Project description DEENESFRITPL Examining the role of innovation in a post-growth era The narrative of infinite economic growth has overlong conditioned the role of innovation. This context of technological determinism and productivism overshadows the socially constructed character of technological development, its political function and its potential to enable both fair societies and technological dystopias. The EU-funded PROSPERA project will challenge the paradigm of endless growth drawing its arguments from the hypothesis that untangling innovation from growth is crucial to imagining a post-growth era. PROSPERA will explore new narratives for innovation that would accordingly change and increase the scope of the innovation concept itself in cultural and institutional transformation, and subsequently in social life and social order. Show the project objective Hide the project objective Objective The feasibility and desirability of endless economic growth is increasingly being questioned by scholars and activists. While envisioning alternative economic models is key to assure the sustainability and wellbeing of present and future generations, few studies have analysed what might be the role of ‘innovation’ in a post-growth era. Innovating has become the imperative for the survival and expansion of any form of organisation. But this ‘innovate or die mania’ underpins assumptions – such as technological determinism and productivism - that neglect the socially constructed character of technological development, its politics and its capacity to enable just and equitable societies but also dystopian technocratic futures. This project posits that untangling innovation from growth is key to imagining a post-growth era. If growth is going to be unsustainable, we need new narratives for innovation that would accordingly also have to change and increase the scope of the innovation concept itself, beyond technology, into cultural and institutional change, and indeed social life and social order. Organizations – in particular capitalist enterprises - are the core of modern industrial societies but are also one of the places in which the discourse of growth is legitimised and constantly reproduced. However, they can also be the places in which people can start to build the capacity for developing alternatives to challenges the growth ideology. But how organizations would look like in a different paradigm, in a system that is not based on and doesn’t not rely on endless growth? Under which conditions STI without growth would be able to flourish? What levels of technological complexity can we reach in a non-growing economy? What policies, infrastructures and organizational forms are needed or are more likely to facilitate this new paradigm of STI? These are questions, rarely asked by innovation, management and organization scholars, that the proposed project will address. Fields of science social sciencessociologyideologies Programme(s) H2020-EU.1.1. - EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC) Main Programme Topic(s) ERC-2020-STG - ERC STARTING GRANTS Call for proposal ERC-2020-STG See other projects for this call Funding Scheme ERC-STG - Starting Grant Coordinator UNIVERSIDAD DE VIGO Net EU contribution € 1 424 375,00 Address Lg campus lagoas marcosende 36310 Vigo pontevedra Spain See on map Region Noroeste Galicia Pontevedra Activity type Higher or Secondary Education Establishments Links Contact the organisation Opens in new window Website Opens in new window Participation in EU R&I programmes Opens in new window HORIZON collaboration network Opens in new window Other funding € 0,00 Beneficiaries (1) Sort alphabetically Sort by Net EU contribution Expand all Collapse all UNIVERSIDAD DE VIGO Spain Net EU contribution € 1 424 375,00 Address Lg campus lagoas marcosende 36310 Vigo pontevedra See on map Region Noroeste Galicia Pontevedra Activity type Higher or Secondary Education Establishments Links Contact the organisation Opens in new window Website Opens in new window Participation in EU R&I programmes Opens in new window HORIZON collaboration network Opens in new window Other funding € 0,00
