Responsible Innovation

Responsible Innovation 2 Responsible Innovation Philippe de Woot 3 First published 2016 by Greenleaf Publishing Limited Published 2017 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business Copyright © 2016 Taylor & Francis All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Cover by Sadie Gornall-Jones Copy-editing and typesetting by Andrew Welsh (www.andrew-welsh.com) British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data: A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN-13: 978-1-78353-443-2 [pbk] ISBN-13: 978-1-78353-521-7 [hbk] 4 The problem that is usually being considered is how capitalism administers existing structures, whereas the relevant problem is how it creates and destroys them. (Schumpeter) A change always lays the cornerstone for a new change. (Machiavelli) For those who spread their sails in the right way to the winds of the earth will always find themselves borne by a current toward the open seas. (Teilhard de Chardin) Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore. (Gide) We have gone further than we thought because we have been innovative. (Eric Domb) The new, barely born, is soon an old moon. (Jean d’Ormesson) 5 Contents Introduction 1 Innovation at the heart of the economy The decisive competitive weapon The collective entrepreneur: increased innovative power Racing ahead and temporary monopolies The entrepreneurial chain and corporate culture 2 Innovation, fairness and the common good Woe to the vanquished: creative destruction Prometheus or the ambiguity of economic and technical creativity Power over the future in an ethical and political vacuum 3 Responsible innovation The entrepreneurial imperative Turning creativity into progress A more societal focus of creative capacity Ethics, politics and the techno-sciences Social innovations 6 Introduction Economic development is rooted in rupture and not in equilibrium. The competition that really counts is competition by innovation, applied to existing products and services. It does not have a marginal role but is central to progress. This type of competition acts through creative destruction. The agent of this competitive struggle is an unusual character: the entrepreneur. He has very specific qualities that are rarely combined in an individual: vision of potential progress; a sufficient appetite for risk and a determination to implement; and an energy and power of conviction to bring about the necessary assistance and resources. Today, enterprises themselves play the role of innovator. They have become “collective entrepreneurs”. If successful companies are observed over a period of five to ten years, not one of them has failed to adapt, transform, renew. All have evolved, and all have innovated in their products, in their markets or in their processes and their organization. Under the pressure of competition, the company is obliged to adopt this logic of innovation, creativity and change. Its long-term survival depends on it. The reason for this is that it gives the enterprise a decisive lead and a major comparative advantage; this innovation is the competitive weapon par excellence, providing a sort of temporary monopoly. This allows the company to set high prices and often reap significant