Department of Science and Technology Studies, University of Vienna, Universitätsstrasse 7, 1010, Vienna, Austria.
School of Management, Technical University Munich, Arcisstrasse 21, 80333, Munich, Germany.
Sci Eng Ethics. 2021 Feb 18;27(1):13. doi: 10.1007/s11948-021-00292-y.
Current European innovation and security policies are increasingly channeled into efforts to address the assumed challenges that threaten European societies. A field in which this has become particularly salient is digitized EU border management. Here, the framework of responsible research and innovation (RRI) has recently been used to point to the alleged sensitivity of political actors towards the contingent dimensions of emerging security technologies. RRI, in general, is concerned with societal needs and the engagement and inclusion of various stakeholder groups in the research and innovation processes, aiming to anticipate undesired consequences of and identifying socially acceptable alternatives for emerging technologies. However, RRI has also been criticized as an industry-driven attempt to gain societal legitimacy for new technologies. In this article, we argue that while RRI evokes a space where different actors enter co-creative dialogues, it lays bare the specific challenges of governing security innovation in socially responsible ways. Empirically, we draw on the case study of BODEGA, the first EU funded research project to apply the RRI framework to the field of border security. We show how stakeholders involved in the project represent their work in relation to RRI and the resulting benefits and challenges they face. The paper argues that applying the framework to the field of (border) security lays bare its limitations, namely that RRI itself embodies a political agenda, conceals alternative experiences by those on whom security is enacted upon and that its key propositions of openness and transparency are hardly met in practice due to confidentiality agreements. Our hope is to contribute to work on RRI and emerging debates about how the concept can (or cannot) be contextualized for the field of security-a field that might be more in need than any other to consider the ethical dimension of its activities.
当前，欧洲的创新和安全政策越来越倾向于应对那些被认为对欧洲社会构成威胁的挑战。在这方面，一个特别明显的领域是数字化的欧盟边境管理。在这个领域，负责任的研究和创新（RRI）框架最近被用来指出政治行为者对新兴安全技术的偶然维度的所谓敏感性。总的来说，RRI 关注的是社会需求以及各利益相关者群体在研究和创新过程中的参与和包容，旨在预测新兴技术的不良后果，并为其寻找社会可接受的替代方案。然而，RRI 也因其被视为行业驱动的企图，试图为新技术赢得社会认可而受到批评。在本文中，我们认为，虽然 RRI 唤起了不同行为者进入共同创造对话的空间，但它也揭示了以负责任的方式治理安全创新的具体挑战。在经验上，我们借鉴了 BODEGA 案例研究，这是第一个将 RRI 框架应用于边境安全领域的欧盟资助研究项目。我们展示了参与该项目的利益相关者如何根据 RRI 来代表他们的工作，以及他们面临的由此产生的利益和挑战。本文认为，将该框架应用于（边境）安全领域揭示了其局限性，即 RRI 本身体现了一种政治议程，掩盖了那些被安全措施实施的人的替代经验，并且由于保密协议，其开放性和透明度的关键主张在实践中几乎无法实现。我们希望为 RRI 的工作以及关于如何为安全领域（这一领域可能比其他任何领域都更需要考虑其活动的伦理维度）对该概念进行背景化的新兴辩论做出贡献。
