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The purposeful governance of technology discontinuation: an explorative study on the discontinuation of the incandescent light bulb in the EU

Visser, Vincent Ruben (2012) The purposeful governance of technology discontinuation: an explorative study on the discontinuation of the incandescent light bulb in the EU.

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Abstract:	Innovation and technological progress are often associated with the introduction and use of new and emerging technologies. The parallel process of technology discontinuation as a counterforce of innovation is often neglected in literature. In this thesis, the discontinuation of technology is approached as a distinctive part of technological change and innovation. The focus of this thesis is on technology discontinuation as a dedicated way to stimulate innova-tion. The goal is to conduct an explorative study to contribute to a better understanding of the way the discontinuation policies are used in a purposeful way to govern innovation. A recent example of a discontinuation policy is the phasing-out of the incandescent light bulb (ILB) in the EU. In 2009, an EU regulation was implemented for the gradual discontinuation of ILBs and other inefficient domestic lighting. This discontinuation policy is used as case-study to do an explorative inquiry. This explorative study did a qualitative inquiry on the policy-making process of this policy on the supranational and the Dutch national level. The analysis exam-ined the meanings that were attributed by the involved actors during these policy-making processes the governance of technology discontinuation. This governance perspective was derived from the ‘governance of problems’ approach of Hoppe (2010). This problem-oriented approach was used to provide an insight in the discontinuation problems that were identified by the involved actors and the way these problems were aimed to be governed. Finally, these findings were used to define a first conceptualization of the discontinuation problem-types, and the attributed governance dimensions to solve these discontinuation problems.
Item Type:	Essay (Master)
Faculty:	BMS: Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences
Subject:	88 social and public administration
Programme:	Public Administration MSc (60020)
Link to this item:	https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/61736
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