessary to achieve part of thebrave new world, and the success or failure offurther development might lead to reconsid-eration of the global promise. In practice,success is often attributed to the ‘force’ of theglobal promise, while failure is seen to derivefrom wrong choices and/or circumstances – sothe global promise remains immune for criti-cism. The effect is that global promises surviveand constitute a repertoire that can be drawnupon. As a relatively stable backdrop for spe-cific discussions and concrete activities, therepertoire is part of the socio-technical land-scape: it is easy to quote from the repertoire,and if one wants to go against a global promise,that will take effort.

A counterpoint to these dual dynamics ofpromises is the possibility of inflated promises

leading to disappointment. This possibilitykeeps spokespersons for nanotechnologyworried: how much hype can we tolerate?What if an impasse occurs as has happenedwith ‘green’ biotechnology? (see Rip, 2006b).The possibility of a hype-disappointment cyclecan be seen as a fact of life, a pattern that occursrepeatedly. It can then be exploited to antici-pate, as the Gartner Group does with its hype-cycle. The hype-cycle of inflated expectations,ensuing disappointment and a shake-out, withonly a few robust technologies remaining, wasdeveloped for information and communica-tion technologies. Its use shows an interestingdialectics. There is reconstruction of the cycle,say for security technologies in various stagesof development and attendant expectations (amaster curve), and the Gartner Group thentells firm X where its technological option islocated on the curve, and thus, what its futurewill be. But the Gartner Group also advisesabout whether to follow the cycle or step out.Determinism is the basis for the analysis, but

Figure 3. Dual Promise Dynamics (courtesy of H. te Kulve)



voluntarism shapes the advice. Things will gothis way, but if you understand it (and hire theGartner Group as consultants) you can escapefrom it by acting (see Rip, 2006b).

In fact, a general point about anticipationbecomes visible here: there is an attempt toproject a path into the future, with a certaininevitability to it. At the same time, the actorswho are supposed to contribute to the realiza-tion of that path are invited to use anticipationto develop better strategies, i.e., deviate fromthe path, perhaps undermine it.

There are many anticipatory activities andco-ordination initiatives, and this implies thatthe ecology of the innovation system is chang-ing. In terms of evolutionary theory, concertedanticipation of future, and thus still unknown,performance and selection environmentsturns into vicarious pre-selection (vicariousbecause there is no way to test the promise otherthan through discussing it). This is a new typeof enabling and constraining of innovationdynamics, and thus makes it a candidate forbecoming a new layer in the context of innova-tion journeys. Whether it will actually becomesuch a layer depends on how it will institution-alize. A key point is that there are now interme-diary actors like consultants (the GartnerGroup is just one of many), working parties anddedicated organizations (e.g., the InternationalTechnology Roadmap for Semiconductors), allin the business of creating roadmaps and otherforesight exercises. So it is not just a matter ofactors anticipating and enrolling other actors. Itmight become a requirement on innovation totake existing roadmaps and other foresightresults into account. Similarly, the repertoire ofglobally formulated and more specific prom-ises is not something that innovators can justpick from. It creates soft requirements for direc-tions to go in, or at least how to justify thedirections that are actually taken when theydiffer from the repertoire. Clearly, there arebuilding blocks for a new layer in the contextof innovation journeys.

Conclusion

While actual contexts of specific innovationjourneys are varied, idiosyncratic and contin-gent, there are also overall patterns in thecontext, related to the way technological inno-vation is organized and embedded in our soci-eties. Given the institutionalized division oflabour between promoting innovation andhandling its embedding in society (Rip, Misa& Schot, 1995), there is somewhat independentvariation and selection so that evolutionarytheory can be applied in a straightforwardway. However, prudent innovators anticipate

on selection, and new intermediary institu-tions emerge to carry such anticipation.

Three overall patterns can be identified, andtheir relation with innovation journeys canbe conceptualized as layers in the context ofinnovation journeys, which enable and con-strain innovation practices. Niches, i.e., pro-tected spaces, are explicitly conceptualizedin evolutionary-theoretical terms (protectionagainst selection), while the actual activitiesand interactions can be understood with thehelp of actor-network theory. Regimes andlandscapes are sedimented outcomes of co-evolution of technology and society, guidingchoices for further innovation as well as beingrelatively independent selection environ-ments. However, novelties, and actors pursu-ing them, may well go against the existingregime and landscape and ‘stretch’ themrather than attempt to survive by ‘fitting’. Inanticipatory co-ordination, depicted as a newlayer in the context of innovation journeys,promises and roadmaps can become stabilizedand shape developments – sedimentation-before-the-fact, as it were.

Niches, regimes and landscapes differ inscope and in their duration over time. Thus,they might be seen as a nested set of selectionenvironments. But their relationship is nothierarchical. Rather, they embody differentmechanisms and dynamics in how they shapeinnovation journeys. All three, as well as theemerging layer of anticipatory co-ordination,are present at the same time, even if some maybe backgrounded. Innovation practices canrefer to them, and play them out against eachother, e.g., by pushing the innovative (break-through) character of what happens in theniche against the conservative thrust of theregime.

When patterns and their shaping of innova-tion practices are emphasized, there is thequestion how much scope there still is foragency. This question is important in its ownright but also relevant for (enlightened) man-agement of innovation. The heroic version ofagency, as ‘winning out against the odds’, isof little help – even if such stories can be told –if agency is embedded, and outcomes areshaped in interaction. The modest version isthat innovators can recognize patterns andtake them into account so as to become moresuccessful in what is then seen as a choicebetween following rules or gradients or break-ing them. In the case of anticipation, there is adialectical relationship between projections ofthe future which must be sufficiently solid tobase action on, and the possibility to chooseactions that go against these projections.

More concretely, management of innovationshould be seen as management of novelties



that are created and nurtured, and thenexposed to the vicissitudes of the wider world,while anticipating possible uptake and embed-ding in society and taking such anticipationsinto account at a relatively early stage in theinnovation journey. There are general manage-ment issues involved, as well as specific dedi-cated (and creative) action. What I have addedto this picture is the importance of takinggeneral patterns in the context into account. Byidentifying them and showing how they work,I have broadened the perspective, enablingenlightened management of innovation.

In doing so, I have also created buildingblocks for a theory of dynamics of innovationjourneys in context. In earlier work, I focusedon patterns in innovation journeys (and drewout implications for disaggregation of govern-mental technology and innovation policy). Inthis article, I identified patterns in the contextof such innovation journeys, and consideredactions of innovators in relation to these pat-terns. Next steps would be, first, to do casestudies informed by this theory-in-the-makingso as to see how much of the dynamics ofinnovation can be understood in those terms,and perhaps modify and extend the theory;and second, to strengthen the theory bymobilizing general social science insights, inaddition to co-evolutionary theory and actor-network theory. To see the world as context forinnovation dynamics is acceptable for an inno-vator, who starts with a concentric perspective(but should not remain imprisoned in it). Atheorist should locate these contexts as part ofhow our late-industrial societies evolve.

Notes

1. This is not the same dynamics as path emer-gence and dependency (Garud & Karnøe, 2001),but there are similarities: both trace emergingand stabilizing patterns. Innovation journeyscan also be followed by organizations (Visscher& De Weerd-Nederhof, 2006).

2. See also Nijhof, Fisscher and Looise (2002) oninclusive innovation.

3. Generally, I draw on theories like ANT and evo-lutionary sociology/economics, because theyfocus on dynamics. In these theories, agency, sayof innovators and entrepreneurs, is an input into,but not the determinant of, eventual outcomes.This implies that my analysis is also a construc-tively critical contribution to the themes treatedin Creativity and Innovation Management, whereagency is often foregrounded. My problematiza-tion of agency also challenges business ethics astraditionally discussed in terms of individualchoices and their justification.

4. This notion of a three-layered constellation alsoapplies to scientific development, with localsearch practices in the protected space of alaboratory, with emerging and stabilized para-

digms, and the wider institutional landscape upto a social contract between science and society(Rip, 2010c).

5. These processes did attract attention when toolsto manage and influence developments wereexplored, as with techno-economic networks(Callon, Larédo & Rabeharisoa, 1992), futurescripts (De Laat, 2000), SocRobust (Larédo et al.,2002), and Constructive TA (Rip, Misa & Schot,1995; Rip and te Kulve, 2008).

6. Tentative actions which might lead to noveltyare often transformed back into the regular(cf. ‘repair work’ as studied in symbolic inter-actionism) or excluded or otherwise madeinvisible.

7. An interesting example of such variation-in-context is how, on 1 December 1955, Rosa Parks,a black lady from Montgomery (Alabama), satdown on the bus in a seat reserved for whites.She was forced to get off the bus, and thissparked off the bus protest movement. Hun-dreds or thousands of black persons had hadthis experience without anything much hap-pening. Now, the circumstances were right, andother actors in the situation, notably in thenascent civil rights movement in Alabama (andlater more widely) who could use Rosa Parks asa case for their cause, co-produced the effect.The common storyline here is that of an indi-vidual act of courage that triggers a collectivedisplay of defiance. Schuyt (1972) alreadyemphasized the incidental character of theaction itself, noting that Rosa Parks had nointention to protest, she was just too tired toremain standing. Whatever the intentions, a‘lateral action’ occurred, across rather thanagainst the existing order. Lovell (2003) addsthat Rosa Parks did have a history in humanrights activities, and then shows that she, ratherthan other blacks who suffered this treatment,was selected as ‘standard bearer’ because shewas working class and respectable. Thus, asBeck, Bonß and Lau (2003, p. 26) phrase it: ‘Thesubject becomes part of a self-selected networkwhich allows connection and communication,but also makes it the object of the choices anddecisions of others.’

8. Garud and his colleagues tend to work with thetheoretical perspective of symbolic interaction-ism, broadly speaking, but arrive at the sameposition as I come to in this section. Cf. theselines from the abstract in Garud, Kumaraswamyand Karnøe (2010): ‘Path creation entertains anotion of agency that is distributed and emer-gent through relational processes that constitutephenomena. Viewed from this perspective,“initial conditions” are not given, “contingen-cies” are emergent contexts for action, “self-reinforcing mechanisms” are strategicallymanipulated, and “lock-in” is but a temporarystabilization of paths in-the-making.’

9. This is also linked to a need to evaluate, up toallocation of praise and blame. See also Garud(2008): the significance of an event cannot bereadily understood in real time, but must beweighed against the overall flow of events overtime.



10. Compare the notion of a ‘fitness landscape’(Lansing & Kremer, 1993), and in biology, an‘epigenetic landscape’ (Waddington, 1975).

11. For further discussion of this example and howit has become iconic, so that the historicaldetails do not matter very much, see Rip (2009).

12. Hoogma (2000) has analysed this retrospec-tively for experiments with electric vehicles (seealso Hoogma et al., 2002). In Doorn (2006), anattempt is made to use the fit/stretch approachto anticipate future developments in nano-electronics.

13. There is a seeming contradiction: if something(here, the transition) is impending, there is noneed to talk about its necessity. In practice,actors mix the two kinds of argument whenthey try to enlist others to the cause. ‘See howimportant a transition towards sustainability (orsecurity, or whatever), so you must join theeffort.’ And: ‘You can’t resist, because the tran-sition is upon us.’

14. World Wars and other external pressures maylead to co-ordination of efforts and create direc-tion to the outcome. The threat of war and theneed for external security can have similareffects, as in the Cold War development of mili-tary technologies. The metaphor of ‘war’ is usedto call for such co-ordination and thrust, as inthe ‘War on Cancer’ (in the USA in the 1970s;see Rettig, 1977) or the ‘War on Poverty’(Edelman, 1977).

15. Now evolved into the ENIAC Joint Undertak-ing, dispensing R&D funds. See http://www.eniac.eu/web/index.php

16. This resembles de-alignment and re-alignment,but need not be linked to the introduction of aspecific technological novelty; see, for example,Stirling (2008).

17. There is rhetorical force in such words andphrases. An earlier example is plastics –compare its use in the 1968 movie The Graduate,where Dustin Hoffman, playing the graduate,receives this career advice: ‘I just want to sayone word to you. Just one word. . . . Plastics. . . There’s a great future in plastics.’

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Arie Rip was educated as a chemist and aphilosopher at the University of Leiden. Heintroduced and directed a program ofteaching and research in Chemistry andSociety there, moved to the Department ofScience Dynamics at the University ofAmsterdam (1984–1987) and then to thechair of Philosophy of Science and Technol-ogy at the University of Twente, fromwhich he has now retired. He hasresearched and published extensively onscience dynamics, technology dynamicsand technology assessment, and recentlyled a major research program on nanotech-nology and society.



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