Section: Technology and Knowledge

To achieve a better alignment of research and innovation with societal and environmental needs new holistic frames are in demand. The concept of Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) is such a new framework which has been widely promoted by the European Commission for a few years throughout the European Union's Framework Programmes for RTD (Research Technology & Development). The proposed RRI concept of the European Commission includes several dimensions such as research ethics, gender equality or open access. However, other approaches on RRI focus on the processes or the expected outcomes of RRI. Thus, a commonly agreed definition of the concept is still lacking. To understand the complexity of this concept and to make it applicable, practical examples and guidelines are currently developed. This results in rather high demands for the developers since the concept is not agreed on as well as the fact that due to the heterogeneous target groups the expectations and needs differ considerably. Still, there is an increasing demand for tools and methods for the concept's implementation that would ease the handling of RRI in the day-to-day practice from the very first steps towards and integration and reflections to the evaluation or assessment of the own RRI performance. One example that has taken first steps towards a supporting tool that would ease the practical implementations is the RRI tools project that has worked out criteria for quality assessment as well as a reflection tool for self-evaluation

How to cite:

Marschalek I., Handler K., Hofer M., Schrammel M., Unterfrauner E. (2019) Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI): A Critical Reflection Toward Evaluation Standards. In: Carayannis E. (eds) Encyclopedia of Creativity, Invention, Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Springer, New York, NY

you can download the article here

Authors: Handler, K., Hofer, M., Marschalek , i., Schrammel, M., Unterfrauner, E.,