Responsible Research and Innovation - The Strategic Challenge for Universities

RRI has become a core point of reference for university researchers. This paper poses five critical questions:

1.What responsibility does the researcher have for the transformations of society that follow from their research?
2.How far can researchers anticipate the range of these future transformations?
3.What does it entail, to engage with the wider public over these futures?
4.Is RRI a responsibility for the individual researcher or necessarily an inter-disciplinary endeavour?
5.What are the strategic implications for universities in relation to the wider society?

It argues that RRI should typically involves a whole series of actors: (a) researchers ranging from basic science to applied science – including social science (b) engagement with the companies and government bodies who apply their innovations in the wider world; (c) the dynamics of markets and other channels of diffusion of innovation; (d) publics and political actors taking stock of the changes under way.

No one scientist can assess their own responsibility therefore without situating it in within this larger chain - of our interrelated disciplines and of action beyond the university. This argues for an integrative notion of RRI, connecting up the university disciplines in a collaborative rather than a dispersive endeavour.