Globelics Academy 2017 Tampere, Finland Innovation systems and social inclusion: towards Inclusive Innovation Systems Judith Sutz University Research Council, Universidad de la República Uruguay

Inequality in recent times

The first guiding question: How does innovation (and knowledge production) affect inequality...? By action (innovations that lead to inequality) By inaction (by not searching for effective solutions to problems that lead to inequality) By indifference (by not trying to redress the inequality effects of certain innovations)

The second guiding question (a) Through which aspects does inequality (and social marginalization) affect the mode of innovation and knowledge production? The innovation agendas: problems of social exclusion become invisible to innovation because they do not steam from effective demand The research agendas: problems of social exclusion are very difficult to unearth in knowledge terms they do not pay well in the academic reward system

The second guiding question (b) Through which aspects does inequality (and social marginalization) affect the participation in innovation and knowledge production? “User-producers” dialogues are particularly complicated to establish in highly asymmetric situations Mutual trust is difficult to build Lack of self-esteem can hamper fruitful joint-efforts to define and to solve problems “People in the margin do not have minds in the margin”, but grassroot innovations tend to be “not seen”

The third guiding question How can innovation (and knowledge production) be organized so that it contributes to a reduction of inequalities...? Before attempting to propose an answer, it is worth formulating the question the other way around: How can the fight against inequality and social marginalization contribute to enhance innovation and learning in developing countries? In fact, such fight can be a great opportunity. A real window of opportunity

A vicious circle that could be transformed in a virtuous one Business demand for innovation and knowledge production is structurally weak in developing countries This lead to a de-legitimation of knowledge policies and to a sort of self-fulfilled prophecy: “our capacities are too weak to address business demand” Under-utilization of existing indigenous capacities will continue unless an alternative source of knowledge and innovation demand appear (an effective demand both in cognitive and economic terms) If problems of social exclusion of all sorts could be transformed in a sustained demand for research and innovation, a huge learning process will be under way Stronger research and innovation capabilities could then “trickle-down” to business and competitiveness

Coming back to the third guiding question: How can innovation (and knowledge production) be organized so that it contributes to a reduction of inequalities...? By action: taking on board problems of social exclusion into research and innovation agendas By committment: paying special attention to the inequality effects of innovation and looking for mechanism to countervailing them By support: devoting important efforts, including money, to transform inequality problems in problems “with voice” and effective demand By “co-production”: building meaningful dialogues between people in different settings By symbolic rewards: prizing highly those that solve problems of inequality and social marginalization

It would be unfair to say that nothing of this sort exists On the contrary, countless examples of research and innovation that help solving the type of problems we are dealing with can be found But they hardly make a difference, because they do not scale-up; they remain as isolated anecdotes Scaling-up needs policies that foster systemic and reinforcing behaviors Which actors can take responsibility for that?

We arrive now to the subject of this class: innovation systems and social inclusion What kind of innovation actors, articulated into a innovation system, could deal effectively with social inclusion? A commonsensical observation: search first of all there were commitment to social inclusion is structural This leads to social policies But social policies are not innovation actors! This is precisely the problem!! We need to transform those that have a mandate to take care of social inclusion (in many different ways) in strong demanders of research and innovation directed to endogenous capabilities Social policies need “to become” innovation policies

What about innovation policies? Business as usual will not do the trick: “As a kind of countervailing power to the colonizing tendency emanating from market - oriented innovation policy we need to develop a wider field of politics – knowledge politics – that covers all aspects of knowledge production and takes into account that the production of knowledge has much wider scope than just contributing to economic growth”(Lundvall, 2010: 346). We can incorporate to this much wider scope the commitment to social inclusion, that is, including as an explicit aim of the innovation policy the redressing of social exclusion Innovation policies need to become social policies

Time for two examples Social policy in need of innovation policy: A pasteurization method for maternal milk was developed by a private firm on demand of a public hospital, based on the solidarity of feeding mothers: it is crucial for poor mother´s premature babies. Its innovative conception makes it cheap to produce. Why is it not widely produced and in use in every hospital in the country and beyond? Knowledge and innovation policy in need of social policy: A university program that funds research and innovation projects oriented towards social inclusion finds great difficulties in identifying suitable problems and needs

Can we be reasonably optimistic The mixture we are looking for can be labelled Inclusive Systems of Innovation Can we be reasonably optimistic in this regard? (i) A new pattern for research and innovation policies seems to be emerging, characterized by its direct relation with pressing social needs (particularly the family of demand-driven innovation policies); they can be seen as belonging to the field of knowledge politics in Lundvall’s sense. (ii) In a more or less systematic way, we are witnessing social policies with an innovation policy turn (Brazil and its health policy)

The task is far from easy... More than a “knowledge society”, we are witnessing the emergence of a “capitalist knowledge society” “Knowledge-based inequality prevails in contemporary world” (Charles Tilly, 2005) Inclusive Systems of Innovation will need to fight against all odds But we are here, in the Globelics Academy, with bright young scholars committed to think differently So the answer is yes, we can be optimistic!