Towards Sustainable and Responsible Regional Innovation Policy—the Case of Tampere Region

Abstract

The sustainability of regional development largely depends on the balance between social, economic and environmental processes. This paper presents the Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) methodology as a regional policy tool that facilitates democratization of research and innovation processes and involves the public in bringing direction and more versatile insights into processes. In other words, among other things, it is supposed to help solve problems related to the pressing economic, social and environmental challenges of our time. This chapter uses data gathered from a development project conducted in Tampere region, Finland, to discuss benefits, challenges and good practices related to adopting the RRI methodology. The region has approximately 35 years of history with various innovation policies, from science parks and cluster policy to platform policy aimed at forming a sustainable and responsible innovation ecosystem. Sources of data include desk research, regional maturity mapping and an interactive workshop. The results show that maturity mapping, despite the challenges that arise, is useful for indicating areas of intervention to strengthen the RRI in regional innovation policy. As a part of a regional innovation policy strategy, Open Innovation Platforms can be a useful tool for implementing certain aspects of RRI in regional policy.