New Trends, New Challenges
International Workshop, Copenhagen Business School, Denmark, 1-2 March 2012
Governance of the Discontinuation of Socio-Technical
Systems
By Peter Stegmaier, Stefan Kuhlmann, Vincent R. Visser
Work in progress! Don’t quote or share without permission. Commentaries and
suggestions are welcome. For contact details, see at the end.
0. Introduction
The governance of socio-technical systems has preferentially been associated with advancement and innovation. Discontinuation of socio-technical systems is, at most, discussed as regime change, innovation setback or failure—as if advance-ment and innovation was the only direction in which socio-technical developadvance-ment and its governance would go. This paper aims at a better understanding of the gov-ernance of the abandonment of socio-technical systems. As observed since Schum-peter’s (1942) insight concerning the symmetry of creation and destruction, the anticipation of discontinuation and fading out is as important as the driving force of expectations about innovation and progress itself. It is crucial to see how technolo-gies are recombined, getting unpopular, liquidated, how promises dissolve—in short: disappear over the horizon of a different future than the one, which was an-ticipated in the past.
The analysis is carried out in five steps: Firstly, we conceptualise the idea of ‘discontinuation governance’; secondly, we provide a preliminary analysis of four exemplary cases placing exemplary emphasis on one of the cases, the phasing-put of incandescent light bulbs in the Netherlands; thirdly, we outline a heuristic de-rived from some explorative cases analyses that spot light on four key dimensions of ‘discontinuation governance’; fourthly, we discuss and partially re-interpret the technological substitution pathway model of Geels/Schot; and we end with conclu-sions and outlook for further research and policy uptake of ‘discontinuation gov-ernance’ as a strategic challenge.
The paper is partially based on research ideas recently developed by a consorti-um of researchers from the Netherlands (Stefan Kuhlmann, Peter Stegmaier, Vin-cent Visser), United Kingdom (Andrew Stirling, Frank Geels), France (Pierre-Benoît Joly, Marc Barbier, Frank Dedieu), and Germany (Johannes Weyer, Marc Mölders). The group at STePS, University of Twente, has initially coined the core research question; with this paper we aim to develop a related research heuristic.
1. Discontinuation and its Governance
We study the governance of discontinuation by observing and analysing relevant institutions, actor networks, governance strategies, and governance pathways in a
multilevel perspective. We explore which forms and ways of termination can be empirically identified in the aforementioned sectors and which are conceivable in principle.
The patterns of development of socio-technical systems have been studied broadly (cf. e.g. Mayntz/Hughes 1988), in particular concerning the growth and the governance of large technical systems (Coutard 1999, Schneider/Bauer 2009), is-sues of path dependency (Garud/Karnøe 2001, Meyer/Schubert 2007) or the trans-formation of established systems, e.g. by regime change (Geels 2007; Geels/Schot 2007; Markard/Truffer 2006; Konrad et al. 2012). However, the success of a new technology goes hand in hand with the hybridisation, fading out, marginalisation, or failure of existing technologies. The number of studies addressing this kind of development is rather small. Latour (2002) tells the story of an ambitious transport technology system called “Aramis” that was ceased politically after some years of intensive research and development at the height of the investment activities, but before the new transport technology could be brought into use. Here, the old sys-tems survive and new ones are developed in the continuity of the old.
Utterback (2003), while describing the role of technological evolution and in-novation, also narrates how the U.S. harvested ice industry demised as the result of the technical feasibility and economic success of first machine made ice and later electric refrigerators. In this case, an established and highly profit-yielding product and system has been driven out of the market. Its place was taken—sometimes abruptly, sometimes gradually—by other technologies and products still offering ice and refrigeration, but by other means. Utterback suggests:
“Generally, in any product market there are periods of continuity, when the rate of innovation is incremental and major changes are infrequent, and periods of disconti-nuity, when major product or process changes occur. Radical changes create a new business and transform or destroy exiting ones.” (2003: 84)
This summarising observation focuses on the level of markets for technologies and their innovations. Three dimensions inform the analytical framework: ‘discontinui-ty’ pertaining to a product or a process; a product substitution or a broadened mar-ket; for established industry, competence-enhancement or competence-destruction (2003: 89). A deeper elaboration has recently been suggested by Turnheim & Geels, emphasising a “neglected aspect of the transitions literature: the destabilisa-tion of existing regimes and industries” (2012: 1). Reviewing and integrating vari-ous literatures, they consider “industry destabilisation is best seen as a longitudinal process that involves both external pressures (...) and endogenous enactment (...)“ (ibid.: 3) across several stages, such as disruptive’ innovations causing the decline of existing industries, as an economic decline process, driven by economic perfor-mance problems and shrinking financial resources, as a de-legitimisation process (ibid.: 2-3).
In contrast to ‘discontinuity’ as market phenomenon (Utterback) and ‘destabili-sation’ as a regime transition phenomenon (Turnheim & Geels), our attention is firmly focused on the hitherto somewhat neglected issue of explicit, deliberate, dedicated governance measures for the discontinuation of established socio-technical systems and their associated regimes—in other words, on ‘discontinua-tion’ as purposeful governance action sui generis. The core question can be formu-lated in a terminology that asks what discontinuation means as a problem of action for policy-makers. From this point of view, continuity and breaks can be investi-gated as ‘governance of problems’ (Hoppe 2010): the concept of ‘discontinuation governance’ becomes recognizable as effects of social action and tangible as for systematic empirical investigation.
The study combines the theoretical framework provided by actor-centred insti-tutionalism with an agency perspective that allows for an integrated view on struc-tures and actors (Mayntz/Scharpf 1995; Scharpf 2000). The focus is on relevant (hard, soft) institutions, actors, and their relations and negotiations. The (boundedly rational) actors and institutions are analysed in terms of how they relate and inter-act in networks aiming to achieve discontinuation. This may include cabinet deci-sions and company strategic acts as much as public-private collaborations, public debate, regulation, and media as actors as well as more or less organised citizens’ groups. To an extent greater than in many other innovation studies, it is also neces-sary to consider the formative role of social movements and civil society organisa-tions—as ‘sub-political’ (Beck 1996) arenas for the institutionalisation of innova-tive normativity; as sources of distributed political pressures and as nurturing envi-ronments for niche experimentation (Smith 2007; Seyfang/Smith 2007; Stirling, 2011). Framed and sensitised through such considerations, but not limited to them, we develop a set of empirically grounded categories (Strauss/Corbin 1990) that allow us to find the appropriate concepts to describe, understand, and explain dis-continuation governance.
A general, non-specific, notion for what is at issue here is ‘regime change’. A ‘socio-technical regime’ (Geels 2002: 14; Geels 2007: 399-400)—the extended concept of Nelson and Winter’s (1982) ‘technological regime’—can be defined as a socio-technical configuration that fulfils a societal function, such as energy pro-vision, transport, or housing (cf. Konrad/Markard/Truffer 2006: 2). This alignment and the interrelations of actors, institutions, activities and structures is a key for the stabilisation of the whole complex. Nevertheless, it can also give direction to change, making certain changes more likely than others, and “incremental changes more likely than radical changes” (Konrad/Markard/Truffer 2006: 2). To round off the picture of regimes, the surrounding macro-level socio-technical landscape, external to the regime, needs to be taken into account (Geels & Schot 2007: 400).
Regime change, as understood by Smith et al. (2005), is the interaction of two processes: (a) shifting (economic, legal, political, cultural) selection pressures on the regime, and (b) the coordination of resources available inside and outside the regime to adapt to these pressures (cf. Geels & Schot 2007: 400-1). This model is realistic in so far as it includes both external and internal factors, factors of interre-lation and factors of influence, as well as the agency dimension (transition trajecto-ries enacted by social groups; structuration of activities in local practices; strategies and strategic interactions of involved actors; intended plans and unintended behav-iour) (Geels 2011: 29-31; Geels/Schot 2007: 402). Although policy discourses often superficially encourage such interpretations, it is a mistake for analysis to assume transitions to be self-evident, technical and deterministic processes, coordi-nated unambiguously and ex ante from the outset in explicit, centralised ways. In reality, also the coordination of discontinuity is an emergent, distributed and intrin-sically ambiguous political phenomenon, unfolding in real time over the course of the transition itself (cf. Geels & Schot 2007: 400, 402).
Discontinuation can be interpreted as one kind of regime change. In the light of the technological substitution pathway described by Geels & Schot (2007: 410) discontinuation can be thought of as the case when a technology drops off the pre-sent sociotechnical regime as the result of (or at least associated with) a specific moment of shock in the broader political-cultural landscape. Within this imagery, discontinuation would mean that a socio-technical system falls into a niche exist-ence, if it doesn’t vanish completely.
Figure 1: Adapted (emphasis added) from Geels/Schot (2007: 410)
In the following, we take four quick explorations as starting basis for the develop-ment of a research heuristic. Instead of starting from hypotheses, which makes sense only in previously well-researched areas, we thus build both the search heu-ristic and the conceptualisation of the governance problems (questions and theory) on the grounds of the investigated phenomena themselves. This provides us with a preliminary heuristic for the analysis of discontinuation governance, which consists of the five problem dimensions:
Exiting Types of termination
Process dynamics Types of dynamics
Policy instruments Types of instruments
Scope Types of range and application
Legitimation Types of regulation and justification
Table 1: Preliminary heuristics for analysing discontinuation governance
The heuristic so far only implicitly addresses aspects like culture (e.g., as knowing what, when and how to discontinue and to build the necessary agendas and net-works) or power (enforcing something in coalitions). These aspects may be added to the heuristic if we will find that they help to draw the fuller picture. A closer look at the types of actors and interaction involved in and busy with the dedicated governance problem of discontinuing technologies and systems is necessary, too, if the concept of discontinuation governance shall encompass the full complexity of how structure, process and action is interwoven.
In the next section, we sketch four cases and derive first indications of the typi-cal structures and processes of discontinuation and its governance.
2. Patterns of Fading Sociotechnical Systems Out
There are a number of relevant present-day cases of purposeful discontinuation of socio-technical systems and their surrounding infrastructures. Recent examples of discontinuation discussed in this paper indicate the significant pace and political momentum that can be acquired in such initiatives.
The following four case studies are well suited to study the conceptual
ques-
tions sketched above. They have been selected due to their topicality, their dissimi-larity, but also regarding different policies in four countries, the Netherlands, Ger-many, France and the United Kingdom:
(1) the phase-out of the incandescent light bulb technology through the EU reg-ulation 244/2009, based on the Eco-Design of Energy-Using Products Directive 2009/125/EC, started in the EU in 2009;
(2) commitments to phase out nuclear power from its current major role in the energy sectors of several countries worldwide, with others ceasing earlier-planned nuclear expansion; discontinuation efforts have been accelerating since the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, Spring 2011;
(3) the synthetic pesticide DDT which was banned for agricultural use world-wide under the Stockholm Convention in 2004;
(4) a major trend in automotive drive engineering to replace fossil fuel combus-tion technology by (battery) electric engine technology, a trend that has been speeding up since the global economic recession in the late 2000s.
Each case exemplifies in different ways the policy pace, political will and institu-tional momentum required in order to transform wider governance environments so as to achieve such large-scale shifts in socio-technical infrastructure.
2.1 Phase-out of the incandescent light bulb technology
The phase-out of the incandescent light bulb (ILB) technology through the EU regulation 244/2009, based on the Eco-Design of Energy-Using Products Directive 2009/125/EC, started in the EU in 2009. Thus the European Union, and also Swit-zerland and Australia, come four years after Brazil and Venezuela who were the first to start phasing ILB out in 2005. Argentina, Russia, and Canada are planning phase-outs in 2012, and Malaysia in 2014. The phase-out occurs disruptive in sev-eral countries. In the EU, the immediate discontinuation applies only to gensev-eral- general-purpose, non-directional incandescent bulbs. The limit will be gradually moved down to lower wattages, and the efficiency levels raised by the end of 2012. Dif-ferent speeds can be observed also between official and private phase-out policies: retailers in many EU countries have reported bulk purchasing through consumers, who thus extend the phase-out in private realms beyond the official deadlines.1
Policy problems of ILB discontinuation and its trade-offs
C1: Level of policy National vs. supranational C2: Strategy of discontinuation Stimulation vs. ban
C3: Pace of regulation Slowing down due to slow innovation vs. speeding up regulation in order to foster faster innovation Policy problems for
dealing with conse-quences of ILB discontinuation
C4: Replacement costs Intervention high price of bulbs vs. return of in-vestment
C5: Price regulation Price policy vs. regulation by market C6: Old infrastructure Transition period vs. total ban
C7: ILB specificities Exceptions for (continued) use vs. no exceptions for use
Table 2: Considerations in parliamentary debate
1 Many shops in Germany sold 80-150 % more light bulbs in the first half of 2009, as Spiegel (www.spiegel.de/spiegel/vorab/0,1518,638227,00.html [16.02.2012]) reports.
We are currently analysing various actors’ governance problems and strategies of ILB discontinuation in the Netherlands. As a first step, an attempt is made to re-construct from documents the discourses setting the agenda for governance chang-es (“chang-establishing the problem”). We start from asschang-essing proceedings of the Dutch parliament (questions officially asked by members of parliament and answered by the government), before and after the ILB discontinuation was finally decided on EU level. Main considerations discussed are displayed in the overview in table 2 above.
In order to give a taste of the considerations that were discussed between gov-ernment and parliament in the making of a discontinuation policy for the Nether-lands, we present abstracts of the seven aforementioned considerations:
C1: In the discussion on the ILB discontinuation, the level of the proposed discontinuation
poli-cy is an omnipresent issue. From the beginning the focus of the parliament is in favor of suprana-tional regulation.
In a first reaction on the written questions about a possible ban on the ILB, the minister of Eco-nomic Affairs and the state secretary of Housing, Spatial Planning and Environment (VROM) at that time explained that they focus on an European approach (TK 2007b: 1933). In a subsequent round of written questions from the same member of the Dutch parliament (MP), the same min-ister and state secretary explained that they cannot initiate a national policy, because this topic was already discussed on the supranational level for the making of an eco-design directive (TK 2007a: 2457-8). The new installed minister of VROM also made it clear that she strives for a Eu-ropean approach as well (TK 2007c: 3763-5). In one document, the ministry of VROM acknowl-edged that supranational policy in relation to the environment is often more efficient and effec-tive in comparison with national policy. However, due to the specific characteristics of individu-al countries, they thought it could be justified to develop a nationindividu-al policy as well (TK 2008b: 1-3). Although in the parliamentary discussion, the supranational focus had not been contested much, the minister wanted to underline that the Dutch delegation had much influence on the is-sue and the manner of phasing out (TK 2008a: 31).
In general, the responsible ministers and state secretaries—besides those from VROM also those from the ministry of Economic Affairs and the after 2010 to the ne ministry of Infrastructure and Environment—explained that the Dutch government was not able to develop a national regula-tion due to European policy-making on the same topic. However, they assured to put much effort in a supranational policy instead. Although they left space open for specific national policy, the legitimacy of supranational policy seemed not to be a point of discussion.
C2: In the discussion on the discontinuation of the light bulb, there was no disagreement that
en-ergy-efficient lighting should be the norm. However, there was discussion on the way this norm needed to be established.
From the start, the minister of VROM was clear about her goal to ban ILBs. However, various MPs disagreed on a ban and argued in favor of discontinuation by stimulation of the use of ener-gy-efficient lighting (TK 2007c: 3763-5). The critique on a ban was the high degree of choice containment of consumers in favor of the collective interests. Although the ministry acknowl-edged that a ban is a ‘steering measure’ (VROM 2010: 12), the minister believed that there are enough alternatives, so there will be a low degree of choice containment (TK 2007c: 3763-5).
All the actors wanted to take the effort to make energy-efficient lighting the norm. However, alt-hough the minister chooses for a ban, some of the MPs assured that this strategy would have too much impact on the choice containment of consumers.
C3: While the phasing out of the ILB was taking its first step, the discussion about the feasibility
of the discontinuation reoccurred. In particular, the practicability of the energy-efficient lighting on the market was openly questioned, due to the slow pace of innovation.
An MP asked the minister of VROM whether there was a possibility to make exceptions for the use of certain ILBs and slow the regulation down due to the slow innovation of energy-efficient lighting (TK 2009b: 8375-8). However, the minister underlined that making exceptions for the use of the discontinued technology should stimulate innovation. She argued that manufactures need to innovate, therefore exceptions will not be necessary and innovation will be forced upon them.
While an MP perceived the technological development of efficient-lighting as a feasibility prob-lem for a total ban of the ILB, the minister wanted to improve the feasibility by sticking to the ban.
C4: The purchase costs were seen by some of the MPs as a major disadvantage of
energy-efficient lighting. The minister of VROM agreed that these high prices could raise a threshold (TK 2009b: 8356). However, she did not want to put an effort in eliminating this threshold,
be-cause the total return of investment is far more than the purchase costs, the lamps use less energy and have a better durability, she argued.
Although there was an agreement that the purchase costs can be an economic obstacle, the min-ister, however, did not want to invest in taking away this obstacle, because she focused on the return of investment of the new light bulbs.
C5: To overcome the high purchase costs of energy-efficient lighting, MPs asked for measures
from the government. A first measure that was discussed is the stop on import levy on energy-efficient lighting (TK 2008a: 8). The government agreed on this measure and explained that they would try to deal with this on EU level. Another measure that was asked from the government is a VAT reduction on efficient lighting (TK 2009a: 361-2; 2009b: 8355-6). In both documents, MPs asked the minister of VROM whether she wanted to install a VAT reduction. The minister replied that the return of investment speaks for itself, and that she believes that the growing de-mand for efficient lighting will let the manufactures innovate and lower the prices automatically (TK 2009a: 361-2, 2010: 2).
While some of the MPs asked to come up with measure for the economic effects of discontinua-tion of ILB, the minister replied that she thinks the market can regulate through innovadiscontinua-tion.
C6: An important disadvantage of the discontinuation of the IBL discussed is the old
infrastruc-ture of lighting that doesn’t fit with the new type of bulbs. This s a result of the different shapes of the new bulbs in comparison with the old bulbs. Consequently, there is a chance that new bulbs do not fit in the old armatures of lamps (TK 2007c: 3763-4, 2008: 8). The minister of VROM did not believe in an extra transition period for these infrastructural problems and ad-justments (TK 2007c: 3763-4). She argued that when this will become a problem manufactures will be forced to solve this.
The minister did not believe that the design obstacles of the discontinuation of the ILB had a need to be solved by a transition period, but a total ban will force the manufactures to solve this obstacle.
C7: The ILB has a broad spectrum of light and is believed to produce more natural light. Energy
efficient lighting is often accused of producing artificial or ugly light. As a result, the ation of the ILB can harm light sensitive people and a MP asked to leave room in the discontinu-ation policy for exceptions like that for the use of the old technology (Tweede Kamer, 2009b, pp. 8357-8358). However, the minister did not want to leave room for the use of ILB in specific cas-es. She argued that exceptions will not be needed when you force the manufactures to innovate and overcome these exceptions with the help of a total ban (Ibid.). Additionally, the Minister ex-plained that the improved Halogen light bulb can act as a temporal solution for these types of problems (Tweede Kamer, 2007c, p. 3765).
Also for specific exceptions, the minister did not want to change the regulation of the ban. In that way, she believed the ban will be embedded most effectively.
This short excursion into debates and agenda setting shows that, as the heuristic suggests, in fact the choice between ban and positive sanctions is an issue, as well as exceptions for different usages, and the question which role regulation could play as opposed to stimulation by incentives (positive sanctions). Both government and members of parliament consider not only the state side, but also the market side of phasing out ILBs, and the government assigns the companies an active role framed through the way the state acts.2
As a next steps in this pilot research on the Dutch ILB case the strategy dis-courses of other relevant actor groups will be reconstructed and compared.
The discontinuation strategy in this field is characterised by a domino effect, where some pioneers made solo attempts, and transnational coordinated efforts followed later. This case also reveals how much a seemingly small technical device such as the light bulb is bound into a larger socio-technical system. The phase out of the small light bulb has wider effects on the infrastructure, on lightening indus-tries as well as on consumer products. Additionally, the case is one recent example
2 Some of the discussion took place before the EU legislation was introduced and some afterwards. So, a part of the data covers the continued discussion about the regulation that was already finalized on the EU level— which is interesting, because despite or while there was a supranational decision, the MPs still tried to change, or at least comment on the regulation by debates with the minister.
for termination by redefinition of technical standards.
2.2 Nuclear energy
In the energy sector, several of countries all-over the world made formalised politi-cal commitments to switch from nuclear towards renewable energy in such a way that they will either exit nuclear energy technology, build no nuclear power plants at all, stop their construction, or replace only single out-dated plants3 (cf. Geels/Verhees 2011).
We intend to study the exit decisions in different European countries, in particu-lar Germany, and their effects on the energy policies in France, The Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Vice-versa we want to understand how the non-discontinuation in the latter three countries effects the situation in Germany. Case studies will also look at the effect of the Fukushima catastrophe on national debates and potential de-alignment dynamics.
Exit Italy Exit decisions 1986, 2011; exit date 1990
Spain Exit decision 1994; exit date 2034 Belgium Exit decision 1999; exit date 2025 Germany Exit decisions 2002, 2011; exit date 2022 Switzerland Exit decision 2011; exit date 2034
Japan Exit announcement 2011; exit in the long term
No expansion Sweden Decision by 2009, confirmed 2010
(new power plants only as substitutes for abandoned ones; no more state funding)
Plant manufacturing
cancelled Ireland Austria 1970s 1978, 1997
Philippines 1986
Cuba 1992, 2000
Table 3: International overview of nuclear power plant moratoria
Quite likely, the discontinuation governance in this field can be characterised as hard termination of a high-risk technology, affecting a large infrastructure system with many international linkages. It is also shaped by a competition of different concepts of governance of complex systems: central provision and decentralized consumption of energy, combined with central coordination (as in former times) or decentralized provision and consumption of energy, combined with a flexible real-time coordination of future smart grids (Weyer 2011).
2.3 Worldwide DDT ban4
The insecticidal properties of the synthetic pesticide DDT (dichlorodiphenyltri-chloroethane) were not discovered until 1939, while it was used with great success in the second half of World War II to control malaria and typhus among civilians and troops. After the war, DDT was made available for use as an agricultural insec-ticide, and soon it became a central product in the agricultural socio-technical sys-tem.
In 2004 DDT was banned for agricultural use worldwide under the Stockholm Convention (Maguire/Hardy 2006). The application of the de-registration proce-dure (Dunlap 1981, 1978; Agler 2010; Maguire/Hardy 2009; Maguire 2004) went
3 Cf. http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kernenergie_nach_Ländern [12.07.11].
4 This section is taken from an earlier version of a research proposal, and was co-authored by Peter Stegmaier and Pierre-Benoît Joly.
step-wise in four respects—from single countries to a worldwide band; with for-ward and backfor-ward decisions; differentiating agricultural and vector control as well as home and foreign markets ban.
Today, we take the ban of DDT for granted (different from nuclear energy or combustion engine). But DDT once was a great promise (for instance, to control malaria and typhus) and its ban has been criticized as contributing to the reviving of malaria epidemics which is said to kill over 2 million people each year—though earlier use of DDT in earlier decades may also have contributed by fostering re-sistant strains of insects (Gray/Graham 1997).
The agricultural use of DDT was first banned in few countries the 1970s and 1980s, before others followed (Hungary 1968, Norway and Sweden 1970, Germa-ny and the United States in 1972, United Kingdom only 1984). Agencies charged with protecting human health and the environment in many countries struggled with the ban decision for several years. Despite the ban, agricultural use continues in India, North Korea, and possibly elsewhere. From time to time, even the reversal of DDT ban to fight malaria is urged (Cocks 2010). Vector control use (mosquito control, most often) has not yet been banned, but largely replaced by less persistent alternative insecticides. DDT also continued to be produced, for instance, in the United States for foreign markets until as late as 1985 (ATSDR 2002; Dar-es-Salam Declaration 2009).
Indeed, the process of discontinuation was long and contested and rested on so-cial mobilisation and the framing of DDT use as a public problem. At first sight, the discontinuation governance in this field is more disruptive than in the other three cases (almost total ban) and more globally coordinated. However, the discon-tinuation concerns a single chemical compound (first synthesised in 1874), not the whole chemical family (organochlorines), nor the technical regime of chemical intensive agriculture. The DDT ban may be considered either as a first step toward a broader challenge of the wider technical regime or conversely as a way to rein-force this regime through incremental changes.
2.4 Combustion engine car technologies5
The combustion car regime one of the longest-standing and most robust socio-technical regimes in modern history (Geels 2005; Marletto 2010). For quite some time engineers, managers and politicians, in various ways and partially in advoca-cy coalitions, are planning to discontinue or at least to shrink market for combus-tion-based automotive drive engineering technologies (Callon 1983; Geels 2002; Mom 2004; Schöller 2007; Canzler/Schmidt 2008; Canzler/Kaufmann/Kesselring 2008; Canzler 2010).
Cars with combustion engine have been banned in some cities totally (e.g. Zer-matt/Switzerland since 1966) or partially (Hagen/Germany since 2007), mostly due to ecologic reasons or as means to reduce intra-urban traffic. In many big cities road pricing has been introduced (e.g. Oslo 1990, London 2003), partially accom-panied with special permits for electric vehicles, thus providing incentives to use or even to buy them.
In the last few years many national governments launched major initiatives to promote research on electric vehicles and to develop prototypes (e.g. France 2009,
5 This section is taken from an earlier version of a research proposal, and was co-authored by Peter Stegmaier and Johannes Weyer.
China 2009, Germany 2010, EU 2010). In some countries pilot projects have been launched to test electric vehicles in practical use and to develop the infrastructure needed (e.g. Mercedes-Benz in the city of Ulm, Ford in the city of Cologne).6 France even subsidizes the purchase of electric vehicles and uses public procure-ment as a means to foster the developprocure-ment.7
A number of small and formerly unknown manufacturers (Tesla, Streetscooter and others) have presented fully operational cars, whereas the big German automo-bile manufacturers were lagging behind for quite some time and started delivering electric vehicles only recently. Japanese and even Chinese manufacturers seem to be far ahead of Europe:
France: Peugeot “iOn” and Citroën “C-Zero” by the end of 2010, Renault “Kangoo Z.E.” and “Fluence Z.E.”
by the beginning of 2012;
Germany: Opel “Ampera” by end of 2011, Audi “e-tron series” 2012/2013, BMW “Active E” by 2012,
Volkswagen “UP blue-e-motion” and “Golf blue-e-motion” by 2013; Mercedes Benz stopped its e-mobility in January 2011.
Japan: Toyota “Prius”, the world’s first gasoline-electric hybrid since 1997; Nissan “Leaf” since 2010.8
China: “Beijing BE701 EV” by 2011 and others.
In the near-term future, the market penetration of electric cars “will remain fairly low compared to conventional vehicles. The estimation based on several govern-ment announcegovern-ments, industry capacities and proliferation projects sees more than five million new Electric Vehicles on the road globally until 2015” (Grünig et al. 2011).
The discontinuation strategy in this field can be characterised as soft termina-tion by gradual replacement, triggered among others by trying out new optermina-tions. Since there is no ban on the combustion engine, as a third option of hybridisation comes in, providing a soft transformation without a hard cut. Nevertheless, the Center of Automotive Research (CAR) expects all cars sold in Europe in 2025 will have electric or hybrid engines.9
There is almost no coordination between national policies, but a sharp competi-tion between incumbent manufacturers and new firms, which stem from other business sectors such as electric energy production or are newcomer garage firms or start-ups, respectively. Additionally the balance seems to be shifting within in-dustry (from automotive to energy inin-dustry) and between continents (from “old” Europe to Asia). Given the inertia of the combustion engine regime it is an open question, whether the discontinuation in the field will succeed.
6 Cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_vehicle_network [22.09.11].
7 Cf. http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elektromobilität (22.09.11). The Deutsche Post recently announced to order 20.000 “Streetscooters”, build by a startup firm from RWTH Aachen (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 14.09.11).
8 Cf. www.cargroup.org/pdfs/deployment.pdf [28.07.11]. Data also from car manufacturers’ web sites (cf. www2.peugeot.de/showrooms/index.php?special=showroom-peugeot-ion [28.07.11], www.renault.de/renault-welt/umwelt/renault-ze/renault-twizy-ze-concept [28.07.11],
www.chevrolet.de/chevrolet-erleben/neuigkeiten/2011/neuigkeiten-2011-overview-news/news-details-2011-13.html [28.07.11], www.opel-ampera.com/index.php/ger/home [28.07.11], www.nissan.de/DE/de/inside-nissan/innovation-and-technology/ev-range.html [28.07.11]), online journalistic sources (www.autobild.de/artikel/peugeot-ion-elektroauto-im-alltagstest-1593731.html [28.07.11], www.autobild.de/marken-modelle/citroen/c-zero [28.07.11], www.welt.de/motor/article13369415/Audi-baut-elektrisches-Grossmaul-R8-e-tron.html [28.07.11], www.autozeitung.de/auto-news/bmw-project-i-bmw-elektroauto-kommt-als-viersitzer-mit-karbonkarosserie [28.07.11], www.welt.de/motor/iaa/article4530200/VW-bringt-2013-das-Elektroauto-E-Up-auf-den-Markt.html [28.07.11]) and an online encyclopaedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_car [28.07.11]).
3 The two layers and the many patterns of discontinuation as governance problem
The above sketched preliminary analyses draw four different pictures of discontin-uation governances, which need to be further elaborated and rendered more pre-cisely (see figure 5).
The studied discontinuation governances have quite different characteristics. Some apply only to one case (e.g., ‘partial replacement’ to the combustion car en-gine in Germany and other countries; in Sweden it has been decided to built also nuclear power plants only in order to replace out-dated ones, but no additional new ones); or to a few (for instance, the production of very specific light bulbs has been ceased in all countries, whereas only the usage, but not the production of DDT has been stopped). ‘Aftercare’ means the governance has not only the problem of fad-ing out the system, but also that of deconstructfad-ing the system and managfad-ing the waste after the last atomic power plant will have been taken from the grid. Perhaps further analyses will show that the same might apply for DDT.
Guiding
problems Operationalisation problems Incandescent light bulb NL Nuclear energy D DDT NL Combustion car engine D
Exiting Abandonment x x Construction stop x x Partial replacement x Aftercare x Process dynamics Incremental steps x x x x Fw./bw. decisions x x x Pioneering (x) x - (D), x (F) Transnat. coordination x x x Policy instru-ments Ban x x
Pricing, permits - (D), (x UK)
Research x x Purchase subsidies - (D), x (F) Alternative offers x x x x Scope Usage (x) x x x Home/foreign markets x x x Official/priv. ending x x
Nat./supranat. gov. level x
Legitima-tion Specific regulations Justification x ? x ? x ? ?
Table 4: Preliminary patterns of discontinuation governance characteristics
If we look at the process dynamics we find in all cases incremental steps toward ending a system of technology, in the case of nuclear energy and ILBs in combina-tion with full exit decisions. Often forward/backward decision-making characteris-es the challenge put on a technology and system, in the case of nuclear energy in Germany the binding decisions have been revised several times within a decade. Germany, even though not being the first country in Europe to stop nuclear power (Italy, Spain, Belgium), could still have a pioneering role as the largest economy in Europe and worldwide to stop this technology along the entire (material, perhaps not so much the knowledge) infrastructure. Quite normal is a certain degree of transnational (at least European, or worldwide) coordination on technology exits, while nuclear energy has been abandoned in individual countries without any noteworthy coordination among the protagonists. It cannot be excluded that “through the alignment of visions and activities of different groups” (Geels/Schot 2007: 402) more coordination along informal, unintended or/and newly developed channels may emerge. The same is true for the quite heterogeneous patterns of using (positive and negative) sanctions and making differences between usages and markets to which the stops are applied.
Through a more systematic and deeper comparison of the cases, on the level of policy-maker and stakeholder discourses, we expect to be able to explain, both single constellations and deviations and the larger picture and typical governance patterns.
4. Discontinuation and Transition
As set out above, discontinuation can be interpreted as one kind of regime change. In the light of the technological substitution pathway described by Geels & Schot (2007: 410) discontinuation can be thought of as the case when a technology drops off the present sociotechnical regime as the result of a specific moment of shock in the broader political-cultural landscape.
This may indeed hold true for the abandonment of nuclear energy right after the 1986 Chernobyl and 2011 Fukushima-Daiichi disasters. The shock hypothesis does, however, obviously not apply to the ILB, DDT, and combustion car engine phase-outs. Rather it seems that more diffuse, less abrupt changes in the landscape and the offer of alternative technologies from niches (like energy-saving lamps and related technologies, less dangerous pesticides, and alternative car engine technol-ogies) can be associated with boosting discontinuation in these areas, in combina-tion with policies and political initiatives pertinent for changes.
Another aspect to be studied further is the fact that in some of the cases possibly no immediate technological alternatives are available, e.g. in the case of nuclear energy: while power plants in theory may be substituted by all kinds of non-nuclear energy generating systems, the grid infrastructure in Germany, in particular, is not yet ready to distribute large amounts of renewable energy across the country. The size, shape, and realisation of an appropriate grid is still furiously disputed among ministries (controlled by members of different parties) and local citizens’ initia-tives are taking a stand against wind turbines and transmission lines. Here, the po-litically intended destabilisation of the regime seems to lead into a vacuum, which cannot immediately be filled by the “emergence of multiple embryonic niche-innovations” (Geels/Schot 2007: 408) as perhaps in the other three cases. The de-alignment is thus sometimes decoupled from re-de-alignment (as the stabilisation of new actor networks, technologies and systems, regimes and policies), substitution and reconfiguration delays and the transformation romps around in a rather incon-sistent state.
Moreover, it remains to be seen how far the transition pathway (Elzen/Geels/Green 2004; Markard et al. 2012) and destabilisation (Turn-heim/Geels 2012) perspectives of existing regime change theory can be used, adapted, or substituted.
5. Conclusion and outlook: Discontinuation governance as strategic challenge
The presented research approach towards the governance of the discontinuation of socio-technical systems is, as has been emphasised in this paper repeatedly, still under construction. Yet, with a serious note of caution, we can state that (1) it takes place in a highly complex context—technically as well as socially—and (2) in most cases discontinuation has to cope with quite some resistance to dedicated, forceful change; not surprisingly, in spite of some strong political will, institutional inertia and vested interests are prevalent. Discontinuation, if successful, has to manage the unbundling of forces, the dismantling of existing structures in order to
overcome inertia of current systems and networks.
Furthermore, the spill-over effects of discontinuation efforts between national economies, sectors and regions come also into focus. National decisions on the termination of a specific technology influence the context of decision-making of other countries, e.g. by providing new arguments or new models of regulatory measures in favour of termination. Also, the progressive availability of new, alter-native technology, such as electric vehicles, as well as successful pilot projects with renewable energies are major factors affecting national and international dis-courses about discontinuation.
At a later stage, this project will further develop conceptual offers around the notion of ‘policy termination’, which can be defined as the discontinuation of a particular way of solving a policy problem. In case of discontinuation of socio-technical systems the termination of a (mostly global) technological regime can be initiated at different levels of policy-making: (1) global or transnational; (2) na-tional; (3) regional or local. Termination may be a coordinated effort or a trouble-some process, shaped by the interplay, interferences or even conflicts between different actors at different levels.
Jim Utterback (2003: 84) sees such continuity and discontinuity following pre-dictable patterns. It is difficult to generalise this to the four cases discussed above, for nobody was, so far, really able to predict the concrete patterns of discontinua-tion in terms of point or phase in time, necessary or sufficient condidiscontinua-tions, emerging or set in motion intentionally with respect to nuclear energy, incandescent light bulb technology, combustion car engines, or DDT. Rather, as the case of nuclear energy teaches a once achieved termination may sooner or later be revoked and even recanted—only to be itself taken back after some time. It is utterly hard to predict how many withdrawals from withdrawals and continuations will occur until a socio-technical system (and perhaps also its regime) is all over and past.
With our focus on the purposeful discontinuation we want to emphasise the need to include in the reflection on how to stimulate innovation also a better under-standing of how to foster termination.
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7. The authors
Having first introduced the idea of ‘discontinuation governance’, Peter Stegmaier further elaborates this concept together with Stefan Kuhlmann, and Vincent Visser recently began a master thesis project as pilot on the Dutch incandescent light bulb governance.
Dr Peter Stegmaier Assistant Professor
Department of Science, Technolo-gy, and Policy Studies (STePS) Institute for Innovation and Gov-ernance Studies (IGS); School of Management and Governance (SMG)
University of Twente
E-mail: p.stegmaier@utwente.nl
Dr Stefan Kuhlmann Professor Foundations of Science, Technology and Society Director of Department of Sci-ence, Technology, and Policy Studies (STePS)
Institute for Innovation and Gov-ernance Studies (IGS); School of Management and Governance (SMG)
University of Twente
E-mail: s.kuhlmann@utwente.nl
Vincent R. Visser MSc Holds a master in Philosophy of Science, Technology and Society and is currently completing a second master in Public Admin-istration at the University of Twente
E-mail:
