Backcasting energy futures using industrial ecology

Backcasting has been widely used for developing energy futures. This paper explores the potential for using industrial ecology to guide the development of energy futures within a backcasting framework. Building on the backcasting work of Robinson [1], a seven step method is presented to embed industrial ecology principles within the development and assessment of future scenarios and transition paths toward them. The approach is applied to the case of backcasting regional energy futures in the Latrobe Valley, near Melbourne, Australia. This region has substantial brown coal deposits which are currently mined and used in coal-fired power stations to generate electricity. Bounded by a sustainability vision for the region in a carbon-constrained world, regional industrial ecologies in 2050 were backcast around three themes: bio-industries and renewables (no coal usage); electricity from coal with carbon capture and storage (low to high coal usage); and coal to products such as hydrogen, ammonia, diesel, methanol, plastics and char (demonstrating medium to high overall coal use relative to current levels). Potential environmental, technological, socio-political and economic impacts of each scenario across various life cycle stages were characterised. Results offer a platform for regional policy development to underpin deliberation on a preferred future by the community, industry and other stakeholders. Industrial ecology principles were found to be useful in backcasting for creatively articulating alternative futures featuring industrial symbiosis. However, enabling the approach to guide implementation of sustainable transition pathways requires further development and would benefit from integration within the Strategic Sustainable Development framework of Robèrt et al. [2].     

Envisioning sustainability: Recent progress in the use of participatory backcasting approaches for sustainability research

This paper describes recent progress in the utilization of participatory scenario-based backcasting approaches to sustainability research that blend quantitative and qualitative analyses in order to explore alternative climate change futures, as undertaken in a range of academic, government, and private sector projects in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, Canada. These projects reveal that buy-in to policy proposals may be enhanced by participation, but there is a risk of participants being overwhelmed by the complexity of the choices they are being asked to make. Furthermore, tools are grounded in a process, which must itself be the explicit focus of attention in designing successful backcasting projects and combining participatory backcasting techniques with more interactive processes that can enhance our ability to explore highly complex and uncertain, value-laden issues. These approaches can be used to drive action and support decision-making, but for a truly consultative and consensus-oriented process to occur, it is important that a broad sample of the community be engaged in the discussion that are equipped with technical knowledge or understanding of the goals of the process in order to participate in an equitable and effective fashion.     

Backcasting for sustainability: Introduction to the special issue

In this introductory paper we introduce the special issue on “Backcasting for Sustainability”. We present briefly a historical background, and position backcasting in the wider context of future studies, in which it can be related to “normative forecasting” and normative scenarios. We reflect on the diversity and variety of backcasting studies and experiments, as presented in the ten papers for this special issue. After summarizing the papers we formulate a future research agenda.     

科研人员职务科技成果赋权、组织能力与衍生创业间关系研究

科研人员职务科技成果赋权是推动职务科技成果转化的重要制度设计。现有研究多从权力改革视角探究赋权科研人员的作用效果,忽视了权力改革后组织能力支持对赋权效果的重要影响。选取中国科学院西安光学精密机械研究所作为案例研究对象,运用扎根理论,深入探究科研人员职务科技成果赋权、组织能力与衍生创业的关系。结果发现,科研人员职务科技成果所有权和长期使用权赋权对科研人员衍生创业具有正向影响;科研人员职务科技成果收益权下放程度与科研人员衍生创业呈倒U型关系;组织能力中的组织文化塑造能力、组织资源整合能力和组织制度构建能力分别在科研人员职务科技成果赋权影响衍生创业的过程中发挥中介作用。     

Beyond the veil — The real value of Foresight

The wide application of foresight would benefit from a common assessment framework that hardly exists. This would require a higher level of reference, i.e. pursuing more generic goals. This is offered by the two concepts of “knowledge society” and “participatory governance”. The aim of the research is to develop an impact assessment framework of foresight programmes in developing more participatory “knowledge societies” beyond their specific aims.Research shows that the major impacts of foresight belong to three groups, i.e. in relation to knowledge, network creation, and promoting public engagement in policy-making. At the same time, the major features of modern societies are of three types, i.e. related to knowledge value, to innovation-driven growth and to consequences of a “risk society”. Thus, the relevant areas where foresight might contribute are: knowledge, networking, and coping with a ‘risk society’.The new framework is built on the features and pre-conditions of more participatory societies and draws upon existing evaluation approaches and concepts (“theory-based evaluation”, “knowledge value framework”, “behavioural” and “cognitive capacity additionality”) to tackle short-comings of earlier evaluation efforts. It is then tested in a case study that demonstrates its feasibility and comprehensiveness and further refines the assessment criteria it is based on.     

Exploring social structures and agency in backcasting studies for sustainable development

This paper examines how social structures and agency have been included in backcasting studies for sustainable development. For this purpose an analytical framework was developed, based on what objects of change (whats), measures (hows) and change agents (whos) are included in the scenario, and to which extent these are approached in an explorative way. Through reviewing a number of backcasting studies it was found that these typically are built upon and elaborated with a predominant focus on the questions of what and how physical/technical aspects could change. Social objects of change and explicit representation or analysis of the question of who could change is rarely included in the analysis. This unbalance brings a number of implications. Firstly, not including social structures and agency obstructs developing socio-technically consistent and comprehensive scenarios. Secondly, through not addressing the questions of how to change and change by whom in an explicit and explorative way, social structures and agency become represented only implicitly and/or are maintained according to the status quo.     

Combining participative backcasting and exploratory scenario development: Experiences from the SCENES project

Social, natural and cultural systems are changing rapidly, influencing the future of Europe's fresh waters. One of the drivers shaping this future is the implementation of the Water Framework Directive. Participatory scenario development is well-suited to the challenges posed by the WFD to develop a long-term view by involving stakeholders. In this paper we analyse the process and results of a series of stakeholder workshops to develop scenarios at pan-European level. Specifically, we aim at analysing the method and results of combining a backcasting methodology and exploratory scenario development process. Four exploratory scenarios (narrative storylines) were developed, in first instance based on a set of existing European scenarios. Results matched expectations; the process produced stories that are complex, integrated, and rich in detail. During the backcasting exercise, four timelines were constructed, each of which took one exploratory scenario as context. The backcasting process established a strong link with the exploratory scenarios by identifying a large number of obstacles and opportunities in the realisation of those timelines. An analysis across all backcasts yielded a list of 15 robust elements, i.e. elements that are potentially effective in all exploratory scenarios. A stakeholder questionnaire showed that overall there was a widespread satisfaction with both the process and the results. Stakeholders were satisfied with the overall methodology and the exploratory scenarios and somewhat more critical on the backcasting exercise and resulting robust strategies. Above all, we hope to have demonstrated that it is conceptually appealing, methodologically feasible, and practically useful to combine exploratory scenario development and backcasting analysis.     

Participatory institutions: The context of common and private property resources

Participation is the initiation and continuance of an active process by which beneficiary groups influence the direction and execution of development activity. In the context of resource management participatory institutions often present an alternative when the market and/or the state fail to maintain resource stocks at desirable levels. This paper presents two case-studies of the emergence of participatory institutions and builds up analytical models that explain the process of their evolution in an inter-temporal framework.It is shown that the evolution, sustenance and replication of participation and its impact on levels of resource conservation depends on (a) the nature of the links between common and private property resources, (b) the possibility of taking advantage of scale economies, and finally (c) the distributional rules and arrangements.     

VUCA环境下商业模式裂变路径与机理——基于扎根理论的探索性研究

在VUCA环境下，企业商业模式裂变现象增多，但现有研究尚未揭示其具体形成路径与机理，无法指导企业实践。选取6家典型商业模式裂变企业，运用扎根理论方法构建商业模式裂变分类模型，探讨每类裂变发生机理。结果发现：VUCA环境能够促使管理者感知到可能存在的事业机会，并为实现事业发展目标进行创新变革，从而促成自我实现型商业模式裂变；组织通过资源有效编排，利用冗余资源推动商业模式创新，导致资源编排型商业模式裂变；企业为了应对外部压力，通过探索多元化市场和构建新的商业模式以获得竞争优势，导致外部压力型商业模式裂变。最后，对结果进行讨论，并提出相关建议。     

University spin-offs and their environment

Using nine university-level variables (including publications, patents, and spin-offs) and ten regional indicators, I show that the regional economy clearly differentiates Italian universities according to four distinct types, corresponding to four productivity levels. The typology stemming from multiple correspondence analysis suggests that a fertile context is important to successful universities; however, where the environment is extremely rich, individuals seem to strongly self-select at the beginning of their careers, thus dividing entrepreneurs from professors; hence university activities in these regions are lower. A categorical regression specifically exploring success in university spin-off creation tends to reject that publications and spin-offs are substitutes, and confirms several US findings, albeit in a significantly different environment.     

Get ready for the L-bomb: A preliminary social assessment of longevity technology

The societal impacts upon various sectors of the United States population resulting from the retardation of the cellular aging process in men and women is the subject of this study. Significant biomedical research advances of recent years, as well as future fruitful areas of bio-science exploration in genetic programming, parabiosis, vitamin therapy, body temperature control, calorie quality and quantity intake, and the control of free radicals in body compounds, indicate the life span of the present generation may be expanded by a considerable number of years. The potential impact upon various sectors of our societal structure and institutions would be enormous. This study proposes to evaluate and assess the impact of the resultant population alteration upon seven major social variables (employment, income, resource consumption, education, the social service load, social institutions, and legal problems). This will be analyzed over a number of ten year time segments.The study will attempt to determine the effects of longevity technology upon the social impact variables within the framework of five basic working lifetime scenarios as follows: (1) normal working lifetime, (2) extended working lifetime, (3) delayed working lifetime, (4) segmented working lifetime, and (5) divided working lifetime. Two computer models of the United States—a demographic and an econometric—will be used to systematically measure the implications of these scenarios for the social impact variables.     

ESTEEM: Managing societal acceptance in new energy projects : A toolbox method for project managers

There is now a large literature dealing with the policy question of public participation in technical choice and technology assessment (TA). Files such as the mad cow crisis, genetically modified food, and the emerging nanotechnologies have been edified into a public problem, and have given place to a number of experiments and reviews about participatory arrangements. Much less attention has been devoted so far to the application of the TA framework to more local and limited projects-not yet and maybe never reaching the public problem status-and the management of their societal dimensions. Among them, new energy technology represents a very interesting field for investigation: many of the new energy enjoy a global positive public image whereas the local implementation of their implantation often raises societal questions and oppositions. This paper describes an original experiment conducted in the field of new energy technologies during which a participatory technology assessment inspired approach was applied to a number of individual and local projects. A framework methodology called ESTEEM was developed to facilitate such participatory process to take place, and it was tested and evaluated in 5 projects located in 5 different countries over Europe. A detailed discussion of the ESTEEM method and its application to one case study, a Carbon Sequestration project in The Netherlands, is provided. We show that a major question in the application in such participatory framework is to establish a reflective practice of project management based on situated and constructive interactions between project promoters and project stakeholders.     

高技术研究机构与衍生企业关系研究

大众创业已成为时代最强音,迫切要求科研人员加快创业步伐。衍生企业是高技术研究机构科技成果转化的重要载体,而其与母体之间的关系深刻影响自身发展。基于制度理论和资源基础理论,构建衍生企业与母体关系分析框架。利用中科院长春光机所、深圳先进院、苏州纳米所、西安光机所案例,归纳了衍生企业与母体的一体式、合同式、平台式、生态式4种关系模式,总结为点、线、面、体的发展关系,提出高技术研究机构衍生企业分类管理政策建议。     

Participation and evaluation for sustainable river basin governance

This paper introduces a special section devoted to participation and evaluation for sustainable river basin governance. The departing point for this research was the recognition that although there is a relative agreement regarding the need to develop new multi-dimensional, inclusive and plural approaches to water resource management, there is still a deficiency of related methodologies and tools. This acknowledgement has motivated the undertaking of the ADVISOR — Integrated Evaluation for Sustainable River Basin Governance research project, which aimed at improving the understanding of evaluation processes, as part of river basin planning and management, and to test the use of specific tools to support the conduct of participatory processes. The paper starts with a discussion of the concept of integrated water resources management and an illustration of the water policies that have been adopted in different countries as a response to these trends. The conceptual framework that was developed in ADVISOR is then presented, as well as the main results from the ex-post analysis of the decision processes regarding five water related projects in different European countries. This analysis concluded that, in most situations, the decision-making processes fell short of including the interests, perceptions and values of affected parties. The remaining of the paper introduces the articles that form this special section, mostly devoted to the testing of new platforms for participation and deliberation. In the final section, a discussion on the assumptions and limitations of deliberative processes is presented, based on the results from the application of the different methods. Further research needs on the integration of different deliberative tools and on the integration of deliberation with decision processes are identified.     

Community foresight for urban sustainability: Insights from the Citizens Science for Sustainability (SuScit) project

A key strength of backcasting is arguably the emphasis it places upon envisaging longer-term distant futures, allowing participants and users to think beyond incremental changes in their current lived experience and to embrace the more radical and disruptive socio-technical changes which may be necessary to deliver sustainability. In so doing, however, backcasting may run the risk of obscuring significant differences in current lived experience, negating alternative problem framings and normatively derived views of what constitutes sustainability. This paper reports an innovative UK attempt to develop an inclusive ‘bottom-up’ community foresight process for urban sustainability research. Unlike most backcasting studies, the methodology was initially grounded in an exploration of the community participants' current lived experience and understandings of sustainability. Given the particular purpose of the study the primary outcome from the work was structured around the articulation of a ‘community-led’ agenda for urban sustainability research, rather than an explicit normative vision and transition pathway. However, the methodology could easily be adapted for use in other contexts, and showed potential to contribute to the formation of local ‘transition arenas’: facilitating network formation and building capacity for local sustainability initiatives and experiments.     

Developing and applying a framework to evaluate participatory research for sustainability

The normative implications of participatory research imply ongoing social learning that ought to lead to personal and institutional transformation. Sustainability science also requires reflexive scientific practice in order to enable the co-generation of solutions that take account of uncertainty and multiple forms of knowledge. However, there is little published peer-reviewed material on how to assess to what degree the rhetoric regarding the benefits of participatory research are achieved in practice, particularly with regard to participatory research for sustainability. This paper outlines how linking the rationales for participatory research and for sustainability science to the principles of evaluation can deliver a conceptually coherent evaluation framework for assessment. The approach for evaluating participatory research in this context consists of framing the evaluation, i.e., setting boundaries on the subject within its social, political, environmental and institutional context and selecting appropriate criteria, methods and data sources. The application of the framework, using a summative evaluation of participatory research for sustainability in north-east Australia, illustrates its strengths and weaknesses, concluding with a consideration of its applicability to further participatory sustainability science.     

The repertory grid to unfold conflicting positions: The case of a stakeholder dialogue on prospects for hydrogen

In this article we share our experience with the application of the repertory grid method, and we demonstrate that this is an appropriate method to scrutinize complex issues and to structure stakeholder dialogues on these issues. Repertory grid originates from construct psychology and has gradually gained ground in other domains as well, such as policy analysis. We used repertory grid to articulate, stakeholders' conceptions of the prospects for hydrogen (H₂). The aim was to highlight not only the mainstream notions of hydrogen but also conceptions that gain less prominence in the hydrogen discourse. Repertory grid was applied in a computerized fashion, with twenty-four stakeholders. During the grid exercise, the stakeholders systematically compared ten different hydrogen visions, which led to a variety of characteristics (‘constructs’) that they used to distinguish and rank the visions. The data were analyzed by means of a frequency analysis and a HOMALS analysis. The analyses demonstrate that repertory grid has been an appropriate method to structure the hydrogen dialogue in three ways: (1) it elicited the full range of concepts that stakeholders used to evaluate hydrogen options; not only the mainstream options and conceptions but also those who are in the margins of the discourse, (2) it identified the most salient hydrogen visions to be explored further in the dialogue, and (3) it helped to form dialogue groups according to these visions. We have also seen that, although repertory grid is well able to prepare for a dialogue process, to make optimal use of the results of repertory grid a genuine deliberation about the marginal positions and conceptions needs to be ensured, even if the powerful actors (who adhere to the mainstream conceptions) are not in favor of this.     

知识特性、创业导向对大学衍生创业绩效的影响

大学衍生创业是加速母体大学创新性科技成果转化的重要途径,大学知识特性、创业导向、综合创业能力和资源禀赋状况都会对衍生创业绩效产生影响。基于实证调查数据,构建了一个被调节的中介效应模型,检验了大学知识特性、创业导向与衍生创业绩效间作用机理,结果发现：知识特性、创业导向都有利于大学衍生创业绩效提升;创业能力在创业导向与大学衍生创业绩效间起中介作用;资源禀赋正向调节创业导向、创业能力与大学衍生创业绩效间关系。     

Economic Regulation and the Courts 1982 to 2001: Ten Cases That Made a Difference

The author has selected ten landmark cases for their likely impact on regulation and regulatory economics. His choice is unashamedly his own personal one and he recognizes that other legal scholars would not make the identical selection. However, there is likely to be substantial agreement on the importance of a majority of the cases. The ten cases are concerned with five themes: antitrust policy, contracting around the regulatory state, constitutional and contractual limits on regulation, the distribution of regulatory authority, and economics in the courtroom.     

Interpreting foresight process impacts: Steps towards the development of a framework conceptualising the dynamics of ‘foresight systems’

Foresight programmes are usually evaluated in terms of the achievement of initial objectives and the scale and nature of direct, anticipated impacts, notwithstanding the difficulty of measuring such impacts. However, indirect and/or unanticipated impacts that fall outside the scope of specific programme goals and objectives have also been reported. These are mainly impacts associated with the foresight process itself, i.e. with the way in which foresight exercises are designed and implemented. These impacts typically fall in areas such as:

• Knowledge creation, diffusion and absorption;

• Social capital and networking;

• The evolution of strategies to cope with or escape from the negative consequences of a ‘risk society’.

The diversity of the above areas suggests that foresight process impacts should be interpreted through the lenses of epistemology, sociology, political science, management science and organisational theory. In parallel, given that developments in the above spheres are strongly associated with the evolution of ‘participatory knowledge societies’, this paper presents an interpretation of foresight process impacts within a conceptual framework that attempts to characterise such societies.

Additionally, such an interpretation is conceived as a step towards the development of a conceptual framework aimed at understanding the dynamics of ‘foresight systems’. This framework should be capable of explaining the interdependencies and inter-relationships between system elements such as actors, processes, inputs, outputs and impacts, as well as the interaction of the system with the broader socio-technological-economic-political environment.

The overall aim of the paper is to develop an impact assessment framework for foresight exercises that assesses the degree to which they promote the development of ’participatory knowledge societies’.

The paper is based primarily on research carried out during the preparation of a PhD thesis entitled “Assessing the contribution of Foresight to a more participatory knowledge society”. The research mainly involved a literature review of available documentation on past and present foresight programmes and their results.