Technology Assessment from a TPM student point of view

First in order to reduce ambiguities, Technology, Policy and Management is a particular broad study. It could be compared with a Swiss Army knife, you study a broad technical side but also learn what governance and judicial aspects come with the problem or opportunity. With the study you get involved with many different multi-actor and complex problems where it is of great importance to map the complete problem field with every actor involved.

The concept of Technology Assessment (TA) is an interesting topic and Constructive Technology Assessment (CTA) even more. In one of my earlier columns I pointed out the important role of irrational emotional behavior among the stakeholders. In short summary, involved actors develop emotion based on knowledge, which comes from experience and what they have been told or informed with. These emotions have a big impact among stakeholders and their point of view.

TA is the study and evaluation of new technologies; this means that society can reflect on different technologies so that appropriate measures could be taken. A forerunner of TA is Impact assessment and is aimed at identifying the future consequences of a current or proposed action. This type of TA gives time and supports debate about new technologies and its implementation. In this way all the involved actors are able to share their thoughts and think about future scenarios.

Constructive Technology Assessment is even more interesting. CTA involves stakeholder while developing new technologies. In this form of Technology Assessment it is know that new technologies clashes with complex factors as: social, economic, technical and political factors. Which interest might align but more often have significant conflicting interests.

When involving stakeholders during the development, this leads to a longer time schedule of implementing new technologies. Throughout the development these stakeholders should be informed and be able to share their opinion about the technology. This is time consuming and, since time is money, not good for the producer.

So what are the advantages of Constructive Technology Assessment?

-          Involving stakeholders during the process, informing them and let them share their opinion about the technology, creates an iterative process. There is continuously feedback on the steps taken which leads to a continuously improvement of the technology during the development.

-          Involving stakeholders in discussion gives them the opportunity to share their concerns and emotions. If this could be dealt with and adapted, there is more support in favor of the technology

-          By involving stakeholders in the development this automatically promotes the technology. The stakeholders involved already know what the product is and through discussion improved support among them. This is almost free advertisement.

It is so import to get all actors in the problem field involved, because of the fact that new technologies are almost always complex problems when it goes to implementation. Every actor has their own vision and point of view, some of them could align others have serious conflicting interest. When involving these actors in the development and let them share their own thoughts and use these thoughts in the development, this leads to major support among the actors. Because of the fact that these actors are taken seriously and they are reassured, it creates a more positive attitude to the technology. It cost more time to develop because of the iterative process but it has more insurance to succeed.