Rethinking Innovation

Innovation is changing. Traditionally viewed as a tool for financial return and market growth, there is mounting pressure to rethink and reframe the theory and practice of innovation for the pressing sustainability and inequality challenges of our era. This textbook provides students with a research-informed dive into the emerging space of innovation for systems/transformative change.

Combining real-world case studies with interdisciplinary theory, it shows how and why innovation for urgent global challenges requires a systems-based approach. Relevant for students and instructors of business and management, particularly innovation studies, development studies and related fields, this book is the first to provide a comprehensive, interdisciplinary and research-informed overview of alternative approaches to innovation focused on systemic change.

"At a time when the challenges for ‘people and planet’ are more pressing than ever, innovation becomes a crucial matter of concern. Can it be part of the solution or only of the problem? Is it possible to imagine innovation working in more responsible, inclusive and transformative ways? Finally, we have a textbook which will inspire and inform a new generation of business and management students – and give the older generation much to ponder. This is an excellent, and much-needed, introduction to an essential field of contemporary research and practice." (Alan Irwin, Professor in the Department of Organization, Copenhagen Business School, Denmark)
"This book is a timely compilation on innovation for students. It pulls together various related, but slightly different, concepts in innovation studies that are sometimes fragmented in the literature. It offers a comprehensive guide to making meaning of the dilemmas of emerging innovations in the 21st century. I find it useful in generating debate and critical thinking among innovation governance students. A must have for instructors and practitioners in unusual times." (Keren Arthur, Senior Lecturer in Entrepreneurship and Innovation & Director of Design Thinking and Innovation Hub, University of Cape Coast, Ghana)

"In these times of unprecedented global uncertainty and threat – when even the most established interests acknowledge needs to “transform our world” – there could hardly be a more important topic than the focus of this textbook. Engaging and authoritative, this refreshing and challenging text escapes from the outset the usual technological straitjackets, to broadly address ‘innovation’ as “futures in the making”. A clear and systematic narrative deftly unpacks long-established discourses and emerging new frameworks alike. Those committed to action in government, business, civil society or academia, could not hope for a more insightful, inspiring or pragmatic companion." (Andy Stirling, Professor of Science & Technology Policy, Science Policy Research Unit, University of Sussex, UK)


"This new textbook serves the undergraduate learner very well indeed, but it also reaches beyond this audience to the wider academic community who are together concerned and motivated by the shared project to challenge the dominant innovation paradigm." (Sally Randles, Professor of Sustainability and Innovation, Manchester Metropolitan University Faculty of Business and Law, UK)


"Innovation has become an imperative for the survival and expansion of our societies. But this ‘innovate or die mania’ hides innovation’s political nature and its capacity to enable just and equitable societies but also dystopian technocratic futures. We need new narratives for innovation that would 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. This book goes in this direction providing novel and refreshing perspectives on the notion of innovation and its role in delivering human wellbeing." (Mario Pansera, Director of Post-growth Innovation of University of Vigo, Spain)


"Innovations do not serve our interests equally. They have specific geographies and politics. They can amplify biases and injustices, but also empower marginalised actors and generate new forms of resistance. Innovation and management studies need critical thinking about the role of innovations in society and organisations. This book offers invaluable support to the practices of both educators and those who innovate or manage innovations. It prompts us to reflect on how we create value and for whom and equips us with two complementary capabilities. One is to critically evaluate innovations, while being cognisant of their multiple meanings, and the other is to steer them towards futuresthat are more just and equitable." (Barbara Ribeiro, Associate Professor at the Centre for Artificial Intelligence, SKEMA Business School, Paris, France)

Katie Ledingham is a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Exeter Business School. Katie’s interdisciplinary teaching and research asks critical questions about how innovation can be made more equitable, just and inclusive.

Sarah Hartley is Professor of Technology Governance at the University of Exeter Business School. Sarah researches and teaches the governance of emerging science and technology applications that seek to address societal challenges and yet generate controversy.

Richard Owen is Professor in Innovation Management at the University of Bristol School of Management. Originally trained as an environmental scientist, his research sits at the intersection of innovation governance and science and technology studies as a critical, interdisciplinary scholar.