Impact

Economic impact (4)
Impact (721)
Impact analysis (17)
Impact assessment (106)
Long-term impact (13)
Negative impact (12)
Positive impact (10)
Possible impact (17)
Potential impact (25)
Significant impact (6)

Synopsis: Impact: Impact:

but considering the dnew perspectivet of the impact of new capabilities that are provided by the Information technologies and the convergence of information and molecular technologies.

and does have an impact on decision-making, and that a main criterion of effectiveness is that it should lead to a reconsideration

The litmus test is the impact on decision-making, either in the shortteer or the long-term.

In order to have an impact on decision-making, it is necessary to create an explicit link between foresighting and decision-making.

if foresight is to have a real impact. In this paper we suggest an approach to forward-looking decision support that addresses the aforementioned shortcomings of conventional foresight.

In many other cases, the impact chains are at least difficult to trace, because the influence on participants'mindsets and decisions is hard to observe,

thus shows a number of shortcomings with respect to its impact on decision-making that can be summarised by the following three points:

what kind of impact they will have. Embedded systems, to take an example from the information and telecommunication technologies, are expected to have a very positive impact within an optimistic information society scenario.

The matter is complicated further by the fact that policy options can have an impact at different levels.

Moreover, the impact and effectiveness of policies depend on their time of implementation. 2. 2. 3. Portfolios of options We have used so far the term package to catch the need to combine a number of elementary options to achieve a robust,

Niche Management 25 and Transition Management 26.14 FANTASIE Forecasting and Assessment of New Transport Technologies and Systems and their Impact on the Environment,

see Eriksson and Stenström 33.16 ICTRANS The Impact of ICT on Transport, a project funded by the DG JRC-IPTS and conducted by the ESTO network in 2002/2003 34.17 For the Nordic Hydrogen Energy Foresight,

to the identification of new socio-technical options, to the growing knowledge and understanding of their impacts, to the design of new types of policy options and to their integration into portfolios.

the impact of guiding policy strategies should not be underestiimate because in particular public policy strategies fulfill an orienting function for many private actors as well,

Bridges Between Science, Society and Policy Technology assessment Methods and Impacts, Springer, Berlin, 2004.9 S. Joss, S. Belluci (Eds.

, D. Banister, K. Dreborg, E. A. Eriksson, D. Stead, K. M. Weber, Impact of ICT on transport (ICTRANS), Research report, IPTS/ESTO, Sevilla

Researchers were asked also to justify the issue by describing expected results and impacts (e g.,, enhancement of competitiveness),

The overview of methodologies in Section 2 starts with a list of possible methodologies which are also relevant for assessing the impact of public R&d policies.

we start with an evaluation matrix (Table 1) presenting methodologies to assess the impacts of different policy instruments.

whose data permits the assessment of the future needs for and impacts of regulations and standards.

Recently, Swann 18 used this information to assess the impact of British standards for the innovation activities of British companies. 504 K. Blind/Technological forecasting & Social Change 75 (2008) 496 516

the impacts of standards on central issues and assets of service companies have also been asked for

and regulations and their possible future impacts is rather difficult even for experts, because standards and regulations contain technical,

In the first German Delphi survey, the field communication was characterised by the most negative values regarding the impact of the regulatory framework3 because of the former monopolistic structures in the telecommunication markets and the massive public intervention in the radio

There are obvious different impacts of governmental regulations and standardisation as an important form of self regulation with the former type being more effective for achieving health, safety and environmental aspects,

but also for the ex ante assessment of the impacts of regulations standards. Furthermore, the small-scale Delphi survey focusing on the future demand for standards in the ICT area confirmed the general applicability of this approach,

Foresight methodologies can also be used to assess ex ante the impacts of just released, but even regulations and standards not yet existing.

For each scenario, the respective relevance and impacts of the selected regulation have to be determined.

and impacts Impossibility to detect major technological breakthroughs and their regulatory requirements Semiquantiitativ In case of conflicting interests, missing-consensus about priorities Identification of experts Uncertainty increases with complexity of the context (technology, markets

19 G. Fahrenkrog, W. Polt, J. Rojo, A. Tübke, K. Zinöcker, RTD Evaluation Toolbox Assessing the Socioeconomic Impact of RTD-Policies, Seville:

, Research policy, vol. 31 (7), 2002, pp. 1141 1161.27 K. Koch, M. Rafiquzzaman, S. Rao, The Impact of Regulatory policies on Innovation:

A very concrete impact on strategy articulation comes from one of the participants a young start-up company initiated in February 2006 with intentions to be the systems integrator of a lab-on-a-chip device focused on a specific application in the medical sector.

Interpreting foresight process impacts: Steps towards the development of a framework conceptualising the dynamics of‘foresight systems'Effie Amanatidou a,,

accepted 1 february 2008 Abstract Foresight programmes are evaluated usually in terms of the achievement of initial objectives and the scale and nature of direct, anticipated impacts,

notwithstanding the difficulty of measuring such impacts. However, indirect and/or unanticipated impacts that fall outside the scope of specific programme goals and objectives have also been reported.

These are mainly impacts associated with the foresight process itself, i e. with the way in which foresight exercises are designed and implemented.

These impacts typically fall in areas such as: Knowledge creation, diffusion and absorption; Social capital and networking; The evolution of strategies to cope with

'The diversity of the above areas suggests that foresight process impacts should be interpreted through the lenses of epistemology, sociology, political science, management science and organisational theory.

In parallel, given that developments in the above spheres are associated strongly with the evolution of‘participatory knowledge societies',this paper presents an interpretation of foresight process impacts within a conceptual framework that attempts to characterise such societies.

'This framework should be capable of explaining the interdependencies and inter-relationships between system elements such as actors, processes, inputs, outputs and impacts,

Impacts assessment; Logic model; Networking; Actors'alignment 1. Introduction The present article presents results to date2 from research leading towards the production of a Phd thesis entitled Assessing the contribution of Foresight to a more participatory knowledge society.

The required inputs and outputs associated with different impacts then need to be mapped. The role of stakeholders/actors, processes and objectives also have to be studied

if these impacts are to be attained intentionally. Furthermore the foresight system's interaction with the wider environment has to be studied

which focused on the reported impacts of foresight exercises both intended and unintended. The available literature7 on foresight impacts notes that it is mainly the foresight process impacts that contribute to certain characteristics of the emerging‘knowledge society'.

'These impacts, however, are not usually the direct or intended ones. The networking effects of foresight programmes enhance collaboration

Foresight can have an impact on the ways in which policy-making deals with uncertainty and lack of knowledge by promoting more participatory governance.

K. Guy/Technological forecasting & Social Change 75 (2008) 539 557 This can be enriched by taking further sub-objectives and related impacts into account,

Table 1 groups together many of the reported objectives and impacts associated with foresight exercises under the headings of‘intermediate'and‘lower level'goals. 5. Approach for developing an impact assessment framework It is possible

to develop an impact assessment framework based on a‘logic model'approach which links the generic goal of a participatory knowledge society with the reported impacts of framework exercises.

and expected impacts achieved Instead, it is more relevant to ask whether particular impacts in line with the generic Table 1 Grouping of foresight reported objectives and impacts a under‘intermediate'and‘lower level'goals Reported foresight programme objectives Reported

impacts of foresight exercises Intermediate goals: IP: Creating informed publics Interest from the general public DU:

Dealing with uncertainty Facilitate better understanding of potential disruptive change Gain insights into complex interactions and emerging drivers of change Detect

inputs and principles/criteria governing their relationship with outputs and impacts). In this way, it should be possible to identify the Fig. 3. a:

in order to achieve impacts in line with the generic goals, along with the criteria to be used when assessing foresight exercises.

focusing first on impacts before moving‘outwards'(or‘backwards')towards the basic elements of the foresight system.

in order to identify the factors enhancing specific foresight impacts. A review of the available literature on factors affecting the results

and impacts of foresight programmes11 identified four main groups of factors: Institutional structures and settings (including the configuration of actors

and institutions and communication between them) Governance and policy-making culture (including levels of commitment) Sociocultural factors in relation to public participation and the perceived utility and eventual impacts of foresight exercises The nature of innovation processes and the‘innovation system'in

The evaluation of the latest UK Foresight programme 5 sheds light on several direct and indirect impacts and highlighted several factors that affected the overall success of the UK foresight exercise.

Impacts were grouped 11 See for example 2, 3, 8, 15 17. It should also be noted that the literature on technology assessment programmes is also relevant to the case of foresight programmes.

In terms of immediate impacts, the areas under study benefited from increased recognition, while new combinations of experts and stakeholders were brought also together.

Intermediate impacts included the development of visions of the future; recommendations and options for action;

In terms of ultimate impacts, the exercise influenced research agendas in the science base and in industry and influenced the shape and course of government policy.

The evaluation of the second round of the Swedish Technology foresight initiative 6 found that indirect effects on foresight capabilities were marked more than the anticipated impacts of foresight results on policy-making.

Increased foresightedness and networking were noted as particularly important impacts. In terms of factors affecting the success of the initiative

The raised awareness of the need for consensus-building approaches in long-term vision-setting exercises in order to ensure the sustainability of resultant polices was acknowledged as another unforeseen impact of the exercise.

and b. This model is depicted in Fig. 5. 8. Impact area specificity: networks and actor alignment Given the peculiar nature of the task at hand, namely the search for diverse impacts (from changes in social capital to more informed publics and better networking) that may

or may not have been targeted in the first place, a finer level of analysis is required. Given the diverse nature of the impacts in question, it is wise to study each of these impact categories separately,

attempting to develop the impact assessment framework within each distinct category. For the purpose of the present article, the area of networking

in order to define the degree to which foresight exercises can achieve impacts in networking and actors'alignment.

The examination of foresight process impacts within a conceptual framework characterising participatory‘knowledge societies'provides indications that foresight can contribute to the emergence of such societies in terms of:

The development of a common impact assessment model requires a clear understanding of the way foresight influences specific impact areas.

thus capable of explaining the interdependencies and interrelatiionship between foresight system elements such as actors, processes, inputs, outputs and impacts,

if foresight exercises are to result in impacts in line with the evolution of participatory‘knowledge societies'.'It also helps in the identification of external factors affecting the success of the foresight system as a whole.

given the diverse nature of the impact areas in question, a finer level of analysis needs to be applied to the different areas of the impact assessment framework.

It is wise to study each of these impact areas separately in order to identify case-specific internal criteria and external factors.

and factors specific to particular impact areas that are not that visible when studying foresight impacts as a whole.

Further work in this area will study other impact areas from the perspective of relevant theories

when targeting such impacts. This will be done in parallel with the continued study of other foresight exercises and a series of interviews with foresight specialists to complete the development of the model describing the dynamics of foresight exercises in different contexts.

An Evaluation of the Second Round of Swedish Technology foresight, Teknisk Framsyn, 2002 2004,2005. 7 J. Cassingena Harper, L. Georghiou, The targeted and unforeseen impacts of foresight on innovation policy:

assessing rationale, process and impact, Technological forecasting and Social Change 73 (7)( 2006) 761 777.9 A. Havas, Context, focus and coherence of foresight programmes, Lessons from the Czech republic and Hungary, Paper

tools to inform debates, dialogues and deliberations, Technikfolgenabschatzung, Theorie und Praxis 2 (14)( 2005) 74 79.14 R. Barre, M. Keenan, FTA Evaluation, Impact and Learning,

and thus neither the potential changes in these broader settings, nor their impacts on higher education can be explored;(

Yet, the likely impacts of potential changes in these broader systems are analysed not at all in the reviewed FTA ACTIVITIES.

the outputs (outcomes, impacts) of research efforts by universities. Only the first aspect is treated in some detail below.

slow down or divert their impacts, or create new drivers for change by introducing far-reaching and resolute goals for research.

is also likely to have an impact on devising evaluation criteria and methods. See Section 4. 1 on different possible rationales for ERIA.

Thus, their impacts should be discussed separately. As for legitimisation and validation of knowledge largely unchanged universities would push hard to maintain their centuries-old monopoly to validate knowledge;

and evaluation of the efficiency and impacts of their activities would be perceived as a burden.

(i e. somewhat neglecting societal issues) 34 The likely impacts of further drivers, not directly related to research activities of universities, are discussed in 21.577 A. Havas/Technological forecasting & Social Change 75 (2008) 558 582 touch with reality.

national and regional levels) could be to‘simulate'the likely impacts of their decisions, by changing the various‘parameters',e g. the overall rationale of the EU or national policies (i e.‘

e g. exploring the impacts of given polices on the mobility of researchers and students inside the EU or globally.

i) the likely impacts of potential changes in the broader socioeconomic systems, in which universities operate,

Future-oriented technology analysis Impacts and implications for policy and decision making The unfolding acceleration of global innovation is expected to become the hallmark of the first half of the 21st century.

Impacts and implications for policy and decision making 1, enabled FTA EXPERTS, practitioners, and policy and decision makers to share their ideas

understanding use, impacts and the role of institutional context factors, the effectiveness of scenario planning in public policy-making.

Impacts and implications for policy and decision making The 2008 FTA International Seville Conference. Online source:

impact on policy and decision making The 2006 FTA INTERNATIONAL SEVILLE SEMINAR, Technol. Forecast. Soc. Change 75 (4)( 2006) 457 582.

Basically they explore the ranges of consequences, outcomes and impacts of strategic decisions and corresponding actions.

if foresight is to have a real impact. We take this proposition as a strong invitation to explicitly specify the organizational and procedural interfaces between the exploratory phase in a strategic planning process

Secondly, the core team systematically evaluates the impacts of these context conditions on the infrastructure system relative to an encompassing list of performance goals.

this can only occur at the expense of a third party (e g. by entailing substantial environmental impacts).

and later on to minimize impacts on aquatic ecosystems. Furthermore, the infrastructure as a public service had to guarantee equal access and affordable tariffs to all citizens.

the downturn scenario showed an increase of the environmental impacts of untreated wastewater overflows during heavy rain events.

Environmental impact ranked only second in their priorities. In contrast, the industry's stakeholders favor besides low tariffs, additionally low levels of bureaucracy as well as voice and participation in the associations decision board. 4. 4. Exploring the trade-off landscape The virtual future stakeholder groups

the increasingly complex world creates new types of risks that shouldn't be bypassed with the examination of future opportunities, creation of shared visions and assessment of desired impacts.

as well as the examination of the technology, its impacts and related policy, are all important in this respect.

and whether it has impacts or side-effects. It is also crucial to study what the future might be,

when analysing new technologies and the impacts of their market introduction. In this way TA can also play a more significant role in pushing the development in a useful or wanted direction. 2. 2 Risk assessment methodologies in industrial safety As noted in the previous Section 2. 1,

When the contribution of FTA is emphasized on revealing technological changes and their impacts in the future, the contribution from other areas is needed also.

Besides technological development decision-makers need all-inclusive knowledge of future developments of society, economy and impacts of science and technology.

The article presents the background, methodology and results of technology barometer, discusses its impacts on national discussion,

albeit the most important data is related to outcomes and impacts of inputs, like embedding of ICT into private

which have an impact on research and on societal development in general. The third part examines innovative societies,

and related indicators are the level of investment, entrepreneurial activity and the impact of technology development on the quality of life.

Section 4. 1 draws conclusions of the experiences and observable impacts of technology barometer as an instrument supporting innovation policy-making

and have an impact on strategic policy-making all the way up to the highest levels in the decision-making processes.

and impacts of globalization on enterprise R&d, innovation systems and innovation policies. He holds A m. Sc. in economics from Helsinki University.

The process had impacts along the six functions of Foresight for policy-making that recently emerged in the Foresight debate (informing policy,

Therefore, this paper focuses on expected impacts and the conceptual design. We analyse the expected impacts along the five functions of Foresight for policy-making that recently emerged in the Foresight debate 1

18.4. Expected output and impact of the process What are expected the outputs and impacts of the BMBF Foresight process?

and how does expected the impact relate to these conceptual developments? Direct outputs in the sense of deliverables were three reports to BMBF as well as a scientific report at the end of the whole process.

and there are many more impacts and outputs in-between. One impact is by informing BMBF about things to come.

The interesting objective here is to achieve an overview in more detail all the departments (Fachreferate) are informed even better in their specific areas.

In these cases, the expected impact of the process will be an addition to the research agenda,

Another impact is expected in the first definition of new strategic partnerships. Strategic partnerships (objective no. 3) are defined very broadly

Therefore, every foresight exercise has an impact on the system the foresight is performed in, in this case the BMBF and the policy as well as the innovation system.

In the BMBF Foresight process, an impact is expected on the interdisciplinary or interdepartmental collaboration concerning new

But it is definitely too early in the process to exhaustively evaluate the impacts according to these five dimensions.

a particular challenge is to ensure impact beyond the general elections: in 2009, general elections will be held in Germany.

there is already an impact on some of the ministerial departments. Nevertheless, the question remains, how this kind of impact can be demonstrated, traced and measured.

References 1 Forlearn, http://forlearn. jrc. ec. europa. eu/guide/1 why-foresight/functions. htm, access:

Understanding use, impacts and the role of institutional context factors Axel Volkery, Teresa Ribeiro European Environment Agency, Strategic Futures Group, Kongens Nytorv 6, DK 1050

less attention has been paid to studying the use, impacts and effectiveness of scenario planning in public policy-making. This article combines preliminary findings from a review of evaluative scenario literature with workshop discussions among scenario practitioners, using environmental relevant policies as a case study. Subject to the nascent evaluative scenario literature

Their use and impacts in the realm of public policy is treated, however, often perfunctorily. Environmental policy-making is a good example.

a systematic analysis of its use, impacts and effectiveness in environmental policy-making is still missing. This article aims to contribute to this discussion through a review of

Which impacts can be observed? 2. Which lessons can be drawn from current practices? How can those in charge of setting up a scenario planning exercise in public policy effectively proceed?

and weaknesses of several different exercises and assessments of the impacts scenario planning approaches can have on decision-making processes Fig. 1. Forms of scenario-based decision support. 1200 A. Volkery, T. Ribeiro/Technological forecasting

when using scenario planning. 3. Synthesizing the available evaluative scenario literature 3. 1. Types of evaluative scenario studies The literature attempting to assess the impacts of scenarios employs different types of evaluative methods.

some reporting specific laboratory tests of the impact on decisions and some referring to observations of decision processes within organisations 19 21.

since impacts might take a long time to become evident or are difficult to single out from the complexity of influence factors. 3. 2. Impacts of scenario planning The few studies that attempt to evaluate the effectiveness of scenarios find them useful 29,30.

We only identified one empirical study that concretely assesses the effects of scenario use on organisational performance:

and could have a decisive impact on the topic at hand) and plot them on two axes to structure the subsequent development of four diverging scenario stories.

The main impacts of scenarios often result more from the process of developing them rather than from any published product describing the scenarios that were created.

Workshop participants also acknowledged the general difficulties of evaluating impacts of scenario planning. However, there was a common agreement among workshop participants that the potential of scenario planning is currently underutilized in dayttoday policy-making.

when it comes to understanding the impacts of scenario planning on overall organisational performance. The literature does not report too many differences between public and private sector applications.

Having an impact on the design and choice of policies remains a litmus test for the relevance of scenario planning.

It is not remarkable to diagnose a limited impact on political decision-making when the governance conditions for scenario planning are developed not rightfully.

Forthcoming efforts should include conducting empirical studies of the impacts of scenarios on organisational performance and their key drivers;

and process of scenario creation affects their impacts. If and how probabilistic information should be used with scenario planning in public policy would be another concern.

In addition, the question of a potential correlation between scenario approaches and impacts and effectiveness of use require further evaluative efforts.

ethical and social impacts of nanosciences,-technologies, and-artifacts. The paper suggests that Inclusive foresight, reinforced with the principles of CSH, can be of use in the nano-field providing wider stakeholder representation during the research and development processes.

The future of nanotechnologies and their impacts on society require widespread participation in elucidating their acceptability in society.

but that this landscape is shaped actively in response to anticipations on development and impact of the novelties.

and their internalisation 3. 1. A project is initiated In Autumn 2007 (as still the case 2 years on) there was an increasing emphasis on societal impact and embedment of nanotechnology applications.

and impact on unforeseen or sub-optimal trajectories of socio-technical developments. This reflexivity allows for a trying out of different possible paths,

http://www. tandfonline. com/loi/ctas20 Impacts and implications of futureorieente technology analysis for policy and decision making Ozcan Saritas, Cristiano Cagnin, Attila Havas & Ian Miles

Ozcan Saritas, Cristiano Cagnin, Attila Havas & Ian Miles (2009) Impacts and implications of future-oriented technology analysis for policy and decision making, Technology analysis & Strategic management, 21:8, 915-916, DOI:

8 november 2009,915 916 EDITORIAL Impacts and implications of future-oriented technology analysis for policy and decision making*Most of the papers in this special issue were presented at the Third International Seville Conference on Future-oriented technology analysis (FTA) that took place in October 2008.

Also that a more formal use of foresight elements could improve the legitimacy and impact of the strategic considerations of research councils and research programmes.

and immediate impacts of a recently completed two-year national technology foresight exercise conducted in Luxembourg. The paper covers the evolution of the foresight exercise over its two-year life span,

Weber et al. discusses the trade-offs between policy impacts of FTA with the experience gained from the innovation policy foresight

The paper gives a comprehensive review of the foresight and the assessment of its impacts on policy.

Ozcan Saritas, Cristiano Cagnin, Attila Havas and Ian Miles Note 1. Reflecting the 2008 FTA Conference emphasis on impacts and implications of FTA for policy and decision making

We also argue that a more formal use of foresight elements might improve the legitimacy and impact of the strategic considerations of research councils and research programmes.

Foresight and similar future-oriented technology analysis methodds such as trend extrapolation, scenarios, Delphi analysis, focus groups, cross-impact analyses and roadmapping, can be found in traditional business-school

but quite a few also included thoughts on education and on the potential industrial and societal Downloaded by University of Bucharest at 05:09 03 december 2014 Foresight and strategy in national research councils and research programmes 925 impacts of the suggested research.

but implementation and impact must be measured in other ways. Second, as illustrated in our case studies,

assessing rationale, process and impact. Technological forecasting and Social Change 73: 761 77. Downloaded by University of Bucharest at 05:09 03 december 2014 932 P. D. Andersen and M. Borup Gibbons, M.,C. Limoges, H. Nowotny, S. Schwartzman, P. Scott,

bmanchester Institute of Innovation research (PREST), University of Manchester, M13 9pl, UK This paper sets out to review the conduct and immediate impacts of a two-year national technollog foresight exercise

Section 6 considers the impacts of the foresight exercise, while a final section draws some summary conclusions and highlights lessons for future foresight practice. 2. STI Policy in Luxembourg Before the 1980s,

to manage expectations of (policy) impacts; to identify and mobilise champions to drive the process forward

A word on impacts of foresight: first, there may be impacts from the process alone, which means they can conceivably appear before an exercise produces its findings;

second, distinction needs to be made between foresight outputs and impacts and it should be acknowledged that there is rarely a direct cause effect link between the two;

third, just as impacts might appear before the generation of final results, they also often appear a long time after the exercise has been completed

and the questionable ownership by the relevant stakeholders. 6. 2. Impact on FNR One of the main objectives of the Foresight was to inform new FNR programmes

developing a new clearly defined strategy in order to sharpen its impact on the Luxembourg research landscape.

thus familiarising the wider public with the stakeholders as well as with the role of science in a modern society. 6. 3. Impacts on the research community As mentioned in the previous section,

and technology priority setting in a small country 947 6. 4. Impacts on the private sector It is unclear

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