A Research On Responsible Innovation Based On Overall-responsibility

Human beings are standing at a turning point today.We are not only face with Grand Challenges such as environmental pollution,ecological destruction,resource shortage,and distribution polarization,but also enormous risks brought by newly and emerging technologies like genetically modified engineering,artificial intelligence,nanotechnology and synthetic biology.Because existing theories cannot appropriately deal with these new situations,the Western academia has suggested the idea of"responsible innovation",which quickly became a hot topic in fields of philosophy of innovation,ethics of responsibility,science,technology etc.However,a few problems come when the idea has been developed;for example,the definitions of some key concepts are still fuzzy and its framework is incomplete.To make a further contribution,this research reinterprets the idea of responsible innovation and its framework by introducing the concept of "overall-responsibility",and then provides several potential answers to the questions like "what is responsible innovation exactly?" and "How could it be practiced?".A systematic comparison between responsible innovation and its familial concepts,including ethical innovation,technology assessment,sustainable development,total innovation,technological fix,and corporate social responsibility,indicates that the conception of responsibility underlying responsible innovation is beyond all individual,separate ones,for example,ethical responsibility,future responsibility,eco-responsibility,innovative responsibility,technological responsibility,and social responsibility.In other words,the responsibility within responsible innovation is an "overall-responsibility".Responsible innovation,therefore,should be understood as an overall-responsibility innovation.Overall-responsibility refers to the suggestion that a community of responsibility constituted by all stakeholders should actively take all the responsibilities involved within its reach.On the one hand,actual basis for realizing this overall-responsibility is the community of shared future for mankind,the information technology and the technology of modern transportation.On the other hand,collective responsibility,shared responsibility,cooperative responsibility,and common responsibility provide an ideological basis.The utopian spirit presented by overall-responsibility is the lasting effort of transcending reality and orienting practice.Overall-responsibility innovation could be seen as an evaluation as well as knowledge and practice,in which the innovation subjects respect people's rights,pursue the human welfare and take the overall-responsibility actively.It could be divided into five levels:quasi overall-responsibility innovation,primary overall-responsibility,basic overall-responsibility innovation,good overall-responsibility innovation and perfect overall-responsibility innovation.In addition,it has four characteristics:remoteness,wholeness,totalitiness and justiceness.Further,The Confucian Improvement based on the principles of justice and risk acceptance could be used as criteria for overall-responsibility innovation.The realization of overall-responsibility innovation is in the specific context and relationship,the innovation community under the guidance of value ideas,obey the overall-responsibility norms,act on the value objects through the overall-responsibility activities so to responsible to the overall-responsibility objects.The context contains certain period of time,regions,different kinds of industry,categories etc.The relationship includes structures,scales,layouts and time sequences.The subject is the innovation community consisted by all stakeholders and the object is the same,because during the realization the actors multiple responsible to each other.The guiding value ideas contain but not limit to liberation,welfare,justice and transparency.The norms include complying with the law,no intently harm to others,respecting to each other,fitting the values,useful for the resolving of Grand Challenges,matching the capacity and the principle of moderation.Moreover,the actions comprise engagement,anticipation,reflexivity and care.However,there will be three dilemmas when realizing overall-responsibility innovation.Responsibility excess appears as subjective hegemony and doting care;responsibility finitude raises because of the constraints of objective laws,external conditions,human finitude,moral luck,and the experimental nature of innovations;the problem of many hands would easily rise blaming game and the damage of justice.As a result,we should strengthen the responsibility identification,promote the role ability,and optimize social institutions to avoid selfish localism,over innovation,narrow innovation viewpoint,and unequal or unclear distribution of responsibility.This research clarifies the implications of overall-responsibility on the one hand,and on the other construct its practical path to promote the relevant researches.It is also of help for strengthening the education of technological ethics and providing some theoretical reference for the implementation of the five development ideas and the change of human development pattern.